nishri@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (Alex Nishri) (06/01/90)
How does Windows 3.0 implement multitasking? The press release claims that in the 386 mode, Windows 3.0 has preemptive multitasking. Am I to presume that in the 386 mode, all programs run in seperate 8086 virtual machines which are premptively dispatched? (Some articles in PC magazines have suggested this is true. On the other hand I used DOS debug to force a bad memory reference and Windows told me it had been corrupted and I should reboot; if I was running in a virtual machine I should have been prevented from corrupting Windows.) Is preemptive multitasking used in the 286 standard mode? If not, then what is the scheme to multitask? What about in the 8086 Windows real mode? Are DOS calls hooked and dispatching only done on such a call? For the purposes of multitasking are Windows applications treated the same as non-Windows applications in all modes? One of the big PC magazines said that graphics applications are suspended when they are in the background; is this true and if so what other types of applications are not run in the background?
rm@dx.sei.cmu.edu (Roger Moos) (06/01/90)
I would like to know if you can run Terminal in the background doing a Kermit download - while doing something else like in a paint file or solitare etc. This would be very useful - has anybody tried this successfully on Win 3.0 Signed: Waiting for coupon
goodearl@world.std.com (Robert D Goodearl) (06/02/90)
In article <7397@fy.sei.cmu.edu> rm@dx.sei.cmu.edu (Roger Moos) writes: >I would like to know if you can run Terminal in the background doing a >Kermit download - while >doing something else like in a paint file or solitare etc. > >This would be very useful - has anybody tried this successfully on Win 3.0 > Multi-tasking works quite nicely (for DOS). I'm running a compile in a dos window as I write this. I'm using Crosstalk for Windows (I called to get an upgrade prior to the release and the upgrade is 3.0 compatible.) I've done quite a bit of downloading in the background. I've even done downloading and compiling in the background while doing something else (like playing solitare) in another window. This has worked well on my PS2 model 70 (with 6 meg of memory) here at work and on my 386 SX clone (4 megs of memory) at home. Also, we just got the new Novell drivers in and there are versions of net3 that run in both Extended and Expanded memory. I'm running the extended memory version now. One warning: xmsnet3 failed when I tried to access network drives from two different windows at the same time. (One was running a compile in the background, I was doing directory listings in the other.) Since that failure, I've been careful to stay on my local disk while the compile is running on network drives. Seems to work just fine. Bob Goodearl goodearl@world.std.com