Hello everyone,
Aleksey suggested that I discuss this here, on the mailing list.
First and foremost, these are enhancements to do for later, much later (what I would want for the next release is support for RAID / SCSI controllers). But I know that a developer doesn't actually keep something in his plans unless he's figured out a way to do it.
I will paste and add additional comments to each of my suggestions.
1. Compatibility with every version of Windows, from Vista until Windows 3.1/ 3.11
That means applications written for 3.1 should work flawlessly on ReactOS, just like apps written for any other Windows. This is probably not hard, as at least XP does the same thing.
However, drivers for Windows 3.1 most probably do not work. If the user actually has hardware that was left unsupported since 3.1, he should be able to use it.
The same goes for the combination Vista-only driver / old Windows '95 or Windows 3.1 application.
oiaohm said it's not really possible because VxD drivers are not well documented. So, maybe in the distant future, maybe when Linux devs will have reversed VxD's on their own. Just don't forget this.
2. Compatibility with DOS**
This will probably not mean DOS drivers, as probably any hardware with DOS drivers also has some sort of Windows drivers. It would only mean application compatibility. However, applications with direct access to hardware will probably have to remain used from within DOS (e.g. BIOS update software). The major thing are games here. The ideal way to run DOS games is:
- anything requested by the game is interpreted and passed on to the ROS API
- Glide commands are interpreted and passed on to OpenGL or Direct3D, resulting in maybe a better image quality, via the use of features OpenGL has and Glide doesn't.
- software rendering requested by games should be interpreted and passed on to OpenGL or Direct3D, again resulting in a better image quality.
Of course, this will probably result in a compatibility layer, like you suggested.
- redbook audio commands should be passed on to ReactOS, who will read in analog mode or digital mode, depending on what the ROS global settings are for that specific optical drive.
My own thing about Descent, quickly: the game tries to access file " 1.midi" but ReactOS plays "1.mp3". I have all the mp3's and will provide them whenever needed in order to make this happen. This will transform the old Descent for DOS in the CD version, that had redbook audio tracks.
Such enhancements were also created for Tomb Raider 1, by Paul that created Glidos ( www.glidos.net ). Please see http://www.glidos.net/retext.html?lang=en and http://www.glidos.net/audio.html?lang=en
Whenever Tomb Raider 1 asked for certain textures / audio data, it was "hijacked" or "redirected" to the better textures or audio files.
Certainly, this DOS compatibility layer would probably need a Glidos-like application to control various specific settings from various DOS applications.
Another DOS related thing would be a command prompt (terminal?) in ReactOS that has drag'n'drop, copy and paste functionality. Still oiaohm: for the distant future. Got it, understood it, I just want to convince you to keep it in your plans. oiaohm even said a compatibility layer already exists.
3. Processors as a devices, in Device Manager * * For example, let's say a PC has a Pentium 4 at 3 GHz, with HyperThreading. Windows XP reports this processor as two identical ones in Device Manager. ReactOS should also do that. Apart from Windows, if the user does a right-click on a processor as a device, in the Device Manager tree, and chooses the Properties page of the processor device, that page should also mention the SPEED of the processor. More than that, it would be a blessing to also see the L1, L2 and L3 cache size, FSB and multiplier, like those SiSoft Sandra / Everest applications report. Maybe even further, the instruction sets supported - MMX, 3DNow!, SSE, etc.
oiaohm again: can be done, but not right now. Stability and usability beat extra information. Got it, too. Bug 2644.
4. Clustering
I discussed this with oiaohm and he said it's doable, as soon as ROS gets Active Directory Server. Only clustered in terms of processing power, the user has more machines in a cluster and he still sees ROS the normal way, it just works faster because there are more processors available. No hard drives in some sort of JBOD, and 3D data is only handled by the "master" machine(otherwise you need about 10 GB/sec between machines), the one the user actually interacts with. This is what he said would be the limitations. I have other details for this, but since it's very far away, it wouldn't make sense to bring them up right now.
5. Driver extraction tool
I already got one, DoubleDriver, that backs up the drivers for devices in the device manager. I was thinking about the hardware that only gets drivers from Windows Publisher (like my MSI Starkey 2.0). Users would need one.
Again, oiaohm said replicating a freeware tool is not high on the list. I'm fine with that.
6. A Windows Media Center equivalent
**WMC doesn't do much. Just lists program schedules, can do scheduled recordings, is able to duplicate streams so that you may record whatever you're watching. It stops suddenly while doing a "record once" capture, when it should have waited for the user to say stop (it happened on Vista Home Premium, on a HP laptop). It has a "touchscreen" kind of interface, that would probably be great on an actual touchscreen, works ok when using a PC remote control, but is kind of stupid when using the mouse. It can record from one channel and let you watch another channel if you have at least two TV tuners in your computer. Naturally, ROS should do this with "n" TV tuners.
It doesn't have composite or S-video capturing, like the vast majority of TV tuner software out there. It only captures in Microsoft's special "Microsoft recorded TV Show" format, extension .dvr-ms I think (no AVI capture, no mpg capture). It won't let you specify how the tuner provides sound from the antenna/cable signal to the sound card (PCI audio, internal cable, external cable, and if any of the last two, what sound card channel it is). While watching, it should be easier to find out what channel you're on, and what the time is, via some sort of OSD (on-screen display) that appears when you move the mouse or something, just like in WMC. The recording should not be affected by this (i.e. the OSD shouldn't show up on the recording if you moved the mouse, again just like in WMC). While watching, it's not possible (or at least not easy) to jump directly to a specific channel, it may only be used as a TV (next channel, next channel...). If the user tries to switch channels while recording, he gets "warning, you're recording, if you switch channels it's going to stop, you want that?" It should just stop, or at least let the user specify that he doesn't want to see that message again somehow. It doesn't let the user specify exactly the framerate, video size, video standard...just the country of origin. And, as an example, Romaniaofficially uses the PAL D standard on "air" broadcast, that you can get with an antenna. But cable providers use PAL B, which is the German official standard. So, in WMC a guy with cable from Romania must say he's from Germany or else he won't hear anything!
All of these should be properly implemented in ReactOS Media Center. Apart from them, "ROSMC" should have all the deinterlacing options and deinterlacing-method autodetection routines from Dscaler. That program also offers a whole lot of other image improvement things, like a good enough TV station logo killer and image de-noising that actually works. Even better than Dscaler, REMEMBER the settings the next time the user runs the program. Maybe also provide the user with basic video editing functionality, meaning most of the features from VirtualDub (the one I find most important is the ability to edit a film with "direct stream copy", meaning it just copies the video and/or audio stream, it doesn't re-encode it. Edit as in cutting parts of the film. In this scenario, the ability to go frame by frame is also very useful).
And since it's the Media Center and not the Media Player, this should be the application that rips audio cd's or audio dvd's. Most of all, it should be "cluster-aware." Regardless of ROS being cluster aware or not, this one should be.
oiaohm said this is not your job, but a job for other projects. He pointed me to MediaPortal. I e-mailed all of them (Virtualdub, Dscaler and MediaPortal) but I doubt they'll combine the three projects. Still, that's why John User still buys Windows. Linux is all over the Internet (docs all over forums, drivers all over sites, applications all over sites as well). Instead, Linux has "cool" stuff like "mousespedometa" (measures the speed with which you move the mouse). Some people don't even have Internet to get what they need (X servers, for instance). To be a Windows alternative, it should contain a lot of things Windows has.
7. 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
Hi! Alexandru Lovin wrote:
Hello everyone,
Aleksey suggested that I discuss this here, on the mailing list.
First and foremost, these are enhancements to do for later, much later (what I would want for the next release is support for RAID / SCSI controllers). But I know that a developer doesn't actually keep something in his plans unless he's figured out a way to do it.
I will paste and add additional comments to each of my suggestions.
- Compatibility with every version of Windows, from Vista until Windows
3.1 / 3.11
WOW
That means applications written for 3.1 should work flawlessly on ReactOS, just like apps written for any other Windows. This is probably not hard, as at least XP does the same thing.
However, drivers for Windows 3.1 most probably do not work. If the user actually has hardware that was left unsupported since 3.1, he should be able to use it.
The same goes for the combination Vista-only driver / old Windows '95 or Windows 3.1 application.
WOW
oiaohm said it's not really possible because VxD drivers are not well documented. So, maybe in the distant future, maybe when Linux devs will have reversed VxD's on their own. Just don't forget this.
- Compatibility with DOS**
This will probably not mean DOS drivers, as probably any hardware with DOS drivers also has some sort of Windows drivers. It would only mean application compatibility. However, applications with direct access to hardware will probably have to remain used from within DOS (e.g. BIOS update software). The major thing are games here. The ideal way to run DOS games is:
anything requested by the game is interpreted and passed on to the ROS API
Glide commands are interpreted and passed on to OpenGL or Direct3D,
resulting in maybe a better image quality, via the use of features OpenGL has and Glide doesn't.
- software rendering requested by games should be interpreted and passed
on to OpenGL or Direct3D, again resulting in a better image quality.
Of course, this will probably result in a compatibility layer, like you suggested.
- redbook audio commands should be passed on to ReactOS, who will read
in analog mode or digital mode, depending on what the ROS global settings are for that specific optical drive.
My own thing about Descent, quickly: the game tries to access file " 1.midi" but ReactOS plays "1.mp3". I have all the mp3's and will provide them whenever needed in order to make this happen. This will transform the old Descent for DOS in the CD version, that had redbook audio tracks.
Such enhancements were also created for Tomb Raider 1, by Paul that created Glidos ( www.glidos.net http://www.glidos.net ). Please see http://www.glidos.net/retext.html?lang=en and http://www.glidos.net/audio.html?lang=en
Whenever Tomb Raider 1 asked for certain textures / audio data, it was "hijacked" or "redirected" to the better textures or audio files.
Certainly, this DOS compatibility layer would probably need a Glidos-like application to control various specific settings from various DOS applications.
Another DOS related thing would be a command prompt (terminal?) in ReactOS that has drag'n'drop, copy and paste functionality.
Still oiaohm: for the distant future. Got it, understood it, I just want to convince you to keep it in your plans. oiaohm even said a compatibility layer already exists.
- Processors as a devices, in Device Manager *
For example, let's say a PC has a Pentium 4 at 3 GHz, with HyperThreading. Windows XP reports this processor as two identical ones in Device Manager. ReactOS should also do that. Apart from Windows, if the user does a right-click on a processor as a device, in the Device Manager tree, and chooses the Properties page of the processor device, that page should also mention the SPEED of the processor. More than that, it would be a blessing to also see the L1, L2 and L3 cache size, FSB and multiplier, like those SiSoft Sandra / Everest applications report. Maybe even further, the instruction sets supported - MMX, 3DNow!, SSE, etc.
oiaohm again: can be done, but not right now. Stability and usability beat extra information. Got it, too. Bug 2644.
- Clustering
I discussed this with oiaohm and he said it's doable, as soon as ROS gets Active Directory Server. Only clustered in terms of processing power, the user has more machines in a cluster and he still sees ROS the normal way, it just works faster because there are more processors available. No hard drives in some sort of JBOD, and 3D data is only handled by the "master" machine(otherwise you need about 10 GB/sec between machines), the one the user actually interacts with. This is what he said would be the limitations. I have other details for this, but since it's very far away, it wouldn't make sense to bring them up right now.
- Driver extraction tool
I already got one, DoubleDriver, that backs up the drivers for devices in the device manager. I was thinking about the hardware that only gets drivers from Windows Publisher (like my MSI Starkey 2.0). Users would need one.
Again, oiaohm said replicating a freeware tool is not high on the list. I'm fine with that.
- A Windows Media Center equivalent
**WMC doesn't do much. Just lists program schedules, can do scheduled recordings, is able to duplicate streams so that you may record whatever you're watching. It stops suddenly while doing a "record once" capture, when it should have waited for the user to say stop (it happened on Vista Home Premium, on a HP laptop). It has a "touchscreen" kind of interface, that would probably be great on an actual touchscreen, works ok when using a PC remote control, but is kind of stupid when using the mouse. It can record from one channel and let you watch another channel if you have at least two TV tuners in your computer. Naturally, ROS should do this with "n" TV tuners.
It doesn't have composite or S-video capturing, like the vast majority of TV tuner software out there. It only captures in Microsoft's special "Microsoft recorded TV Show" format, extension .dvr-ms I think (no AVI capture, no mpg capture). It won't let you specify how the tuner provides sound from the antenna/cable signal to the sound card (PCI audio, internal cable, external cable, and if any of the last two, what sound card channel it is). While watching, it should be easier to find out what channel you're on, and what the time is, via some sort of OSD (on-screen display) that appears when you move the mouse or something, just like in WMC. The recording should not be affected by this (i.e. the OSD shouldn't show up on the recording if you moved the mouse, again just like in WMC). While watching, it's not possible (or at least not easy) to jump directly to a specific channel, it may only be used as a TV (next channel, next channel...). If the user tries to switch channels while recording, he gets "warning, you're recording, if you switch channels it's going to stop, you want that?" It should just stop, or at least let the user specify that he doesn't want to see that message again somehow. It doesn't let the user specify exactly the framerate, video size, video standard...just the country of origin. And, as an example, Romania officially uses the PAL D standard on "air" broadcast, that you can get with an antenna. But cable providers use PAL B, which is the German official standard. So, in WMC a guy with cable from Romania must say he's from Germany or else he won't hear anything!
All of these should be properly implemented in ReactOS Media Center. Apart from them, "ROSMC" should have all the deinterlacing options and deinterlacing-method autodetection routines from Dscaler. That program also offers a whole lot of other image improvement things, like a good enough TV station logo killer and image de-noising that actually works. Even better than Dscaler, REMEMBER the settings the next time the user runs the program. Maybe also provide the user with basic video editing functionality, meaning most of the features from VirtualDub (the one I find most important is the ability to edit a film with "direct stream copy", meaning it just copies the video and/or audio stream, it doesn't re-encode it. Edit as in cutting parts of the film. In this scenario, the ability to go frame by frame is also very useful).
And since it's the Media Center and not the Media Player, this should be the application that rips audio cd's or audio dvd's.
Most of all, it should be "cluster-aware." Regardless of ROS being cluster aware or not, this one should be.
oiaohm said this is not your job, but a job for other projects. He pointed me to MediaPortal. I e-mailed all of them (Virtualdub, Dscaler and MediaPortal) but I doubt they'll combine the three projects. Still, that's why John User still buys Windows. Linux is all over the Internet (docs all over forums, drivers all over sites, applications all over sites as well). Instead, Linux has "cool" stuff like "mousespedometa" (measures the speed with which you move the mouse). Some people don't even have Internet to get what they need (X servers, for instance). To be a Windows alternative, it should contain a lot of things Windows has.
- 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.
Thanks, James
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
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
I wrote that e-mail ONE YEAR ago. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot ?!
Since then, I kinda found a way to solve them without being cursed at by ROS devs (well, yeah, they didn't actually curse). The ROS Media Center would combine Mediaportal (stability), VirtualDub(video editing), Dscaler(many useful filters) and MythTV(cluster-capable). All open-source. This doesn't need to be the ROS media center, just a cool software application. Maybe I'll be able to convince the Alter team (alter.org.ua) to do it someday.
VxD compatibility is not needed - thank GreatLord and oiaohm for illuminating me - because probably all the devices with Win '95-only drivers also had NT 4.0 drivers. End of story. 16-bit operation is not needed, either. After the OS gets really stable and feature-rich, I guess it'll be a fun challenge to make it run on a 386, maybe even a 486. Operating on a 286 can be done as well, but I'm not going to say how, because most developers look at it as it's evil alien technology that nobody needs, or even worse, that would destroy the OS or something. I asked some of them and they sounded reserved to say the least. However, being able to run 16-bit Windows applications should be done, but I think that's really not the current issue right now.
Glide compatibility on non-3dfx hardware: I will be able to convince the guy making Glidos to give the ROS team the sources. That's for DOS Glide games and generally DOS games as well. For Windows Glide games there are open source projects already underway, as far as I know.
Descent: there's a Windows port out there, Dxx-rebirth that managed to do exactly the music files thing. I bothered them for a while, but they did it.
I'm watching and waiting for whenever I can voice out requests such as these. A friend has some sort of design doc for a very functional telephony application that would manage every feature modems have, manage faxes, dial-up connections etc. But the devs are still working on the networking part and I assume they really don't want to get into telephony right now.
But right now people are fixing bugs and updating the OS. I really can't insist with such "advanced" issues.
And by the way, I can't code. Nor do I have Stefan Ginsberg's amount of time on my hands, to stick around and learn how to. I can work in the graphics but mf is kinda always closed-doors and seemingly unwilling to start the work on re-doing the interface, due to reasons I'm unaware of. And it's not my business as to what they actually are, so I can't really contribute right now.
On Wed, Sep 24, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Wesley Parish wes.parish@paradise.net.nzwrote:
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
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
-- Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
Gaul is quartered into three halves. Things which are impossible are equal to each other. Guerrilla warfare means up to their monkey tricks. Extracts from "Schoolboy Howlers" - the collective wisdom of the foolish.
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui? You ask, what is the most important thing? Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata. I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people. _______________________________________________ Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
Honestly I think that coding for the 286 would almost be out of the question considering the fact that the processor can only physically address 16MB of ram.... Just my thought.
2008/9/24 Alexandru Lovin thypope@gmail.com
I wrote that e-mail ONE YEAR ago. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot ?!
Since then, I kinda found a way to solve them without being cursed at by ROS devs (well, yeah, they didn't actually curse). The ROS Media Center would combine Mediaportal (stability), VirtualDub(video editing), Dscaler(many useful filters) and MythTV(cluster-capable). All open-source. This doesn't need to be the ROS media center, just a cool software application. Maybe I'll be able to convince the Alter team (alter.org.ua) to do it someday.
VxD compatibility is not needed - thank GreatLord and oiaohm for illuminating me - because probably all the devices with Win '95-only drivers also had NT 4.0 drivers. End of story. 16-bit operation is not needed, either. After the OS gets really stable and feature-rich, I guess it'll be a fun challenge to make it run on a 386, maybe even a 486. Operating on a 286 can be done as well, but I'm not going to say how, because most developers look at it as it's evil alien technology that nobody needs, or even worse, that would destroy the OS or something. I asked some of them and they sounded reserved to say the least. However, being able to run 16-bit Windows applications should be done, but I think that's really not the current issue right now.
Glide compatibility on non-3dfx hardware: I will be able to convince the guy making Glidos to give the ROS team the sources. That's for DOS Glide games and generally DOS games as well. For Windows Glide games there are open source projects already underway, as far as I know.
Descent: there's a Windows port out there, Dxx-rebirth that managed to do exactly the music files thing. I bothered them for a while, but they did it.
I'm watching and waiting for whenever I can voice out requests such as these. A friend has some sort of design doc for a very functional telephony application that would manage every feature modems have, manage faxes, dial-up connections etc. But the devs are still working on the networking part and I assume they really don't want to get into telephony right now.
But right now people are fixing bugs and updating the OS. I really can't insist with such "advanced" issues.
And by the way, I can't code. Nor do I have Stefan Ginsberg's amount of time on my hands, to stick around and learn how to. I can work in the graphics but mf is kinda always closed-doors and seemingly unwilling to start the work on re-doing the interface, due to reasons I'm unaware of. And it's not my business as to what they actually are, so I can't really contribute right now.
On Wed, Sep 24, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Wesley Parish < wes.parish@paradise.net.nz> wrote:
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
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
-- Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
Gaul is quartered into three halves. Things which are impossible are equal to each other. Guerrilla warfare means up to their monkey tricks. Extracts from "Schoolboy Howlers" - the collective wisdom of the foolish.
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui? You ask, what is the most important thing? Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata. I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people. _______________________________________________ Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
My bad. I only noticed the date after I'd sent it off.
My humble apologies.
Wesley Parish
On Thursday 25 September 2008 09:18, Alexandru Lovin wrote:
I wrote that e-mail ONE YEAR ago. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot ?!
Since then, I kinda found a way to solve them without being cursed at by ROS devs (well, yeah, they didn't actually curse). The ROS Media Center would combine Mediaportal (stability), VirtualDub(video editing), Dscaler(many useful filters) and MythTV(cluster-capable). All open-source. This doesn't need to be the ROS media center, just a cool software application. Maybe I'll be able to convince the Alter team (alter.org.ua) to do it someday.
VxD compatibility is not needed - thank GreatLord and oiaohm for illuminating me - because probably all the devices with Win '95-only drivers also had NT 4.0 drivers. End of story. 16-bit operation is not needed, either. After the OS gets really stable and feature-rich, I guess it'll be a fun challenge to make it run on a 386, maybe even a 486. Operating on a 286 can be done as well, but I'm not going to say how, because most developers look at it as it's evil alien technology that nobody needs, or even worse, that would destroy the OS or something. I asked some of them and they sounded reserved to say the least. However, being able to run 16-bit Windows applications should be done, but I think that's really not the current issue right now.
Glide compatibility on non-3dfx hardware: I will be able to convince the guy making Glidos to give the ROS team the sources. That's for DOS Glide games and generally DOS games as well. For Windows Glide games there are open source projects already underway, as far as I know.
Descent: there's a Windows port out there, Dxx-rebirth that managed to do exactly the music files thing. I bothered them for a while, but they did it.
I'm watching and waiting for whenever I can voice out requests such as these. A friend has some sort of design doc for a very functional telephony application that would manage every feature modems have, manage faxes, dial-up connections etc. But the devs are still working on the networking part and I assume they really don't want to get into telephony right now.
But right now people are fixing bugs and updating the OS. I really can't insist with such "advanced" issues.
And by the way, I can't code. Nor do I have Stefan Ginsberg's amount of time on my hands, to stick around and learn how to. I can work in the graphics but mf is kinda always closed-doors and seemingly unwilling to start the work on re-doing the interface, due to reasons I'm unaware of. And it's not my business as to what they actually are, so I can't really contribute right now.
On Wed, Sep 24, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Wesley Parish
wes.parish@paradise.net.nzwrote:
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
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
-- Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
Gaul is quartered into three halves. Things which are impossible are equal to each other. Guerrilla warfare means up to their monkey tricks. Extracts from "Schoolboy Howlers" - the collective wisdom of the foolish.
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui? You ask, what is the most important thing? Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata. I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people. _______________________________________________ Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
Alexandru Lovin schrieb:
Hello everyone,
Aleksey suggested that I discuss this here, on the mailing list.
First and foremost, these are enhancements to do for later, much later (what I would want for the next release is support for RAID / SCSI controllers). But I know that a developer doesn't actually keep something in his plans unless he's figured out a way to do it.
Aleksey said he wanted to have a look at a 3rd party SATA driver. He also mentioned that our scsiport might need more work. For SCSI support.... don't know.
- Compatibility with every version of Windows, from Vista until
Windows 3.1 / 3.11
That means applications written for 3.1 should work flawlessly on ReactOS, just like apps written for any other Windows. This is probably not hard, as at least XP does the same thing.
We only target compatibility for Windows NT, 2000, XP, 2003 and Vista. Win 3.x/9x are a completely different architecture. They are based on DOS. To be compatible to those versions of windows, we would need WOW (Wndows On Windows) / NTVDM (NT Virtual Dos Machine). Wich we don't have (or only stubbed). If you want DOS/Win 3.x/9x support, you are welcome to implement all the needed stuff. ;-)
However, drivers for Windows 3.1 most probably do not work. If the user actually has hardware that was left unsupported since 3.1, he should be able to use it.
The same goes for the combination Vista-only driver / old Windows '95 or Windows 3.1 application.
oiaohm said it's not really possible because VxD drivers are not well documented. So, maybe in the distant future, maybe when Linux devs will have reversed VxD's on their own. Just don't forget this.
I don't think it's worth the efford of developing something like that. If you really have hardware, that does not have a driver for NT/2000/XP, you better buy new hardware. Honestly, if you take every current and future Windows and ReactOS user and sum up all the money they would have to spend to buy new hardware, because there are no NT drivers for it.... you could probably hardly convince anyone writing the needed code if he got all that money.
My own thing about Descent, quickly: the game tries to access file " 1.midi" but ReactOS plays "1.mp3". I have all the mp3's and will provide them whenever needed in order to make this happen. This will transform the old Descent for DOS in the CD version, that had redbook audio tracks.
Such enhancements were also created for Tomb Raider 1, by Paul that created Glidos ( www.glidos.net http://www.glidos.net ). Please see http://www.glidos.net/retext.html?lang=en and http://www.glidos.net/audio.html?lang=en
Whenever Tomb Raider 1 asked for certain textures / audio data, it was "hijacked" or "redirected" to the better textures or audio files.
The same way it should be done for Descent. There's no point in adding extra stuff into ROS, to make an old DOS game fancier.
Another DOS related thing would be a command prompt (terminal?) in ReactOS that has drag'n'drop, copy and paste functionality.
We already have a command prompt: cmd. At the moment it doesn't support copy/paste or Drag'n'Drop, but will sooner or later like Windows does.
- Processors as a devices, in Device Manager *
*For example, let's say a PC has a Pentium 4 at 3 GHz, with HyperThreading. Windows XP reports this processor as two identical ones in Device Manager. ReactOS should also do that. Apart from Windows, if the user does a right-click on a processor as a device, in the Device Manager tree, and chooses the Properties page of the processor device, that page should also mention the SPEED of the processor. More than that, it would be a blessing to also see the L1, L2 and L3 cache size, FSB and multiplier, like those SiSoft Sandra / Everest applications report. Maybe even further, the instruction sets supported - MMX, 3DNow!, SSE, etc.
Some additional functionality in that area wouldn't hurt. When we are reaching 1.0, we might get some more additional stuff. Or earlier if there is somebody who is willing to write the needed code.
- A Windows Media Center equivalent
**[...]
All of these should be properly implemented in ReactOS Media Center. Apart from them, "ROSMC" should have all the deinterlacing options and deinterlacing-method autodetection routines from Dscaler. That program also offers a whole lot of other image improvement things, like a good enough TV station logo killer and image de-noising that actually works. Even better than Dscaler, REMEMBER the settings the next time the user runs the program. Maybe also provide the user with basic video editing functionality, meaning most of the features from VirtualDub (the one I find most important is the ability to edit a film with "direct stream copy", meaning it just copies the video and/or audio stream, it doesn't re-encode it. Edit as in cutting parts of the film. In this scenario, the ability to go frame by frame is also very useful).
And since it's the Media Center and not the Media Player, this should be the application that rips audio cd's or audio dvd's.
Most of all, it should be "cluster-aware." Regardless of ROS being cluster aware or not, this one should be.
oiaohm said this is not your job, but a job for other projects. He pointed me to MediaPortal. I e-mailed all of them (Virtualdub, Dscaler and MediaPortal) but I doubt they'll combine the three projects. Still, that's why John User still buys Windows. Linux is all over the Internet (docs all over forums, drivers all over sites, applications all over sites as well). Instead, Linux has "cool" stuff like "mousespedometa" (measures the speed with which you move the mouse). Some people don't even have Internet to get what they need (X servers, for instance). To be a Windows alternative, it should contain a lot of things Windows has.
That's something for ... "distros". Well, distros is not to be understood like Linux distros, all of them being different in the user experience and sometimes incompatible. More like ReactOS + applications. We are only developing the core. More than the kernel, but less than what a Linux distro is with 1000s of open source applications. We are not going to reinvent the wheel and create a new Media Player/Center, a new webserver or a new whateverfunkyapp. People like to decide for themselves what to use. Some people will use firefox, some will use netscape, some like mpc, some like vlc, some people don't want a webserver, some do. We don't decide for them. It's all out there. If you don't like it, choose something else or write something better. And noone stops you from bundeling all your favourite open source apps with reactos and put it for download somewhere as long as you respect the licenses.
- 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.
Ehh? Some people say that in a few years noone will use 32 bits anymore and we are still developing an "outdated" 32 bit OS. And you suggest 16 bit Hw compatibility? Noone is using 16 bit PCs anymore. And if then only for the fun. But then they use DOS. ReactOS will never run on 16 bit. And there's no point in even thinking about it. If you have an old record player it will simply never play DVDs. Get used to it and buy a dvd player.
Those are my suggestions. They are not for now, they are not easy to do, etc. Just don't discard them, please.
Alex
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
Some thoughts on various points:
1. Windows 3.0/3.1 applications could access hardware directly (Windows 9x/Me apps could as well, but it was less common because NT compatibility was more important). Even Windows XP cannot run all Win16 applications (or those certain Win32 apps that did funky things); full native compatibility is a fairly ludicrous goal. Probably better for users to just run Windows 3.x/95 when necessary in DOSbox or QEMU.
2. Full DOS compatibility is probably even more complex than full Win16 compatibility. Besides, DOSbox already works wonderfully :)
5. Good idea. Windows NT desperately needs something that has been easy as pie since forever on Unix.
6. MythTV?
7. Tons of work would be needed for little benefit (btw, 386 and 486 are 32-bit processors). If needing to use these machines, it's probably a better idea to use FreeDOS. Also, you seem to be confusing Windows 95 as being purely 16-bit, it is not.
Too much wheel re-inventing for the short-term. Dosbox works on ROS doesn't it. There's the dos support.
Once we can make stable and maintain the windows NT basic features, graphics/opengl, audio, drivers, etc, which is what this project is about, then we can figure out what other priorities we want to create. Right?
On 9/13/07, Alexandru Lovin thypope@gmail.com wrote:
Hello everyone,
Aleksey suggested that I discuss this here, on the mailing list.
First and foremost, these are enhancements to do for later, much later (what I would want for the next release is support for RAID / SCSI controllers). But I know that a developer doesn't actually keep something in his plans unless he's figured out a way to do it.
I will paste and add additional comments to each of my suggestions.
- Compatibility with every version of Windows, from Vista until Windows 3.1
/ 3.11
That means applications written for 3.1 should work flawlessly on ReactOS, just like apps written for any other Windows. This is probably not hard, as at least XP does the same thing.
However, drivers for Windows 3.1 most probably do not work. If the user actually has hardware that was left unsupported since 3.1, he should be able to use it.
The same goes for the combination Vista-only driver / old Windows '95 or Windows 3.1 application. oiaohm said it's not really possible because VxD drivers are not well documented. So, maybe in the distant future, maybe when Linux devs will have reversed VxD's on their own. Just don't forget this.
- Compatibility with DOS
This will probably not mean DOS drivers, as probably any hardware with DOS drivers also has some sort of Windows drivers. It would only mean application compatibility. However, applications with direct access to hardware will probably have to remain used from within DOS (e.g. BIOS update software). The major thing are games here. The ideal way to run DOS games is:
anything requested by the game is interpreted and passed on to the ROS API
Glide commands are interpreted and passed on to OpenGL or Direct3D,
resulting in maybe a better image quality, via the use of features OpenGL has and Glide doesn't.
- software rendering requested by games should be interpreted and passed on
to OpenGL or Direct3D, again resulting in a better image quality.
Of course, this will probably result in a compatibility layer, like you suggested.
- redbook audio commands should be passed on to ReactOS, who will read in
analog mode or digital mode, depending on what the ROS global settings are for that specific optical drive.
My own thing about Descent, quickly: the game tries to access file " 1.midi" but ReactOS plays "1.mp3". I have all the mp3's and will provide them whenever needed in order to make this happen. This will transform the old Descent for DOS in the CD version, that had redbook audio tracks.
Such enhancements were also created for Tomb Raider 1, by Paul that created Glidos ( www.glidos.net ). Please see http://www.glidos.net/retext.html?lang=en and http://www.glidos.net/audio.html?lang=en
Whenever Tomb Raider 1 asked for certain textures / audio data, it was "hijacked" or "redirected" to the better textures or audio files.
Certainly, this DOS compatibility layer would probably need a Glidos-like application to control various specific settings from various DOS applications.
Another DOS related thing would be a command prompt (terminal?) in ReactOS that has drag'n'drop, copy and paste functionality.Still oiaohm: for the distant future. Got it, understood it, I just want to convince you to keep it in your plans. oiaohm even said a compatibility layer already exists.
- Processors as a devices, in Device Manager
For example, let's say a PC has a Pentium 4 at 3 GHz, with HyperThreading. Windows XP reports this processor as two identical ones in Device Manager. ReactOS should also do that. Apart from Windows, if the user does a right-click on a processor as a device, in the Device Manager tree, and chooses the Properties page of the processor device, that page should also mention the SPEED of the processor. More than that, it would be a blessing to also see the L1, L2 and L3 cache size, FSB and multiplier, like those SiSoft Sandra / Everest applications report. Maybe even further, the instruction sets supported - MMX, 3DNow!, SSE, etc.
oiaohm again: can be done, but not right now. Stability and usability beat extra information. Got it, too. Bug 2644.
- Clustering
I discussed this with oiaohm and he said it's doable, as soon as ROS gets Active Directory Server. Only clustered in terms of processing power, the user has more machines in a cluster and he still sees ROS the normal way, it just works faster because there are more processors available. No hard drives in some sort of JBOD, and 3D data is only handled by the "master" machine(otherwise you need about 10 GB/sec between machines), the one the user actually interacts with. This is what he said would be the limitations. I have other details for this, but since it's very far away, it wouldn't make sense to bring them up right now.
- Driver extraction tool
I already got one, DoubleDriver, that backs up the drivers for devices in the device manager. I was thinking about the hardware that only gets drivers from Windows Publisher (like my MSI Starkey 2.0). Users would need one.
Again, oiaohm said replicating a freeware tool is not high on the list. I'm fine with that.
- A Windows Media Center equivalent
WMC doesn't do much. Just lists program schedules, can do scheduled recordings, is able to duplicate streams so that you may record whatever you're watching. It stops suddenly while doing a "record once" capture, when it should have waited for the user to say stop (it happened on Vista Home Premium, on a HP laptop). It has a "touchscreen" kind of interface, that would probably be great on an actual touchscreen, works ok when using a PC remote control, but is kind of stupid when using the mouse. It can record from one channel and let you watch another channel if you have at least two TV tuners in your computer. Naturally, ROS should do this with "n" TV tuners.
It doesn't have composite or S-video capturing, like the vast majority of TV tuner software out there. It only captures in Microsoft's special "Microsoft recorded TV Show" format, extension .dvr-ms I think (no AVI capture, no mpg capture). It won't let you specify how the tuner provides sound from the antenna/cable signal to the sound card (PCI audio, internal cable, external cable, and if any of the last two, what sound card channel it is). While watching, it should be easier to find out what channel you're on, and what the time is, via some sort of OSD (on-screen display) that appears when you move the mouse or something, just like in WMC. The recording should not be affected by this (i.e. the OSD shouldn't show up on the recording if you moved the mouse, again just like in WMC). While watching, it's not possible (or at least not easy) to jump directly to a specific channel, it may only be used as a TV (next channel, next channel...). If the user tries to switch channels while recording, he gets "warning, you're recording, if you switch channels it's going to stop, you want that?" It should just stop, or at least let the user specify that he doesn't want to see that message again somehow. It doesn't let the user specify exactly the framerate, video size, video standard...just the country of origin. And, as an example, Romania officially uses the PAL D standard on "air" broadcast, that you can get with an antenna. But cable providers use PAL B, which is the German official standard. So, in WMC a guy with cable from Romania must say he's from Germany or else he won't hear anything!
All of these should be properly implemented in ReactOS Media Center. Apart from them, "ROSMC" should have all the deinterlacing options and deinterlacing-method autodetection routines from Dscaler. That program also offers a whole lot of other image improvement things, like a good enough TV station logo killer and image de-noising that actually works. Even better than Dscaler, REMEMBER the settings the next time the user runs the program. Maybe also provide the user with basic video editing functionality, meaning most of the features from VirtualDub (the one I find most important is the ability to edit a film with "direct stream copy", meaning it just copies the video and/or audio stream, it doesn't re-encode it. Edit as in cutting parts of the film. In this scenario, the ability to go frame by frame is also very useful).
And since it's the Media Center and not the Media Player, this should be the application that rips audio cd's or audio dvd's. Most of all, it should be "cluster-aware." Regardless of ROS being cluster aware or not, this one should be.
oiaohm said this is not your job, but a job for other projects. He pointed me to MediaPortal. I e-mailed all of them (Virtualdub, Dscaler and MediaPortal) but I doubt they'll combine the three projects. Still, that's why John User still buys Windows. Linux is all over the Internet (docs all over forums, drivers all over sites, applications all over sites as well). Instead, Linux has "cool" stuff like "mousespedometa" (measures the speed with which you move the mouse). Some people don't even have Internet to get what they need (X servers, for instance). To be a Windows alternative, it should contain a lot of things Windows has.
- 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
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
I would love to see 16 bit app support and DOS app support (Dosbox is way too slow). But it's not really a priority. And it all depends on if there is a dev with that interest.
I know Myria was interested in DOS support at one point. Don't know now though. I think she also stated dos support would be easier than 16 bit app support.
I still have hope :)
Hi pure dos apps will never run in ReactOS out of box. Then next is MS have remove VDM in 64bits system it mean no dos/win3.11 apps will work in vista
VxD VxD are full documented, I can implement support for it pretty easy but I refuse doing so. for u need full access to the hardware direcly. and allown the VxD doing anything it like even write to resusers it does not belong to. and other direty thing. And some company runing VxD driver in NT with own hacks. for getting their copyright protections to work
GLIDE GLIDE is dead it was for voodo card their own driver api. and I do not like implement hacked way as glide is.
How DirectX works is like this 1. The driver got a DirectX interface it proivde to windows
2. Windows have a file call dxg.sys their the DirectX graphic api lives allot of them
3. Then we got Win32k.sys that have few DirectX api and bind dxg.sys api toghter in win32k.sys then both of them call to the driver. win32k.sys pass the orginal DFN list to the dxg.sys and the dxg.sys return a new list their it have a api for.
4. Gdi32.dll contain the user mode part that comucate with win32k.sys and send the api we requesti to win32k.sys it also working as big translater betwin diffent stucrt and handles and replace kmode pointer to user mode pointer and drvier functions to internal gdi32 functions and so on.
5. then we got DirectX user mode dx files that always comcucate with gdi32.dll
OpenGL works simluare way.
Audio CD Red book audio is a standard how the sound are store on the CD, it being automatic play up to audio out on the CD. we need a audio driver in reactos That can redirect the audio to the PC speaker.
A Windows Media Center equivalent I do not like bundle any Media or audio player with ReactOS, it is up to u choice wich u whant u got vlc, mplayer, and media player classic, media classic need KS.SYS and allot dshow filer to work we do not have that moment, and it is extream huge work to implement it. and it will not be this year. I am still implement the baisc of DirectX in ReactOS (ReactX)
Running on 16-bit systems like 286/386/486 in a "ReactOS Essentials" (equivalent to a stripped-down XP) mode I am exprment with a dymatic translator betwin diffent CPU if it goes in the way as I like, it will posible runing any CPU in reactos so long the apps is writen for windows.
----- Original Message ----- From: Alexandru Lovin To: ros-dev@reactos.org Sent: Thursday, September 13, 2007 11:57 PM Subject: [ros-dev] Trying to push ideas (again:) )
Hello everyone,
Aleksey suggested that I discuss this here, on the mailing list.
First and foremost, these are enhancements to do for later, much later (what I would want for the next release is support for RAID / SCSI controllers). But I know that a developer doesn't actually keep something in his plans unless he's figured out a way to do it.
I will paste and add additional comments to each of my suggestions.
1. Compatibility with every version of Windows, from Vista until Windows 3.1 / 3.11
That means applications written for 3.1 should work flawlessly on ReactOS, just like apps written for any other Windows. This is probably not hard, as at least XP does the same thing.
However, drivers for Windows 3.1 most probably do not work. If the user actually has hardware that was left unsupported since 3.1, he should be able to use it.
The same goes for the combination Vista-only driver / old Windows '95 or Windows 3.1 application.
oiaohm said it's not really possible because VxD drivers are not well documented. So, maybe in the distant future, maybe when Linux devs will have reversed VxD's on their own. Just don't forget this.
2. Compatibility with DOS
This will probably not mean DOS drivers, as probably any hardware with DOS drivers also has some sort of Windows drivers. It would only mean application compatibility. However, applications with direct access to hardware will probably have to remain used from within DOS (e.g. BIOS update software). The major thing are games here. The ideal way to run DOS games is:
- anything requested by the game is interpreted and passed on to the ROS API
- Glide commands are interpreted and passed on to OpenGL or Direct3D, resulting in maybe a better image quality, via the use of features OpenGL has and Glide doesn't.
- software rendering requested by games should be interpreted and passed on to OpenGL or Direct3D, again resulting in a better image quality.
Of course, this will probably result in a compatibility layer, like you suggested.
- redbook audio commands should be passed on to ReactOS, who will read in analog mode or digital mode, depending on what the ROS global settings are for that specific optical drive.
My own thing about Descent, quickly: the game tries to access file " 1.midi" but ReactOS plays "1.mp3". I have all the mp3's and will provide them whenever needed in order to make this happen. This will transform the old Descent for DOS in the CD version, that had redbook audio tracks.
Such enhancements were also created for Tomb Raider 1, by Paul that created Glidos ( www.glidos.net ). Please see http://www.glidos.net/retext.html?lang=en and http://www.glidos.net/audio.html?lang=en
Whenever Tomb Raider 1 asked for certain textures / audio data, it was "hijacked" or "redirected" to the better textures or audio files.
Certainly, this DOS compatibility layer would probably need a Glidos-like application to control various specific settings from various DOS applications.
Another DOS related thing would be a command prompt (terminal?) in ReactOS that has drag'n'drop, copy and paste functionality.
Still oiaohm: for the distant future. Got it, understood it, I just want to convince you to keep it in your plans. oiaohm even said a compatibility layer already exists.
3. Processors as a devices, in Device Manager
For example, let's say a PC has a Pentium 4 at 3 GHz, with HyperThreading. Windows XP reports this processor as two identical ones in Device Manager. ReactOS should also do that. Apart from Windows, if the user does a right-click on a processor as a device, in the Device Manager tree, and chooses the Properties page of the processor device, that page should also mention the SPEED of the processor. More than that, it would be a blessing to also see the L1, L2 and L3 cache size, FSB and multiplier, like those SiSoft Sandra / Everest applications report. Maybe even further, the instruction sets supported - MMX, 3DNow!, SSE, etc.
oiaohm again: can be done, but not right now. Stability and usability beat extra information. Got it, too. Bug 2644.
4. Clustering
I discussed this with oiaohm and he said it's doable, as soon as ROS gets Active Directory Server. Only clustered in terms of processing power, the user has more machines in a cluster and he still sees ROS the normal way, it just works faster because there are more processors available. No hard drives in some sort of JBOD, and 3D data is only handled by the "master" machine(otherwise you need about 10 GB/sec between machines), the one the user actually interacts with. This is what he said would be the limitations. I have other details for this, but since it's very far away, it wouldn't make sense to bring them up right now.
5. Driver extraction tool
I already got one, DoubleDriver, that backs up the drivers for devices in the device manager. I was thinking about the hardware that only gets drivers from Windows Publisher (like my MSI Starkey 2.0). Users would need one.
Again, oiaohm said replicating a freeware tool is not high on the list. I'm fine with that.
6. A Windows Media Center equivalent WMC doesn't do much. Just lists program schedules, can do scheduled recordings, is able to duplicate streams so that you may record whatever you're watching. It stops suddenly while doing a "record once" capture, when it should have waited for the user to say stop (it happened on Vista Home Premium, on a HP laptop). It has a "touchscreen" kind of interface, that would probably be great on an actual touchscreen, works ok when using a PC remote control, but is kind of stupid when using the mouse. It can record from one channel and let you watch another channel if you have at least two TV tuners in your computer. Naturally, ROS should do this with "n" TV tuners.
It doesn't have composite or S-video capturing, like the vast majority of TV tuner software out there. It only captures in Microsoft's special "Microsoft recorded TV Show" format, extension .dvr-ms I think (no AVI capture, no mpg capture). It won't let you specify how the tuner provides sound from the antenna/cable signal to the sound card (PCI audio, internal cable, external cable, and if any of the last two, what sound card channel it is). While watching, it should be easier to find out what channel you're on, and what the time is, via some sort of OSD (on-screen display) that appears when you move the mouse or something, just like in WMC. The recording should not be affected by this (i.e. the OSD shouldn't show up on the recording if you moved the mouse, again just like in WMC). While watching, it's not possible (or at least not easy) to jump directly to a specific channel, it may only be used as a TV (next channel, next channel...). If the user tries to switch channels while recording, he gets "warning, you're recording, if you switch channels it's going to stop, you want that?" It should just stop, or at least let the user specify that he doesn't want to see that message again somehow. It doesn't let the user specify exactly the framerate, video size, video standard...just the country of origin. And, as an example, Romania officially uses the PAL D standard on "air" broadcast, that you can get with an antenna. But cable providers use PAL B, which is the German official standard. So, in WMC a guy with cable from Romania must say he's from Germany or else he won't hear anything!
All of these should be properly implemented in ReactOS Media Center. Apart from them, "ROSMC" should have all the deinterlacing options and deinterlacing-method autodetection routines from Dscaler. That program also offers a whole lot of other image improvement things, like a good enough TV station logo killer and image de-noising that actually works. Even better than Dscaler, REMEMBER the settings the next time the user runs the program. Maybe also provide the user with basic video editing functionality, meaning most of the features from VirtualDub (the one I find most important is the ability to edit a film with "direct stream copy", meaning it just copies the video and/or audio stream, it doesn't re-encode it. Edit as in cutting parts of the film. In this scenario, the ability to go frame by frame is also very useful).
And since it's the Media Center and not the Media Player, this should be the application that rips audio cd's or audio dvd's.
Most of all, it should be "cluster-aware." Regardless of ROS being cluster aware or not, this one should be.
oiaohm said this is not your job, but a job for other projects. He pointed me to MediaPortal. I e-mailed all of them (Virtualdub, Dscaler and MediaPortal) but I doubt they'll combine the three projects. Still, that's why John User still buys Windows. Linux is all over the Internet (docs all over forums, drivers all over sites, applications all over sites as well). Instead, Linux has "cool" stuff like "mousespedometa" (measures the speed with which you move the mouse). Some people don't even have Internet to get what they need (X servers, for instance). To be a Windows alternative, it should contain a lot of things Windows has.
7. 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
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
_______________________________________________ Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
Running on 16-bit systems like 286/386/486 in a "ReactOS Essentials" (equivalent to a stripped-down XP) mode I am exprment with a dymatic translator betwin diffent CPU if it goes in the way as I like, it will posible runing any CPU in reactos so long the apps is writen for windows.
386 and 486 are already 32 bit cpus. I don't think porting reactos to 16 bit would be useful, because many structures are for 32 bit numbers. Besides of this, most 8086/286 does only have 1 MB Ram, a few 4 MB (the theoretical maximum is 16 MB for 286)
Porting it to PowerPC or Arm would be much more usefull ;)
Hi ReactOS can not be run on i386 or i486 will offical change it to P1 or P2 soon adding vitual machine for 16bits apps it mean we can later allown any dos apps runing in ros, and allown it messy with the vitural hw we add, it mean more safer in stable of runing dos program in ros, for a dos program love messing around with the computer hw, at end it will result in bsod in NT, that why ms limit VDM and another thing with VDM is it can not switch the cpu from protected mode to normal mode. with a vitual cpu, this problem are slov and it mean at end any dos program can be run. at end, that why dosbox emulated thuse hw
----- Original Message ----- From: "Michael Fritscher" michael@fritscher.net To: "ReactOS Development List" ros-dev@reactos.org Sent: Sunday, September 16, 2007 11:23 AM Subject: Re: [ros-dev] Trying to push ideas (again:) )
Running on 16-bit systems like 286/386/486 in a "ReactOS Essentials" (equivalent to a stripped-down XP) mode I am exprment with a dymatic translator betwin diffent CPU if it goes in the way as I like, it will posible runing any CPU in reactos so long the apps is writen for windows.
386 and 486 are already 32 bit cpus. I don't think porting reactos to 16 bit would be useful, because many structures are for 32 bit numbers. Besides of this, most 8086/286 does only have 1 MB Ram, a few 4 MB (the theoretical maximum is 16 MB for 286)
Porting it to PowerPC or Arm would be much more usefull ;)
Ros-dev mailing list Ros-dev@reactos.org http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
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