johnl@ima.ISC.COM (John R. Levine) (12/22/87)
In article <2273@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu> boneill@hawk.cs.ulowell.edu (Debugger) writes: >I just read in a book given to me for Christmas (thanks, Jeff) that >DOS 4.0 is to be a multi-user, multi-tasking operating system for the PC. DOS 4.x has been out for a while but as far as I can tell is only sold in Europe. It's a multitasking version of DOS, sort of like Digital Research's Concurrent DOS. Microsoft makes no secret of it, but they don't seem to be very enthusiastic about it either. My impression is that it doesn't swap, it just partitions up whatever memory you've got. So much for breaking out of 640K. -- John R. Levine, IECC, PO Box 349, Cambridge MA 02238-0349, +1 617 492 3869 { ihnp4 | decvax | cbosgd | harvard | yale }!ima!johnl, Levine@YALE.something The Iran-Contra affair: None of this would have happened if Ronald Reagan were still alive.
cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) (12/24/87)
> In article <2273@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu> boneill@hawk.cs.ulowell.edu (Debugger) writes: > >I just read in a book given to me for Christmas (thanks, Jeff) that > >DOS 4.0 is to be a multi-user, multi-tasking operating system for the PC. > > DOS 4.x has been out for a while but as far as I can tell is only sold in > Europe. It's a multitasking version of DOS, sort of like Digital Research's > Concurrent DOS. Microsoft makes no secret of it, but they don't seem to be > very enthusiastic about it either. My impression is that it doesn't swap, > it just partitions up whatever memory you've got. So much for breaking out > of 640K. > -- My understanding is that DOS 4.x provides a background task strictly for communications -- that it isn't a general purpose multitasking OS. Clayton E. Cramer
g-thaler@gumby.cs.wisc.edu (Maurice Thaler) (12/25/87)
When I was in Europe this summer I asked several computer vendors about
DOS 4.0 and they all responded that it did not exist. This was in Germ{any
and Denmark. Perhaps it is available elsewhere but I doubt it.karel@dutesta.UUCP (Karel van Houten) (12/28/87)
In article <1274@gumby.cs.wisc.edu> g-thaler@gumby.WISC.EDU (Maurice Thaler) writes: |When I was in Europe this summer I asked several computer vendors about |DOS 4.0 and they all responded that it did not exist. This was in Germ{any |and Denmark. Perhaps it is available elsewhere but I doubt it. Well, this response is from Europe: We have never heard about 4.x here either. Sure. -- Karel van Houten Delft University of Technology INTERNET : karel@dutesta.UUCP Faculty of Electrical Engineering UUCP : ..!mcvax!dutrun!dutesta!karel Room 9.29H, Mekelweg 4 SURFnet : DUTRUN::ETSTKVH 2628 CD DELFT, The Netherlands VOICE : +31 15 783502
zu@ethz.UUCP (Urs Zurbuchen) (01/05/88)
In article <817@ima.ISC.COM> johnl@ima.UUCP (John R. Levine) writes: >DOS 4.x has been out for a while but as far as I can tell is only sold in >Europe. It's a multitasking version of DOS, sort of like Digital Research's MS-DOS 4.x is an OEM version of MS-DOS 3.x. No operating system was ever sold as MS-DOS 4.x, not even here in Europe. At least to my knowledge and I live in Europe. But it was bundled with some IBM-PC clones of different manufacturers. As far as I know, MS-DOS 4.x is only an internal name of MicroSoft. But before April 2, 1987 it was also rumored to be the 80286 specific version of MS-DOS (including multitasking and everything to be found real soon now in OS/2 which in turn is called BS/2 in the German speaking part of Europe - thank you IBM :-) ). ...urs UUCP: ...seismo!mcvax!cernvax!ethz!zu
ray@micomvax.UUCP (Ray Dunn) (01/11/88)
In article <276@bernina.UUCP> zu@bernina.UUCP (Urs Zurbuchen) writes: >In article <817@ima.ISC.COM> johnl@ima.UUCP (John R. Levine) writes: >>DOS 4.x has been out for a while but as far as I can tell is only sold in >>Europe. It's a multitasking version of DOS, sort of like Digital Research's > >MS-DOS 4.x is an OEM version of MS-DOS 3.x. No operating system was ever >sold as MS-DOS 4.x, not even here in Europe. Not speculation, fact: MSDos 4.0 was/is the "multitasking" version of Dos "released" to support MSNet 2.0. The multitasking is only as required to handle the asynchronous tasks of the network support, no multi-tasking is available at the applications level. I believe MS never released it at the retail level but they did supply a version of it to OEM's (including ourselves). We as an organisation do supply this product to our customers in Europe. Ray Dunn. ..philabs!micomvax!ray Disclaimer: The above are personal opinions and not necessarily that of my employer, and, to the best of my knowledge, contains information proprietary to neither my employer nor any other organisation.