aazard wrote on 2024-08-25, 16:46:

Did they also recompiled that GEOS.GEO?
As in same maker, different site profiles?

No, the context was just the quoted text. Not a big deal; just surprising in a, "That sounds like something I would have written... hey, wait a minute." kind-of way.

In any event, thank-you for your post! I've become an avid fan and user of GeoWorks Ensemble / NewDeal Office over the past several years and certainly think it deserves more attention.

Cloudschatze wrote on 2024-08-25, 18:48:

aazard wrote on 2024-08-25, 16:46:

Did they also recompiled that GEOS.GEO?
As in same maker, different site profiles?

No, the context was just the quoted text. Not a big deal; just surprising in a, "That sounds like something I would have written... hey, wait a minute." kind-of way.

In any event, thank-you for your post! I've become an avid fan and user of GeoWorks Ensemble / NewDeal Office over the past several years and certainly think it deserves more attention.

Sorry meaning went over my head. Great work!

I have recently become a fan of "lite'er" alternatives (& I despise Win3.x's shell) and NDO2000 tickles me (as does 286 Desktop2 & 8088 Costa).

aazard wrote on 2024-08-15, 18:31:

UPdated Kernel for Geoworks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble: WORKS ON XT's!!!! […]
Show full quote

UPdated Kernel for Geoworks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble: WORKS ON XT's!!!!

Updated Recompiled GEOS.GEO For Geoworks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble.
See images (this was on a 80286, but tests to work on an 8088)
PICTURE #14 is impressive (multi-tasking & on web, confirmed on a NEC V30 XT with 640kb)

MY REDDIT POST WITH GREATER DETAILS:
https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/com … al_office_2000/

My Archive.org reupload:
https://archive.org/details/geos_20240815

Ethernet Driver, EtherPKT.Geo:
https://archive.org/details/etherpt-2

EMU386:
https://survpc.tripod.com/emu386/download.htm

System requirements appear to remain:

• 8088 (NEC V20 or better, + FPU for best results. Tested on NEC V30HL + NEC D9008D FPU @ 16mhz )
• Less than 256 kB of RAM (more = better results, 1024kb+ would be ideal. Tested on 1024kb + PicoMem 5MB EMS card)
• Base DOS install (IBM PC-DOS 7.1 BLD134 used for testing)
• Supports VGA true/high
• Supports Ethernet (driver above)

TO INSTALL/USE:

• Install GEOS, New Deal Office, Breadbox Ensemble (I suggest New Deal Office 2000 on an XT)
• Complete setup as normal, boot into it once & reboot to DOS
• Replace your SYSTEM\GEOS.GEO with it
• Reboot as normal
• I Suggest use of EMU386 if you have the memory to spare for it. Will work on NEC V20 or better with 8086-2 instruction set

Adds:

• Still boots & works on an XT 8088/8086, NEC V20/V30 with 640kb (tested on V30)
• SSL and HTML4 in the browser
• JPEG viewing support (in browser at very least)
• PDF that supports PDF 1.0-1.3 and then some.
• See images (this was on a 80286, but tests to work on an 8088)

Notably: READ THIS 1ST ONE, ABSORB, SERIOUSLY!

"So, I re-compiled latest FreeGEOS kernel with 32-bit support off and dropped it into NewDeal Office 2000 install. It boots and it works, there is SSL and HTML4 in the browser, and there's PDF that supports PDF 1.0-1.3 and then some. It works with acceptable speed, in fact."

&

"Nice bonus: even if MediaViewer doesn't seem to support JPEG files, they can be opened in browser. It is a very big deal for a 286 machine"

Found at:
https://tech.lgbt/@nina_kali_nina/111653827347219206

///

EtherPKT.GEO Note:

EtherPKT.Geo, GeoWorks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble ethernet driver.

NC_Quite.zip is This is a custom-compiled version of mTCP's Netcat utility mentioned.

Two Ether packet drivers. The driver in the ETHER_1 folder seems to be a bit older and a bit smaller. The driver in the ETHER_2 folder is the one from Thomas' download link. Which of the two works better is unclear.

I've been successfully using ETHERPKT.GEO with a NewDeal Office 3.2a setup for the past day-or-so, per an adaptation of this configuration.

Here is a generalized procedure:

1. Place ETHERPKT.GEO in the \SYSTEM\SOCKET subdirectory of your NDO installation.​

2. Load the packet driver for your particular NIC.​

3. Configure and run "DHCP" from Mike Brutman's mTCP package, taking note of the returned IP information.​

4. Edit your GEOS.INI file to reflect the following for the [tcpip], [accpnt], and [accessPoint0001] sections. Populate the relevant IP fields with the information returned by the DHCP utility.​

Code:
[tcpip]
driver = TCP/IP Driver
driverType = 0
link = Packet Ethernet Driver
linkDomain = Packet Ethernet
port = 2

[accpnt]
prevID = 4
contents = {
00010001
}

[accessPoint0001]
name = LAN
netType = 1
default = 1
ipaddr = x.x.x.x
ipgate = x.x.x.x
ipmask = x.x.x.x
dns1 = x.x.x.x

5. Fire-up NDO, and go to town.​

There has been mention of the "ipaddr" field of the GEOS.INI file being dynamic if set to "0.0.0.0," but this failed to work for me. Also, it's worth noting that, in the absence of DHCP persistence in your environment, the expiration of an IP lease may require regular updating of the static IP address in that field.

The only anomalous behavior worth mentioning in all of this is that, with my particular system, some quirk of the ETHERPKT.GEO driver causes the keyboard to become unresponsive when exiting back to DOS from NDO. As a workaround, I'm just initiating "Exit > Reboot the Computer" instead.

EDIT: liiks like OG poster (Cloudschatze) of info is here, here is the link:
https://forum.vcfed.org/index.php?threads/loo … 959/post-929465

That is SICK. Can it exploit 8514A clones for GUI acceleration like an ATI Graphics Vantage? If so, I may have a OS for my Micro 8088 when I finally get around to putting the finishing touches on it!

Jackal1983 wrote on 2024-08-26, 17:10:

aazard wrote on 2024-08-15, 18:31:

UPdated Kernel for Geoworks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble: WORKS ON XT's!!!! […]
Show full quote

UPdated Kernel for Geoworks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble: WORKS ON XT's!!!!

Updated Recompiled GEOS.GEO For Geoworks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble.
See images (this was on a 80286, but tests to work on an 8088)
PICTURE #14 is impressive (multi-tasking & on web, confirmed on a NEC V30 XT with 640kb)

MY REDDIT POST WITH GREATER DETAILS:
https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/com … al_office_2000/

My Archive.org reupload:
https://archive.org/details/geos_20240815

Ethernet Driver, EtherPKT.Geo:
https://archive.org/details/etherpt-2

EMU386:
https://survpc.tripod.com/emu386/download.htm

System requirements appear to remain:

• 8088 (NEC V20 or better, + FPU for best results. Tested on NEC V30HL + NEC D9008D FPU @ 16mhz )
• Less than 256 kB of RAM (more = better results, 1024kb+ would be ideal. Tested on 1024kb + PicoMem 5MB EMS card)
• Base DOS install (IBM PC-DOS 7.1 BLD134 used for testing)
• Supports VGA true/high
• Supports Ethernet (driver above)

TO INSTALL/USE:

• Install GEOS, New Deal Office, Breadbox Ensemble (I suggest New Deal Office 2000 on an XT)
• Complete setup as normal, boot into it once & reboot to DOS
• Replace your SYSTEM\GEOS.GEO with it
• Reboot as normal
• I Suggest use of EMU386 if you have the memory to spare for it. Will work on NEC V20 or better with 8086-2 instruction set

Adds:

• Still boots & works on an XT 8088/8086, NEC V20/V30 with 640kb (tested on V30)
• SSL and HTML4 in the browser
• JPEG viewing support (in browser at very least)
• PDF that supports PDF 1.0-1.3 and then some.
• See images (this was on a 80286, but tests to work on an 8088)

Notably: READ THIS 1ST ONE, ABSORB, SERIOUSLY!

"So, I re-compiled latest FreeGEOS kernel with 32-bit support off and dropped it into NewDeal Office 2000 install. It boots and it works, there is SSL and HTML4 in the browser, and there's PDF that supports PDF 1.0-1.3 and then some. It works with acceptable speed, in fact."

&

"Nice bonus: even if MediaViewer doesn't seem to support JPEG files, they can be opened in browser. It is a very big deal for a 286 machine"

Found at:
https://tech.lgbt/@nina_kali_nina/111653827347219206

///

EtherPKT.GEO Note:

EtherPKT.Geo, GeoWorks GEOS, New Deal Office & Breadbox Ensemble ethernet driver.

NC_Quite.zip is This is a custom-compiled version of mTCP's Netcat utility mentioned.

Two Ether packet drivers. The driver in the ETHER_1 folder seems to be a bit older and a bit smaller. The driver in the ETHER_2 folder is the one from Thomas' download link. Which of the two works better is unclear.

I've been successfully using ETHERPKT.GEO with a NewDeal Office 3.2a setup for the past day-or-so, per an adaptation of this configuration.

Here is a generalized procedure:

1. Place ETHERPKT.GEO in the \SYSTEM\SOCKET subdirectory of your NDO installation.​

2. Load the packet driver for your particular NIC.​

3. Configure and run "DHCP" from Mike Brutman's mTCP package, taking note of the returned IP information.​

4. Edit your GEOS.INI file to reflect the following for the [tcpip], [accpnt], and [accessPoint0001] sections. Populate the relevant IP fields with the information returned by the DHCP utility.​

Code:
[tcpip]
driver = TCP/IP Driver
driverType = 0
link = Packet Ethernet Driver
linkDomain = Packet Ethernet
port = 2

[accpnt]
prevID = 4
contents = {
00010001
}

[accessPoint0001]
name = LAN
netType = 1
default = 1
ipaddr = x.x.x.x
ipgate = x.x.x.x
ipmask = x.x.x.x
dns1 = x.x.x.x

5. Fire-up NDO, and go to town.​

There has been mention of the "ipaddr" field of the GEOS.INI file being dynamic if set to "0.0.0.0," but this failed to work for me. Also, it's worth noting that, in the absence of DHCP persistence in your environment, the expiration of an IP lease may require regular updating of the static IP address in that field.

The only anomalous behavior worth mentioning in all of this is that, with my particular system, some quirk of the ETHERPKT.GEO driver causes the keyboard to become unresponsive when exiting back to DOS from NDO. As a workaround, I'm just initiating "Exit > Reboot the Computer" instead.

EDIT: liiks like OG poster (Cloudschatze) of info is here, here is the link:
https://forum.vcfed.org/index.php?threads/loo … 959/post-929465

That is SICK. Can it exploit 8514A clones for GUI acceleration like an ATI Graphics Vantage? If so, I may have a OS for my Micro 8088 when I finally get around to putting the finishing touches on it!

way past me, I like to tinker, but this is outside my experience (actually recompiling open-sourced software).
Also, NDO200/GEOS is only a GUI Shell for DOS, I dont think they do much that couldn't be replicated with separate applications inside DOS (but I am hardly an expert, please correct me if needed)

3 small adds:

1. I would ask the OG poster linked, and/or ask the ascended masters present on Vogons.
2. But from my understanding "v4" or Breadbox Ensemble is a i386 app, but New Deal Office 2000 and previous are not (I have heard they are improvements on v2 code base, all working on 8088's, but this is "hear say").. but can this mentioned geos kernel be used/the kernel be recompiled to 16bit now that its "free'ed"... again somewhat past me
3. I also "believe" from reading that most parts of NDO2000 are able to be "tinkered" with, minus the web browser (I am unsure why, someone likley "owns" it)

756kb (including "setup.exe" & "mouse.com"), can be "optimized" (remove 24 extra themes/icons/etc) shrinking it, making it under 300kb in size (or even less)

Github: https://github.com/jacobpalm/costa

Has 25x themes, including default theme, 72x icons, 2x Games (TicTacToe & MineSweeper) & 2x Apps (Calculator & Text editor), and 16kb "help/manual" txt
All Docs, Games, Apps, All icons (but 1) & Themes (but 1) & Theme/Icon Editors can be removed (it appears to work totally modularly)

The Costa GUI

Costa is a graphical user interface (GUI), designed to run on top of the command line as a shell.

The low system requirements make Costa especially useful for older machines, which are also the machines that typically run the MS-DOS operating system.

System requirements
Costa is designed for MS-DOS, but tested with PC-DOS, DR-DOS, FreeDOS, Novell DR Multiuser DOS and DOSBox as well. In theory it should run on any IBM compatible system with:

Note: v1.7.1 forward removed specific VGA for EGA, but still works fine on VGA in my own tests:

From Releases Github Page: VGA support has been removed, as EGA 640x350 looks good on both old CRT monitors, and modern widescreen monitors where the aspect radio fits nicely.

1. An 8088 or better CPU (386 or better recommended)
2. EGA (256KB or more VRAM required) or VGA graphics (any VGA compatible card should do) ** Incorrect spoke to Dev Jacob, EGA Mode should only need 64kb vram
3. A recommended minimum of 200 KB available memory while running Costa. When running external programs or games, Costa will exit first and then reload after, taking no memory from your other programs.
4. MS-DOS 4.0 or newer, or a compatible operating system

Although not required, a 386 or better CPU is recommended, as well as disk caching software (SmartDrive or similar) when running on older machines. Costa uses the path defined in the TEMP environment variable in AUTOEXEC.BAT for temporary file storage, so it is possible to use a RAM disk if desired. If TEMP is not defined, Costa will use the path where it is located.

///

IMHO:
This is an excellent "GUI shell" for very old PC's (8088's), its basically a minimal launcher/file manager. Nice for an emergency boot disk if you have the space/trim it

analog_programmer wrote on 2024-02-29, 13:00:

lEEt/OS + ST-DOS […]
Show full quote

lEEt/OS + ST-DOS

"lEEt/OS is a graphical shell and partially posix-compliant multitasking operating environment that runs on top of a DOS kernel...

lEEt/OS also has its own DOS kernel, but it is still very experimental and unstable. For any real use it is recommended to use lEEt/OS on top of the FreeDOS kernel.
lEEt/OS is slowly but surely migrating from FreeDOS to ST-DOS, its own DOS kernel.

lEEt/OS is licensed with GPLv3 license."

System requirements for version 2:
* Intel 8088 or compatible processor
* 256 kB of RAM
* CGA or better graphics adapter
* 300 kB of floppy or hard disk space
* IBM PC-compatible BIOS

Now says:

The first thing you need to do is installing ST-DOS. Without its DOS kernel lEEt/OS will not work. The install procedure goes like this:

Pretty much sank project for common use? no? Why drop support for PC-DOS/MS-DOS/FreeDOS?
May be I misunderstand why?

aazard wrote on 2024-08-28, 00:48:

Now says: […]
Show full quote

Now says:

The first thing you need to do is installing ST-DOS. Without its DOS kernel lEEt/OS will not work. The install procedure goes like this:

Pretty much sank project for common use? no? Why drop support for PC-DOS/MS-DOS/FreeDOS?
May be I misunderstand why?

As I can see ST-DOS is still there.

"Features
Support for large disks and 2 GB FAT filesystems
Dynamic disk caching
Dynamic file buffering
Mostly MS-DOS-compatible API - most DOS programs should work
Can create and mount disk images
Calls DOS idle handler (int 28h) also during disk I/O
Symbolic links"

Obviously lEEt/OS runs on top of it.

analog_programmer wrote on 2024-08-28, 03:15:

As I can see ST-DOS is still there. […]
Show full quote

aazard wrote on 2024-08-28, 00:48:

Now says: […]
Show full quote

Now says:

The first thing you need to do is installing ST-DOS. Without its DOS kernel lEEt/OS will not work. The install procedure goes like this:

Pretty much sank project for common use? no? Why drop support for PC-DOS/MS-DOS/FreeDOS?
May be I misunderstand why?

As I can see ST-DOS is still there.

"Features
Support for large disks and 2 GB FAT filesystems
Dynamic disk caching
Dynamic file buffering
Mostly MS-DOS-compatible API - most DOS programs should work
Can create and mount disk images
Calls DOS idle handler (int 28h) also during disk I/O
Symbolic links"

Obviously lEEt/OS runs on top of it.

I'd love to confirm with dev, but see no contact info

aazard wrote on 2024-08-28, 03:28:

I'd love to confirm with dev, but see no contact info

I think I found developer's YT-channel (seems like there's not much of PC related stuff): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vcmf9y_hrc

Just tried Breadbox Ensemble and Costa GUI on top of M$-DOS 7.10. Both seems like Norton Commander (and clones) killers - small and fast DOS graphical environments. Of course Breadbox Ensemble looks more mature and complete, it has those windows 95 vibes. Costa GUI reminds me of windows 2.0.

analog_programmer wrote on 2024-08-28, 13:12:

Just tried Breadbox Ensemble and Costa GUI on top of M$-DOS 7.10. Both seems like Norton Commander (and clones) killers - small and fast DOS graphical environments. Of course Breadbox Ensemble looks more mature and complete, it has those windows 95 vibes. Costa GUI reminds me of windows 2.0.

Breadbox Ensemble ( GEOS/Geoworks family, v4.x.x) is a highly polished commercial product. Its among my personal favorites in "New Deal Office 2000" (v3.x.x) release (due to insane low requirements, with powerful features).

Costa is a (highly dedicated/well done) 1-person dev'ed, and also very mature (half as old as GEOS mind you), hobby project.

Checkout the English/German program "Desktop2", if you want to fall out of your chair at "feature packed": http://www.mevis-research.de/~ritter/awakeideas/desktop.html

If I could re-write, or commission a re-writing, of a few in 16bit FASM or NASM, the space available would be "effectively vast overkill" ... even on a 360kb floppy, see the, 32bit, KolibriOS for example

aazard wrote on 2024-09-05, 13:19:

Checkout the English/German program "Desktop2", if you want to fall out of your chair at "feature packed": http://www.mevis-research.de/~ritter/awakeideas/desktop.html

If I could re-write, or commission a re-writing, of a few in 16bit FASM or NASM, the space available would be "effectively vast overkill" ... even on a 360kb floppy, see the, 32bit, KolibriOS for example

I've never heard of DESKTOP2, but looks good "on paper". From the screenshots given it reminds me of GEOS/Breadbox Ensemble. Thank you, I'll try this one.

I know those small KolibriOS and it's predecessor MenuetOS. Both of them are great projects, but they're DOS/windows incompatible, thus very limited in software which can be used with them.

It might be running a modern version of the kernel, but slackware is probably the most retro GNU/Linux distro you can get without going full BSD. Outside of occasional changes, it's exactly today as it was in the 90s. Package manager is just a bash script and you get zero dependency resolution automatic. It's both a fascination and time machine at the same time. Because the entire thing is meant to be installed offline, you could unlike other distros, do a full install of any version on any OS without internet access.

keen wrote on 2024-11-13, 19:13:

It might be running a modern version of the kernel, but slackware is probably the most retro GNU/Linux distro you can get withou […]
Show full quote

It might be running a modern version of the kernel, but slackware is probably the most retro GNU/Linux distro you can get without going full BSD. Outside of occasional changes, it's exactly today as it was in the 90s. Package manager is just a bash script and you get zero dependency resolution automatic. It's both a fascination and time machine at the same time. Because the entire thing is meant to be installed offline, you could unlike other distros, do a full install of any version on any OS without internet access.

This is more a curse than a blessing, though.. If you ever tried to use modern Slackware, you know. 🤣

keen wrote on 2024-11-13, 19:13:

It might be running a modern version of the kernel, but slackware is probably the most retro GNU/Linux distro you can get withou […]
Show full quote

It might be running a modern version of the kernel, but slackware is probably the most retro GNU/Linux distro you can get without going full BSD. Outside of occasional changes, it's exactly today as it was in the 90s. Package manager is just a bash script and you get zero dependency resolution automatic. It's both a fascination and time machine at the same time. Because the entire thing is meant to be installed offline, you could unlike other distros, do a full install of any version on any OS without internet access.

oh gosh what a nostalgic feelings 😀 reminds me of RedHat 6.0 I used to install on my pentium 😀

It may not fit in this thread, but not long ago I managed to stuff a modern Linux (Debian 12, to be exact) into my retro PC. The PC is a Pentium II machine with 256 MB of RAM. Apparently, the Debian installer needs at least 512 MB, so I did the installation in a VirtualBox VM. Apart from this initial pain, I did not have to do a lot of effort. The ISA sound card, and the 3Com network card were all automatically configured, and I could listen to some online radio.

Granted, it is only text mode for now, but it works. The bare system after boot consumes less than 30 MB of RAM.

I cannot imagine modern Windows on a retro PC.

SvarDOS

SvarDOS is an open-source project that is meant to integrate the best out of the currently available DOS tools, drivers and games. DOS development has been abandoned by commercial players a long time ago, mostly during early nineties. Nowadays it survives solely through the efforts of hobbyists and retro-enthusiasts, but this is a highly sparse and unorganized ecosystem. SvarDOS aims to collect available DOS software and make it easy to find and install applications using a network-enabled package manager (like apt-get, but for DOS and able to run on a 8086 PC).

Not an OS per se, but a fine retro GUI for DOS - MCShellGS 97 v3.1 !
Runs on 80286 minimum w/ VGA, but needs some XMS memory (2 MB up).
Reminiscence of System 7.x..

Features: Picture Viewer (BMP/PCX), Print Manager (Epson/Laserjet/Proprinter), Virtual Memory, Calculator etc.
File Manager: Copy/Format Disk, Search Files, Copy+Paste, etc.
Desktop: Wallpapers, Patterns, Clock, Sound Effects etc.

Oh wow, is this a contemporary thing or something made back in the day? That's like.. pretty cool. I never knew these shells existed back in the day. The only shell I ever used was DOSSHELL in DOS 5.9 and that was rather meh.. No idea why it was ever made or discontinued 😁

appiah4 wrote on 2025-01-30, 10:48:

Oh wow, is this a contemporary thing or something made back in the day? That's like.. pretty cool.
I never knew these shells existed back in the day. The only shell I ever used was DOSSHELL in DOS 5.9 and that was rather meh..
No idea why it was ever made or discontinued 😁

Hi! Yes, I think many here are indeed from back in the day. ^^
That MCShell is from 1996, for example and almost as old as the first popular web browsers,
such as Netscape Navigator 2.x, Internet Explorer 3.

DOS Shell was discontinued towards the end of the MS-DOS days because of Windows 3.11, I think.
MS-DOS 6.22 and WfW 3.11 were sold as bundles, often, so it made sense.

DOS Shell had it's height with MS-DOS 5, though and served as a counterpart to DR-DOS 5's ViewMax .
The nice thing about DOS Shell was that it could work in plain text-mode (using characters available in code page 437 and up), too.
I loved the "Emerald" theme, by the way! 😁

That being said, I also like PC-Tools Desktop, as part of Central Point PC-Tools 7.x. On MS-DOS! 😁
The colour scheme is nice, I think. Some later releases were sold by Symantec, who had bought it's arch rival.

Both Norton Utilities and PC-Tools were part of DOS history, because their utilities had been included in MS/PC-DOS.
In a nutshell, it was like this: MS-DOS -> Norton Utilities, IBM PC-DOS -> PC-Tools

The ANSI-capable terminal program in PC Tools Desktop was my favorite, next to BananaCom and Windows 2.x Terminal. ^^

PS: The new ones are cool, too! I'm glad new OSes and GUIs are still being made.
It makes these retro computers feel more "alive".

PS/2: As far as DOS is concerned, GeoWorks Ensemble is sort of a must have (latest version now free).
GeoWorks Ensemble may seem overrated these days, but it played an important part of history.
The folks at Microsoft (and Apple ?) even considered buying it, because it ran so well on low-end hardware.