Subj : MS-DOS Emulation -use To : Ky Moffet From : Barry Martin Date : Sat Aug 01 2020 10:11:00 Hi Ky! > KM> If I had to bet, I'd be looking at the FILES= statement in > KM> CONFIG.SYS -- due to some cranks left over from the MSDOS4.x era, > KM> some programs, and therefore Win3.1x itself, needed them set to > KM> some ridiculously high number. > That would almost make sense: here it seemed as if a buffer/holding area > of some sort was being overloaded/overfilled as always worked for a > little while and then stopped. The amount of time varied: sometimes KM> When it ran out of file handles, probably. Windows could scrape KM> by on 20 (IIRC) but as soon as you run something else... KM> kablooie. Probably -- not questioning, just not recalling as that was a long time ago, and haven't fiddled with this Windows XP (on the virtual machine) in I don't know how long -- I think it's even a clone of what was on the old computer. ...Yup: 2008 (!) Well, c:\windows\system32\config.nt has Files=40. (And I've switched topic from ~WFWG to XP.) > almost immediately to a few minutes. Would be nice to be able to go > back and check. KM> Time machine needs rebooting? :D Might be abad time to find the motherboard battery is dead and we're at the computer epoch date! > KM> all was well. (And Windows never, ever crashed again, nor even > KM> misbehaved in any noteworthy way. Seven years without a single > KM> crash!) > Seven days is considered a long time!! KM> Not in MY house! It's all due to the typewriter hung onthe fence!! > KM> You may note a common theme here... the problem was that DOS4.x > KM> didn't close files properly on disk, and apparently these > KM> programs compensated, which was disagreeable to other DOS > KM> versions (and thereby caused the very files-left-open problem it > KM> was supposed to prevent). > One fix for a problem creates a problem which needs to be fixed KM> Haha, so it goes! Job security for the programmers! Fix on problem, create another, but not so it looks like incompetence! > elsewhere. Which sort of makes points for having a base operating > system and separate applications/utilites as opposed to having those > applications and utilities built into the OS. Seems like separate and > independent would be easier to correct without screwing up something > else. (Still a possibilty, just less so.) KM> Or why I'm a big fan of portable apps, and why we have Flatpak KM> and AppImage for linux (given DLL Hell has NOTHING on Dependency KM> Hell). I can sort of see both sides: mainly why re-invent the wheel so use something already working (guess called a 'dependency'), but of course that has backfired with the utility no longer working when the other utility was altered. (Thinking in particular of GET and STRINGS.) > KM> Yeah, I wound up using it because the person who got me started > KM> on this stuff was a DRDOS enthusiast, but fact was it wasn't > Something like when I got started with Linux. The utility I was using > at the time for recording TV was MythDora, which is based on Fedora. > ..Hmm: so why did I go Ubuntu instead of Fedora?? KM> There's no excuse for Ubuntu. Maybe the Desktop background caught my eye: a Felt Fedora - yawn! An Energetic Ermine -- hmm! ...Probably more MythDora died (no longer supported) and Mythbuntu was the replacement. (I do recall looking at other options but they appeared to be too complex, especially for the other person here.) Mythbuntu was built on Ubuntu and so if seems halfway logical to get more into Ubuntu. KM> Seriously, it makes Win10 seem agreeable... I'm thinking it's just a personality conflict: no real problems here; have been some minor issues but IMO they got resolved quickly. Now maybe when looking at a more in-depth and technical mindset.... > KM> retired, I never messed with it again., Nowadays when I use DOS, > KM> by preference it's MSDOS7 from Win98 (with the 8.0 mouse driver). > I'll admit to not really needing to return to the Old Stuff, mainly > because nothing I'm using needs it, though some does use NonCurrent KM> Yeah, I'm down to just a couple things that need Old Stuff, and KM> some year I'll find me a Pascal programmer and get the 16bit DOS KM> pedigree program converted to 32bit Windows. Or x64 linux, as the KM> case may be. Well I'll admit to being a bit biased in my searches so ignoring the Windows options and looking at those for Linux. https://www.howtoforge.com/tutorial/run-dos-application-in-linux/ He's wanting to run a 16-bit MS-DOS game. WINE won't work because 16-bit applications want to access the first 64K of kernel memory and that's a security issue. DOSBox and DOSemu seem to be working. I was expecting another page as he said 'tutorial'... This article may give you some other clues: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/15597155/porting-16-bit-dos-x86-asse mbly-to-32-bit-linux-x86-assembly My search was "convert 16 bit DOS to Linux" ==> https://www.google.com/search?channel=fs&client=ubuntu&q=convert+16+bit+ DOS+to+Linux Probably the more technical hits will be what you need -- they're over my head. > Stuff! Glad I learned the more or less bare bones MS-DOS and early > Windows: great for troubleshooting as I sort of understand what is > happening. KM> Indeed... I can feel baffled often enough without lacking these KM> old foundations! Yeah! Like my little issue with getting the fiber optic system going here: details is posts with Nancy in Chit Chat, basically I figured out why my computers weren't seeing the outside world: (a) Ethernet cable was disconnected, and (b) needed another device (a router -- I wasn't sure of the terminology so when talking to IT let them give me their name for the device). Over the years have done lots of troubleshooting by paying attention to details. Stuff doesn't run off 'magic'. > KM> Geez, look what happens when you stir the ancient sludge in the > KM> sewers of Ky's brain... > So there was this article about how the Thames River was London's sewer > and during droughts..... KM> ....they found Ubuntu CDs?? :D Nah: Prodigy! ¯ ® ¯ BarryMartin3@ ® ¯ @MyMetronet.NET ® ¯ ® ¯ (Humans know what ® ¯ to remove.) ® .... Shell to DOS...Come in DOS; do you Copy? 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