Thirty years ago, we thought this only would happen when hell freezes over.
15 years later I spoke to Sam Ramj, then head of MS OSS labs, he told me it would take some time. I thought they were faster in Redmond. :-).
That was 2007. 16 years ago.
Here's the news:
Microsoft open sources MS-DOS. Repeat: The source code of MS-DOS is now #opensource #msdos 1 and 2, that is. Well, it's a start.
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How cool is that?! A new, so far unknown version of Stunts (a.k.a. 4D Sports Driving) for MS-DOS was just uploaded to archive.org. These 5.25" disks are dated from December of 1990 and the binary files are actually quite different compared to the later version.
just watched this video and noticed the channel only has a little over 600 subscribers. i know some of you #msdos nerds following me are into this so watch it and then subscribe to their channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_FdCxHOeyU
Growing up with MS-DOS, I knew its role in today's Windows' usage of \ to separate directories and / for command-line arguments (choices that sound quirk-y in an Unix-influenced world that uses / and -, respectively.)
I never understood why MSFT - a very Unix-aware shop, having released their XENIX a year before MS-DOS - went with such an odd choice, until I looked at the (recently open-sourced) MS-DOS source code.
The files include documentation for computer manufacturers (so they could write compatible BIOS code, customize distribution, etc.), and this piece on MS-DOS 2.0 (which introduced subdirectories) suggests that - as usual in those times - the party behind the odd decision was none other than IBM: