As the forerunner to the graphical user interfaces in Microsoft’s Windows platform, MS-DOS helped set the stage for the company’s dominance in the PC software market. When MS-DOS was released in 1981, ...

FreeDOS is an open source operating system that allows you to run MS-DOS applications even though Microsoft stopped developing and supporting MS-DOS more than two decades ago. While FreeDOS has been ...

In context: Back in 1980, Tim Paterson was creating a new operating system he called QDOS or Quick and Dirty Operating System. The system was later renamed 86-DOS, as it was being designed to run on ...

Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Before Windows, there was MS-DOS—that’s the Microsoft Disk ...

30 years ago today, Microsoft bought the rights to the Quick and Dirty OS, re-branded it as MS-DOS, struck a deal with IBM, and made history. Share on Facebook (opens in a new window) Share on X ...

It’s been decades since Microsoft stopped developing MS-DOS, but there are thousands of old DOS applications that aren’t designed to run on newer operating systems like Windows 10. Enter FreeDOS, a ...

Editor’s note: After this article was published, Microsoft issued a statement clarifying that cmd.exe will not be going away after all. Read Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols’ follow-up column. My very first ...

You will find the complete list of MS-DOS commands below. However, MS-DOS commands are not the same as Windows command line commands or Powershell commands. MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System) is ...

Update, July 5, 2021: It's the July 4 holiday weekend in the US, which means Ars staff gets a well-deserved holiday to catch up on this summer's Steam sale (or maybe just to rest). As such, we're ...

Windows is probably the most consequential software ever created. It for nearly four decades, it has run the computers that we use to learn, create, defend our country, heal the sick, and look at ...

The SA health department has been using the Chiron patients record system, which was developed in the 1980s, in several of its rural units. At that time, the operating system predominantly used on ...

A one-man company named Whitehorn Ltd. Co. recently announced that DR-DOS is coming back. The "new" text-based operating ...