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Reminds me of https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DESQview https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DESQview and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_TopView https://en.m.wi

Reminds me of https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DESQview https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DESQview and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_TopView https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_TopView It'd be interesting to try this concept again on the wildly different computers we have now compared to 40 years ago. 4k monitors, high speed networks, dozens of cores, things are significantly different - might open some wildly exciting and new possibilities

skissane 1y ago
Also reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaWindows https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaWindows Although I’ve never succeeded in locating a copy of the spec, any implementations, even a screenshot… would be great if any of them turned up some day
- eschaton 1y ago
  This should have enough to build either an emulator or a window manager. https://bitsavers.org/pdf/displayIndustryAssociation/AlphaWindow_Software_Architecture_Rev_1.0_May1992.pdf https://bitsavers.org/pdf/displayIndustryAssociation/AlphaWi...
  - skissane 1y ago
    Also there is a firmware dump for the HP 700/70 which implemented it: https://bitsavers.org/pdf/hp/terminal/700/HP_700_70_C1093/ https://bitsavers.org/pdf/hp/terminal/700/HP_700_70_C1093/ Likewise for the Televideo 995-65: http://bitsavers.org/pdf/televideo/995/firmware/ http://bitsavers.org/pdf/televideo/995/firmware/
jd3 1y ago
I'm a fan of the tiles/patterns from DESQView/X https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16044021 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16044021
- kristopolous 1y ago
  I got Desqview/X running about 25 years ago on some Everex. An X Terminal that ran win16 software - Useless but fascinating. IIRC there was some additional minimal runtime stuff like perl/awk/sed that came with it kinda like MinGW later on
  - johng 1y ago
    Same experience here. It blew my mind but it wasn't really useable.
boznz 1y ago
and Borland Turbovision
ivolimmen 1y ago
... and visual basic 1.0 for DOS
nickdothutton 1y ago
Got hold of a free copy of this as a student, on underpowered PCs at college and it was a superpower.
icedchai 1y ago
I was just about to same the same thing! I remember briefly running DESQview on a 386SX, before installing Linux...

skissane 1y ago

Also reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaWindows https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaWindows Although I’ve never succeeded in locating a copy of the spec, any implementations, even a screenshot… would be great if any of them turned up some day

eschaton 1y ago
This should have enough to build either an emulator or a window manager. https://bitsavers.org/pdf/displayIndustryAssociation/AlphaWindow_Software_Architecture_Rev_1.0_May1992.pdf https://bitsavers.org/pdf/displayIndustryAssociation/AlphaWi...
- skissane 1y ago
  Also there is a firmware dump for the HP 700/70 which implemented it: https://bitsavers.org/pdf/hp/terminal/700/HP_700_70_C1093/ https://bitsavers.org/pdf/hp/terminal/700/HP_700_70_C1093/ Likewise for the Televideo 995-65: http://bitsavers.org/pdf/televideo/995/firmware/ http://bitsavers.org/pdf/televideo/995/firmware/

jd3 1y ago

I'm a fan of the tiles/patterns from DESQView/X https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16044021 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16044021

kristopolous 1y ago
I got Desqview/X running about 25 years ago on some Everex. An X Terminal that ran win16 software - Useless but fascinating. IIRC there was some additional minimal runtime stuff like perl/awk/sed that came with it kinda like MinGW later on
- johng 1y ago
  Same experience here. It blew my mind but it wasn't really useable.

boznz 1y ago

and Borland Turbovision

ivolimmen 1y ago

... and visual basic 1.0 for DOS

nickdothutton 1y ago

Got hold of a free copy of this as a student, on underpowered PCs at college and it was a superpower.

icedchai 1y ago

I was just about to same the same thing! I remember briefly running DESQview on a 386SX, before installing Linux...