On Saturday 15 September 2007 05:16, James Tabor wrote:
Hi!
Alexandru Lovin wrote:
Hello everyone,
Aleksey suggested that I discuss this here, on the mailing list.
<snip
- Running on 16-bit systems like 286/386/486 in a "ReactOS Essentials"
(equivalent to a stripped-down XP) mode *
It should be the same operating system, but in 16-bit mode only. That's an ideal scenario and I'm sure it cannot be done no matter how good the programmers are. So, what can someone do on a 286 ? Listen to mp3's ? No way. Listen to audio CD's, yes, and hopefully digital playback, too. Watch TV ? Yes, if the user can find an ISA TV tuner (ATI made such tuners, but they required a PCI ATI video card, and if you have PCI why not get a better tuner?). Record TV shows ? Not on that kind of computer. Browse the internet ? That may be possible, with some really outdated, 16-bit browser, like the Internet Explorer for Windows 3.1. And I don't know how many sites will work on it. Play games ? Yes, either old DOS or Windows 3.1 ones or the ones that come with ReactOS, written in 16-bit especially for this mode. Join a hive as either master or slave ? Hopefully it will be possible, but probably in the year 2015 at least. Use office applications ? Sure, if the user can find that last Microsoft Office or maybe Microsoft Works version compatible with Windows 3.1. Run a web server ? I know a guy who had a server running on a 386 system, on Windows 3.11. So yes, it is possible, only I don't know what software he used to actually serve the data. Act as a router ? Again, hopefully. That is, if the entire network is on 10 megabit, because I don't think there are ISA 100 megabit network cards (ISA bandwith is not enough). 2D graphics ? It was possible in Windows 3.1, why not ? Maybe the first Photoshop versions actually were 16-bit. 3D graphics ? The first 3D Studio Max (that is, 3D Studio) was for DOS only. That probably means 16-bit right from the start, and that should mean yes, you can do it, with the DOS compatibility layer. Web design ? If you can find a 16-bit application, yes.
A separate ReactOS for 16-bit only, or just all the 16-bit functionality included in the normal ReactOS ? Things look better when it works out of the box, but it's a waste of space to include applications written for 16-bit only. People that really need the 16-bit version will not mind paying extra attention to actually download this one and not the normal one. Besides that, ReactOS is free. And the presence of such a version would mean a selfless devotion to people. An act of charity for real. Allowing people to use their computers and do as many modern things as possible on them.
An open source Windows 3.11 with better compatibility and adherence to standards. Compatible with all the 9x and ME. Has been tried in Free Win 95, oiaohm said "dead and staying that way" about it, but maybe VxD documentation and whatever else you would need will appear (or be reverse engineered by someone). Once a bigger effort will be done, the missing info is probably easier to uncover.
Those are my suggestions. They are not for now, they are not easy to do, etc. Just don't discard them, please.
Alex
Well that is allot! I like ideas too! But~ need more developers here. The best we will do for now is NT/2k/Xp/2k3/V. Downward compatibility is WOW and we don't have WOW. If you want! Come and help us.
Now for win311,,, Take FreeDOS and Wine 16 bit retool the wine code base it on information from "Undocumented Windows by A. Schulman, D. Maxey and M. Pietrek". You will have a good project there! I would like to play with that but~ I have to much right now.
"Unauthorized Windows 95" by Schulman for the info on the vmmd32.vxd, and the *.vxd info.
Wesley Parish
Thanks, James
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