ms-dos

4 definitions found

ms-dos - WordNet (r) 2.1 (2005) :

  MS-DOS
      n 1: an operating system developed by Bill Gates for personal
           computers [syn: MS-DOS, Microsoft disk operating system
           ]

ms-dos - Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (26 May 2007) :

  Microsoft Disk Operating System
  Microsoft DOS
  MS-DOS
  
     <operating system> /M S doss/ (Or "MS-DOS", "PC-DOS",
     "MS-DOG", "mess-dos") Microsoft Corporation's clone of
     the CP/M disk operating system for the 8088 crufted
     together in 6 weeks by hacker Tim Paterson, who is said to
     have regretted it ever since.
  
     MS-DOS is a single user operating system that runs one
     program at a time and is limited to working with one megabyte
     of memory, 640 kilobytes of which is usable for the
     application program.  Special add-on EMS memory boards
     allow EMS-compliant software to exceed the 1 MB limit.
     Add-ons to DOS, such as Microsoft Windows and DESQview,
     take advantage of EMS and allow the user to have multiple
     applications loaded at once and switch between them.
  
     Numerous features, including vaguely Unix-like but rather
     broken support for subdirectories, I/O redirection and
     pipelines, were hacked into MS-DOS 2.0 and subsequent
     versions; as a result, there are two or more incompatible
     versions of many system calls, and MS-DOS programmers can
     never agree on basic things like what character to use as an
     option switch ("-" or "/").  The resulting mess became the
     highest-unit-volume operating system in history.  It was
     used on many Intel 16 and 32 bit microprocessors and IBM PC
      compatibles.
  
     Many of the original DOS functions were calls to BASIC (in
     ROM on the original IBM PC), e.g. Format and Mode.  People
     with non-IBM PCs had to buy MS-Basic (later called
     GWBasic).  Most version of DOS came with some version of
     BASIC.
  
     Also know as PC-DOS or simply DOS, ignoring the fact that
     there were many other OSes with that name, starting in the
     mid-1960s with IBM's first disk operating system for the
     IBM 360.
  
     [Jargon File]
  
     (2007-05-21)
  

ms-dos - Jargon File (4.4.4, 14 Aug 2003) :

  MS-DOS
   /M.S.dos/, n.
  
     [MicroSoft Disk Operating System] A clone of CP/M for the 8088
     crufted together in 6 weeks by hacker Tim Paterson at Seattle
  Computer
     Products, who called the original QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating
     System) and is said to have regretted it ever since. Microsoft
     licensed QDOS in order to have something to demo for IBM on time, and
     the rest is history. Numerous features, including vaguely Unix-like
     but rather broken support for subdirectories, I/O redirection, and
     pipelines, were hacked into Microsoft's 2.0 and subsequent versions;
     as a result, there are two or more incompatible versions of many
     system calls, and MS-DOS programmers can never agree on basic things
     like what character to use as an option switch or whether to be
     case-sensitive. The resulting appalling mess is now the
     highest-unit-volume OS in history. Often known simply as DOS, which
     annoys people familiar with other similarly abbreviated operating
     systems (the name goes back to the mid-1960s, when it was attached to
     IBM's first disk operating system for the 360). The name further
     annoys those who know what the term operating system does (or ought
     to) connote; DOS is more properly a set of relatively simple
  interrupt
     services. Some people like to pronounce DOS like "dose", as in "I
     don't work on dose, man!", or to compare it to a dose of
     brain-damaging drugs (a slogan button in wide circulation among
     hackers exhorts: "MS-DOS: Just say No!"). See mess-dos.
  

ms-dos - V.E.R.A. -- Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms (June 2006) :

  MSDOS
         MicroSoft Disk Operating System (MS, OS, PC)