4 ms·

MS-DOS user experience was extremely similar CP/M. In fact, one could safely say MS-DOS/PC-DOS only existed in the first place as a "quick and dirty" approximat

• zabzonk 7y ago
  This is true for MS-DOS 1.0, but 2.0 introduced tree-structured directories, which 8-bit CP/M didn't have.
  • p_l 7y ago
    2.0 was also the "breakout" version of MS-DOS that made it win over CP/M. It did it by introducing features inspired by another Microsoft OS, the Unix for 8080 known as Xenix: - tree structured directories - pipes - output redirection - DEV directory (mostly hidden as it didn't catch on, afaik)
• smacktoward 7y ago
  So similar, in fact, that it led to years of allegations that MS-DOS was a ripoff of Digital Research's intellectual property (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/86-DOS#Intellectual_property_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/86-DOS#Intellectual_property_d...). > one could safely say MS-DOS/PC-DOS only existed in the first place as a "quick and dirty" approximation of CP/M One could indeed, especially seeing how the original name of the product Microsoft acquired and turned into MS-DOS 1.0 was QDOS, which stood for "Quick and Dirty Operating System" (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/86-DOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/86-DOS) :-D
• laumars 7y ago
  The story is weirder than not just agreeing to licensing terms. Gary Kildall (of Digital Research) and IBM have wildly conflicting versions of how their meeting went. To the point that I don't think the exact circumstances will ever be clear.
  • mehrdada 7y ago
    I've only ever heard of the IBM/MS side of the story. Where can we find Gary Kildall's version?
    • bake 7y ago
      It's out of print now, but "Hard Drive" by James Wallace and Jim Erickson tells it: https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Drive-Making-Microsoft-Empire/dp/0471568864 https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Drive-Making-Microsoft-Empire/dp...
• wvenable 7y ago
  The MS-DOS Program Segment Prefix[1] exists for source compatibility with CP/M. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_Segment_Prefix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_Segment_Prefix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_page_(CP/M) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_page_(CP/M)
  • sedatk 7y ago
    Also, first 9 or so functions of INT 21h were directly analogous to CP/M's BDOS. DOS also used FCB similar to CP/M.