FreeDOS is a free and open‐source operating system designed to be compatible with MS‑DOS. Developed to keep the DOS experience alive even after Microsoft ended support for MS‑DOS, FreeDOS has grown into a complete environment that not only preserves classic DOS functionality but also introduces modern enhancements. Its simplicity and low resource requirements have made it a cherished resource for retro computing enthusiasts and a practical tool for embedded systems and legacy hardware.
↫ André Machado
A short but useful overview of what FreeDOS is. One of my favourite stories about FreeDOS will always be not just that HP offered it as an option on some of its laptops – supposedly because it couldn’t sell laptops without an operating system preinstalled – but also just how convoluted this preinstalled copy of FreeDOS was set up. They shipped several FreeDOS virtual machines on top of a minimal installation of Debian, in a complex web of operating systems and VMs.
I remember some Lenovo laptops coming with FreeDOS preinstalled. AFAIK it was installed on bare metal in that case.
Shipping with FreeDOS is really just a way of shipping with nothing so that they do not have to pay the Windows tax. I think some laptops came with a utility to update the BIOS via DOS.
I love that they keep chugging along though. FreeDOS 1.4 is just about to be released (first RC was January) and the software ecosystem sees a steady stream of updates.
Another fun fact: there’s another DOS system still being developed, namely SvarDOS (http://svardos.org/) which is a fork of Enhanced DR-DOS, itself being a successor to CP/M, first released in 1974.
Source: https://eylenburg.github.io/os_familytree.htm (use Ctrl+F to search for SvarDOS)
Yep. I wrote about it when it changed to the EDRDOS kernel:
https://www.theregister.com/2024/12/23/svardos_drdos_reborn/
Apart from the EDRDOS kernel and `COMMAND.COM` it is mostly FreeDOS — but it has its own network-aware package manager, which needs just a packet driver.
This is not accurate. SvarDOS is no fork of Enhanced DR-DOS, though it switched its default kernel to an EDR-DOS kernel fork (https://github.com/SvarDOS/edrdos). The kernel is actually replacable through the package manager. Currently the EDR and FreeDOS kernels are supported. So SvarDOS is a multi-kernel DOS.
SvarDOS is also not a fork of FreeDOS. The installer for example is an original development, like the shell (which is replacable) and the editor and package manager. It shares however many open source DOS tools with FreeDOS.
I remember hearing about that. It was hilariously complex and over engineered. They spared no expense to keep from shipping a computer with vanilla Debian on it. LOL
It was perfectly on brand for HP at the time. Overly complex and obtuse yet amazingly braindead.