5 ms·

My fav utility was the File Explorer predecessor, Norton Commander. Hopefully someone else remembers these great tools. :)

by martin1975 7y ago

pdonis 7y ago
Yes, Norton Commander was my go-to utility during the DOS era.
dakna 7y ago
Even today, on every OS, I still manage files using a two-pane window and the keyboard unless I'm using a terminal.
Shorel 7y ago
Yes. And I still find weird that Midnight Commander has no quick view functionality.
- scotty79 7y ago
  What's a quick view? I just press F3. It's quick enough for me.
  - Shorel 7y ago
    It means you have the file list on one panel and the contents on the other panel. So you scroll over the list and the contents update with each file. SMH
h2odragon 7y ago
Xtree was better
- Shendare 7y ago
  Norton Utilities, XTree Pro Gold, and Borland Sidekick were the tits on MS-DOS.
- EricE 7y ago
  With at least one other, I far preferred PC Tools. Until Symantec bought and canned them. PC Tools had a great tape backup program too - that was the real casualty of Symantec buying them. At least I'm still not bitter :p
- frankharv 7y ago
  I still use a Xtree clone and it is nice. https://www.han.de/~werner/ytree.html https://www.han.de/~werner/ytree.html
signal11 7y ago
nc was awesome — it still lives on in a way, as inspiration for Midnight Commander[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Commander https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Commander
Andrew_nenakhov 7y ago
The only piece of software from DOS/Windows I miss on Linux is an analog to Far Manager - THE descendant of Norton Commander app. No other 2 panel file managers come close, and mc just doesn't cut it. All those hotkeys are ingrained in my memory despite not using the application for more than 15 years.
- malkia 7y ago
  I've been using Far Manager since forever, but also "mc" on linux/osx machines (as you've said, it's not very useable on Windows itself, tried the cygwin version, and meh).
- jasonjayr 7y ago
  Windows Commander (now Total Commander) was/is still good. It was the first piece of shareware I registered, for Windows 3.1. It's still in development today, with an Android version!
  - saiya-jin 7y ago
    Total commander is a great successor I think. Once you get used to 2-pane logic, the efficiency boost with anything file-related is really huge. It is fast and has so many features - tabbed panes, quick recursive file content search, very nice comparison of 2 files, folders synchronization, built-in navigation in archives (I often edit files directly in packages, it recompresses them automatically) and archives within archives, great network/FTP browser and many more... it really packs few tens of great tools into one neat package. One of many detractors from Linux in the past from me - whenever I tried any equivalent there, it was very slow, featureless, crashing etc. I hope these days the situation is better. Whenever I look at any other colleague, who use that primitive File explorer or equivalent, how clunky and slow work it is, its sad that people don't do this one-time effort to transition to the tool which is so vastly better.
    - haspok 7y ago
      FYI: Total Commander runs on Linux with Wine fairly well. One notable problem with it (and Wine in general) is that it is not HiDPI-aware, so you get a miniature UI :( Having said that, I think Krusader comes pretty close with the right settings / keyboard shortcuts.
mhd 7y ago
For a short time, my nickname (not just internet pseudonym, but real-life monicker) was "ndos" as someone in my circle of nerdy friends liked to call me that (I actually used 4dos, not its licensed variant, but let's not be too pedantic). And yes, while it wasn't as great as the DOpus my Amiga friends always showed me, it was one of the great DOS apps.
glandium 7y ago
I was more of a PC Shell (from PC Tools) person.
gesman 7y ago
yum -y install mc :)
core-questions 7y ago
Does anyone remember the Norton Desktop shell for Windows 3.1? It turned 3.1 into something beating the Mac in terms of a desktop experience. Absolutely amazing levels of customization, a full shell scripting language with GUI components reminiscent of Tk/Wish, I could go on. That desktop plus the whole set of Windows 3.1 programs were a killer combo.
- mixmastamyk 7y ago
  Don’t remember it, but sounds neat.
  - core-questions 7y ago
    http://toastytech.com/guis/ndw.html http://toastytech.com/guis/ndw.html has some screenshots.
- jaclaz 7y ago
  Sure I remember it, it also came with a sort of scripting (very much batch-like) language. I remember writing a pseudo-GUI for PKzip in it at the time (WinZip was more or less the only graphical zip tool and it costed too much).
  - core-questions 7y ago
    Shame that so many interesting GUIs like this simply fell away, and meanwhile my Linux GNOME desktop still doesn't feel as obvious and powerful as that machine did back in 1994.
    - jaclaz 7y ago
      Well, there was also the MC Shell, you can get a copy from here (in case you get an attack of nostalgia and have a VM or a spare old-old machine available): http://reboot.pro/topic/752-mcshell-a-shell-look-a-like-to-mac-and-win31/ http://reboot.pro/topic/752-mcshell-a-shell-look-a-like-to-m...

My fav utility was the File Explorer predecessor, Norton Commander. Hopefully someone else remembers these great tools. :)

pdonis 7y ago

Yes, Norton Commander was my go-to utility during the DOS era.

dakna 7y ago

Even today, on every OS, I still manage files using a two-pane window and the keyboard unless I'm using a terminal.

Shorel 7y ago

Yes. And I still find weird that Midnight Commander has no quick view functionality.

scotty79 7y ago
What's a quick view? I just press F3. It's quick enough for me.
- Shorel 7y ago
  It means you have the file list on one panel and the contents on the other panel. So you scroll over the list and the contents update with each file. SMH

h2odragon 7y ago

Xtree was better

Shendare 7y ago
Norton Utilities, XTree Pro Gold, and Borland Sidekick were the tits on MS-DOS.
EricE 7y ago
With at least one other, I far preferred PC Tools. Until Symantec bought and canned them. PC Tools had a great tape backup program too - that was the real casualty of Symantec buying them. At least I'm still not bitter :p
frankharv 7y ago
I still use a Xtree clone and it is nice. https://www.han.de/~werner/ytree.html https://www.han.de/~werner/ytree.html

signal11 7y ago

nc was awesome — it still lives on in a way, as inspiration for Midnight Commander[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Commander https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Commander

Andrew_nenakhov 7y ago

The only piece of software from DOS/Windows I miss on Linux is an analog to Far Manager - THE descendant of Norton Commander app. No other 2 panel file managers come close, and mc just doesn't cut it. All those hotkeys are ingrained in my memory despite not using the application for more than 15 years.

malkia 7y ago
I've been using Far Manager since forever, but also "mc" on linux/osx machines (as you've said, it's not very useable on Windows itself, tried the cygwin version, and meh).
jasonjayr 7y ago
Windows Commander (now Total Commander) was/is still good. It was the first piece of shareware I registered, for Windows 3.1. It's still in development today, with an Android version!
- saiya-jin 7y ago
  Total commander is a great successor I think. Once you get used to 2-pane logic, the efficiency boost with anything file-related is really huge. It is fast and has so many features - tabbed panes, quick recursive file content search, very nice comparison of 2 files, folders synchronization, built-in navigation in archives (I often edit files directly in packages, it recompresses them automatically) and archives within archives, great network/FTP browser and many more... it really packs few tens of great tools into one neat package. One of many detractors from Linux in the past from me - whenever I tried any equivalent there, it was very slow, featureless, crashing etc. I hope these days the situation is better. Whenever I look at any other colleague, who use that primitive File explorer or equivalent, how clunky and slow work it is, its sad that people don't do this one-time effort to transition to the tool which is so vastly better.
  - haspok 7y ago
    FYI: Total Commander runs on Linux with Wine fairly well. One notable problem with it (and Wine in general) is that it is not HiDPI-aware, so you get a miniature UI :( Having said that, I think Krusader comes pretty close with the right settings / keyboard shortcuts.

mhd 7y ago

For a short time, my nickname (not just internet pseudonym, but real-life monicker) was "ndos" as someone in my circle of nerdy friends liked to call me that (I actually used 4dos, not its licensed variant, but let's not be too pedantic). And yes, while it wasn't as great as the DOpus my Amiga friends always showed me, it was one of the great DOS apps.

glandium 7y ago

I was more of a PC Shell (from PC Tools) person.

gesman 7y ago

yum -y install mc :)

core-questions 7y ago

Does anyone remember the Norton Desktop shell for Windows 3.1? It turned 3.1 into something beating the Mac in terms of a desktop experience. Absolutely amazing levels of customization, a full shell scripting language with GUI components reminiscent of Tk/Wish, I could go on. That desktop plus the whole set of Windows 3.1 programs were a killer combo.

mixmastamyk 7y ago
Don’t remember it, but sounds neat.
- core-questions 7y ago
  http://toastytech.com/guis/ndw.html http://toastytech.com/guis/ndw.html has some screenshots.
jaclaz 7y ago
Sure I remember it, it also came with a sort of scripting (very much batch-like) language. I remember writing a pseudo-GUI for PKzip in it at the time (WinZip was more or less the only graphical zip tool and it costed too much).
- core-questions 7y ago
  Shame that so many interesting GUIs like this simply fell away, and meanwhile my Linux GNOME desktop still doesn't feel as obvious and powerful as that machine did back in 1994.
  - jaclaz 7y ago
    Well, there was also the MC Shell, you can get a copy from here (in case you get an attack of nostalgia and have a VM or a spare old-old machine available): http://reboot.pro/topic/752-mcshell-a-shell-look-a-like-to-mac-and-win31/ http://reboot.pro/topic/752-mcshell-a-shell-look-a-like-to-m...