All Things Microsoft > Microsoft Software
Windows 3.xx, OS or not?
worker201:
--- Quote from: Aloone_Jonez on 3 June 2010, 23:37 ---The whole argument is bullshit anyway because no one has defined what an operating system is, for the purposes of this discussion.
--- End quote ---
I don't think that matters all that much, unless your definition of an OS is wildly different than someone else's. If Kintaro's last statement is true, then Windows is performing OS duties (again, using whatever subset of all computer actions you can name, Windows is doing them), and this argument is over without defining its parameters.
Kintaro:
An operating is system is what gives the userland apps functionality, an application binary interface, some memory management.
DOS fits this quite well, so does Windows 3.xx which is highly independent of DOS. Especially 3.1x because it adds virtual memory, among others things as I keep saying. Windows 3.11 has its own APIs and application support and all that.
Calum:
i'd like to see you install MS Windows and not DOS and get the computer working.
An OS makes your computer operate. Without DOS, 16 bit Windows does not do this.
Arguments based on OS duties, functionality etc are secondary to this inescapable fact.
PS - 32 bit windows is an OS because it does do this, whether it's based on MS DOS or not, if you get a Windows 95/98/2000 CD and install the system from it, you get a windows operating system, with DOS integrated (or emulated in some cases?) as part of it. But with 16 bit windows, the installer is a program that you run in DOS, just like every other DOS program is.
simples.
Kintaro:
--- Quote from: Calum on 4 June 2010, 12:08 ---i'd like to see you install MS Windows and not DOS and get the computer working.
An OS makes your computer operate. Without DOS, 16 bit Windows does not do this.
Arguments based on OS duties, functionality etc are secondary to this inescapable fact.
PS - 32 bit windows is an OS because it does do this, whether it's based on MS DOS or not, if you get a Windows 95/98/2000 CD and install the system from it, you get a windows operating system, with DOS integrated (or emulated in some cases?) as part of it. But with 16 bit windows, the installer is a program that you run in DOS, just like every other DOS program is.
simples.
--- End quote ---
Nope, you won't get Windows 9x to run either without DOS. This is because in the initial stages of its operation, just like Windows 3.xx, win.com uses DOS disk functions to open up vxds (in 9x) for things like the disk driver, display driver, etc. Then it switches into protected mode, and fires up the virtual machine (that 'emulator' you talk about). Also, with Windows 3.xx the extractor that puts the installer on the disk is written in DOS, the actual installer is a windows application. As a nostalgic, I've installed this recently enough under VMware to know.
Anyway, none of your points change the fact that Windows 3.11 puts the processor in protected mode and runs a virtual machine that emulates all of the features of DOS. When these are disk features, that magic in MSDOS.SYS does the real work. It doesn't really run on top of dos though, it runs an independent system that then provides an abstraction of some very small DOS features.
In any case this is getting a bit like debating that Linux isn't an operating system when it is running under VMware.
Aloone_Jonez:
--- Quote from: Kintaro on 6 June 2010, 15:45 ---Anyway, none of your points change the fact that Windows 3.11 puts the processor in protected mode and runs a virtual machine that emulates all of the features of DOS. When these are disk features, that magic in MSDOS.SYS does the real work. It doesn't really run on top of dos though, it runs an independent system that then provides an abstraction of some very small DOS features.
--- End quote ---
He's not saying any of that isn't true, just that his definition of an operating system is a piece of software which is required to use a computer and that Windows 3.1 doesn't meet that definition because DOS is required in order to fulfil the role of an OS.
We're going round in circles, I said this a couple of posts ago, not only is Windows 3.1 not an operating system neither is Linux which is just a kernel and requires other components (bootloader, shell etc.) before it can be considered to be an operating system.
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