• Disable RAID or AHCI in the BIOS. Remember to set it back or else Windows gets all mad.
• When booting FreeDOS, at the memory settings menu, select optimal not silent or quiet. It should be the second option. Make sure to boot without APM.

• My “FreeDOS primer” doesn’t advise on making bootable floppy images
• My “USB boot…” article assumes a prebuilt disk image
• BIOS updates may require the ability to execute a DOS program

Requirements

Toolchain components:

• unzip (latest v6.0, with v6.1 in public beta),
• mtools (latest v4.0.15),
• nasm (latest v2.10rc2),
• sys-freedos

Floppy content:

• Kernel (latest is 2.0.39; I’ve been using v2.0.36 for some time);
  various kernels for download here

• command.com v0.83b26
• Other utilities: see FreeDOS primer for recommendations

Step 1: Toolchain build

1a. mtools and nasm: these packages have configure scripts. Simply set an appropriate –prefix, then run `make` and `make install`.

1b. unzip: unzip is Makefile-based for Unix and Unix-like systems. You will need to:

1. ensure the sanity of ‘CC’ in unix/Makefile
2. run `make -f unix/Makefile generic`
3. copy ‘unzip’, ‘funzip’, ‘unzipsfx’ to toolchain

1c. sys-freedos: this is a perl script, and therefore doesn’t have a compilation stage. You will need to:

1. copy ‘bootsecs’ to toolchain’s /etc
2. edit sys-freedos.pl to reference this directory
3. copy the adapted script to your toolchain

Step 2: Populate staging directory

Create a directory and copy in the binaries from their respective archives, e.g:

fd-kernel: bin/kernel.sys

fd-sys: bin/sys.com (this is also present in some kernel archives)

fdisk: PROGRAM/FDISK.EXE, PROGRAM/FDISK.INI, PROGRAM/FDISKPT.INI

format: bin/format.exe

Step 3: Create/populate disk image

Create file of required size: dd if=/dev/zero of=${DISKIMG} bs=1k count=1440

Create filesystem: /sbin/mkfs -t msdos ${DISKIMG}

Make image bootable: sys-freedos --disk=${DISKIMG} --offset=0 --drive=0

Populate with kernel, etc: mcopy -i ${DISKIMG} -s ${STAGINGDIR}/* ::

Now, to avoid the XY Problem, I’ll tell you my evil plan: I want to browse the web using Arachne inside FreeDOS running on top of QEMU or VirtualBox (but I’d avoid it), inside Xubuntu.

Now, I installed almost all FreeDOS disksets, I configured Crynwr with the NE2k driver for QEMU (and the PCnet (?) driver for VirtualBox) and I configured both WatTCP and Arachne with BOOTP/DHCP. The result? Failure, of course.

Now, I think I’ll try running QEMU manually on my disk image and pray it works. I’ll post back if it does.

• DOS installation with edit (e.g. FreeDOS; see FreeDOS primer)
  )

• Linux distribution (pre-2.6) with UMSDOS support (e.g. “Zipslack” from Slackware; filenames and system requirements will certainly vary with other distributions – see the relevant documentation)
• Loadlin (typically supplied, but also available from here)

Preparation

1. Create virtual machine with 64MB RAM, 192MB hard disk,
2. mount FreeDOS install CD; start the machine so it boots,
3. format the hard disk with 16MB partition for DOS and remainder for data,
4. reboot; install DOS,
5. import and unzip loadlin and Zipslack to the root of the data partition (e.g. D:\),
6. examine linux.bat (in D:\linux) for the “IDE hard drives” section; edit to suit the data partition location (e.g. /dev/hda2 if D: is the second partition of the first hard disk),
7. run linux.bat under DOS and enjoy; note that kernels with UMSDOS support have their containing drive available under either / (D:\linux) or /DOS (D:\).

Miscellany

My template for loadlin configuration files is:

${KERNEL}

root=/dev/hda1 rw
ramdisk=0,no
#initrd=initrd.mnz ramdisk_size=1536

# kernel parameters
debug
no387
#               vga=ask,vga=extended
vga=normal

# confused ide0 interface?
#ide0=noprobe ide0=0x1f0,0x3f6,14

#[ZIP]          #aha152x=0x140,10,7,1
#[ZIP]          #max_scsi_luns=1
#ether=10,0x280,0xc8000,0xcbfff,eth0
#sound=0x0TTPPPID

• dosfstools (currently v3.0.9) or equivalent, for formatting the device;
• GrUB bootloader
• memdisk (from syslinux v3.86), unless booting kernels directly
• memtest86 or memtest86+ or other suitable disk image (see FreeDOS Primer) or kernel/initrd combination

Step 1: Partition the device as desired, noting that the ‘bootable’ flag can be left unset unless the booted operating system requires it. Format with a file system that GrUB can read (e.g.
FAT, minix, ext2, …); see mkdosfs guides re ‘-F’ (set msdosfs FAT size) if applicable.

2. Populate /boot/grub on the device by mounting the filesystem where GrUB is to be installed and issuing `cd /mnt/sdc1 && grub-install --root-directory=. /dev/sdc` as suits the device and mount point; this adds the “stage 1.5″ files and configures device.map. The ‘cd’ command may be omitted if the path to the mount point does not contain spaces (some versions of GrUB don’t handle this well).

Optional alternative step: Place ‘stage1′, ‘stage2′ and related files manually and use the GrUB shell or an existing GrUB installation to issue `install (DEVICENAME)/boot/grub/stage1 (DEVICENAME) (DEVICENAME)/boot/grub/stage2` as appropriate. This is useful if a second machine is available should ‘grub-install’ fail with “[devicename] does not have any corresponding BIOS drive”.

3. Create a suitable menu.lst. Set a suitable prompt timeout. Configuration of ‘default’ and ‘fallback’ selection settings is optional. Note that GrUB has ‘root’, ‘makeactive’, and ‘chainloader’ runtime commands to handle boot loaders which expect partition tables to have the primary boot partition entry marked bootable.

Some example stanzas from my current setup follow:

## FreeDOS ODIN 0.7 (has USB drive support) -- at http://odin.fdos.org/odin2005/

title FreeDOS odin0.7 (1440K version, via memdisk)
	kernel /boot/memdisk/memdisk
	initrd /boot/odin1440.img.gz

## Tiny Core, a minimal linux desktop system

title TinyCore
	kernel /boot/bz_tc11.lx
	initrd /boot/rfs_tc11.gz
	append base

## Debian live

title   Linux (Debian Live, standard)
        root (hd0,0)
        kernel /boot/deblive.lx boot=live noautologin union=aufs
        initrd /boot/deblive.rd

## Debian Live failsafe

title   Linux (Debian Live, failsafe)
        root (hd0,0)
        kernel /boot/deblive.lx boot=live noautologin union=aufs  noapic noapm nodma nomce nolapic nosmp vga=normal
        initrd /boot/deblive.rd

## EeePC (Xandros) linux -- boot kernel direct from HDD

title	Linux (EeePC HDD)
	root (hd1,0)
	kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.21.4-eeepc quiet rw vga=785 irqpoll
i8042.noloop=1 root=/dev/sda1
	initrd /boot/initramfs-eeepc.img

## memtest memory tester -- works like booting a regular kernel

title	memtest
	kernel /boot/memtest.bin

## Other OS by chainload of boot sector

# FAT filesystem can be read by GrUB; NTFS can't -- use 'noverify'
# (should also 'noverify' "late" files/partitions on LBA disks [v0.5.95])
title		Willow Win95 (C:, FAT)
root (hd0,0)
#rootnoverify (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1
boot

Related Resources

• Installing GrUB on a USB drive
  

• Virtualbox, or QEmu 0.12.2 w/ SDL 1.2.14;
• FreeDOS (see ODIN) boot disk or CD image;
• suitably-sized hard disk image;
• (optional) mtools for writing to disk images.

Step 1. Hard Disk Partition Table Configuration

1. Boot with floppy as primary boot device
2. Boot via selection “Start FreeDOS for 386 + HIMEM” (the default)
3. Set up a partition table on the hard disk with `fdisk`; reboot as prompted

Step 2. HDD Setup

1. Boot with floppy as primary boot device, same boot option as before
2. Run `format c: /s` and note the appearance of ‘kernel.sys’ and ‘command.com’ on target drive. It should now be possible to reboot the machine with the internal drive as the primary boot device (needs `fdisk /mbr` as well if the disk was not previously bootable).

Step 3. Useful utilities

(Filenames are those provided on the ODIN disk image)

• fdisk and format (fdisk.exe, fdisk.ini, fdiskpt.ini, format.exe) for disk creation
• chkdsk and defrag (chkdsk.exe, defrag.exe, defrag.hlp) for disk management
• edit and more (edit.exe, edit.hlp, more.exe) for editing/showing files
• unzip (unzip.exe) for extracting archives
• xcopy (xcopy.exe) for copying directory trees
• devload (devload.com), shsucdx (shsucdx.com), x[g]cdrom (xgcdrom.sys), for reading CDs and disk images.

Disk Image Generation:

1. Create and format: `mformat -C -f 1440 -i x1440a.img ::`
2. Populating: `mcopy -i x1440a.img infile.1 infile.2 [...] ::`

Mounting CDs

1. Type `devload /h \dos\drivers\xgcdrom.sys /d:cdrom001` (or add the line `device[high]=\dos\drivers\xgcdrom.sys /d:cdrom001` to [fd]config.sys permanently)
2. Run `shsucdx /d:cdrom001,D` to load the disk (later, `shsucdx /u` to unload it)

(If this fails with “Need more drive letters” you should add a `lastdrive <X>` directive to config.sys on the boot drive)

Éste proyecto surgió cuando el antiguo MS-DOS se dejó de vender y de dar soporte él. Entonces, se propuso hacer un clon libre de él, pues mucha gente aún lo usaba (y se siguió usando posteriormente, como parte de Windows hasta Windows ME, pues si DOS no podía arrancar, si bien no se vendía por separado y era, por tanto, inseparable de Windows).

¿Cuáles son las ventajas respecto a su antecesor? Pues FreeDOS, como proyecto de Software, ha ido evolucionando tal como lo ha hecho el hardware y, por ejemplo, soporta discos duros grandes (entendiendo como tales aquellos mayores de 128 GB, que era la limitación previa), soporta FAT32 así como la internacionalización, ésto es, que se pueda usar en el idioma que se quiera.

Os dejo con una captura de pantalla suya:

Pues poco más que decir, si os ha gustado, echadle un vistazo a la web de FreeDOS.

Schritt 1: Die Diskette
Für eine FreeDOS Diskette benötigt ihr eine normale 3,5″ Diskette mit 1,44MB Speicherplatz. Diese müsst ihr vorbereiten, damit ihr später eine bootfahige Diskette erstellen könnt. Und zwar formatiert ihr die Diskette wie folgt:
“Arbeitsplatz” -> Rechtsklick auf “A:” -> “Formatieren”
Hier wählt ihr bei “Speicherkapazität” die Option -> 3,5″, 1,44MB, 512Bytes/Sektor <- und bei “Größe der Zuordnungseinheit” stellt ihr auf 512. Bei Volumenbezeichn ung könnt ihr der Diskette einen “Namen” geben. Dann klickt auf “Starten”. Während ihr formatiert, könnt ihr schonmal die Daten für die Diskette herunter laden. Ihr benötigt dazu die Datei “odin7bin.zip“, welche ihr hier direkt von meinem Server herunter laden könnt. Dann entpackt die Datei.

Wenn die formatierung abgeschlossen ist, geht auf “Start” -> “Ausführen”, gebt “command” ein und bestätigt mit “Ok”. Nun öffnet sich ein Command Promt, auch als Shell-fenster oder Dos-fenster bezeichnet. dort gebt ihr folgenden befehl ein:
c:\Downloads\odin7bin\diskcopy fdodin07.144 A:
Den roten bereich müsst ihr natürlich zu dem entpackziel eurer odin7bin.zip abändern. Nun wird die datei fdodin07.144 auf die diskette entpackt. Legt ihr nun die Diskette ein und startet den Computer, bootet FreeDOS.

Alle Angaben sind ohne Gewähr, die Benutzung ist auf eigene Gefahr und daher ist eine Haftung ausgeschlossen.

Las empresas que venden estos notebooks sin Windows son PC-Planet y Andigraf. Sin embargo, también venden notebooks con Windows. Apoyemos la iniciativa tomada por estas empresas, comprando notebooks que no tengan Windows preinstalado. De esta forma, otras empresas de ventas de computadores verán que esto es un buen negocio y harán lo mismo. Recordemos que al comprar un notebook o un computador con Windows, estamos pagando la licencia de Windows y por lo tanto estamos financiando a una empresa que hace software no libre. Ahora tenemos la oportunidad de no hacerlo.

Enlace relacionado:
FayerWayer: HP vende PCs sin Windows, pero de verdad

1.- Uso de algun live CD linux que tenga NTFS 3G, por todo aquel rollo de leer/escribir en dichas particiones (por ahora no tengo no tengo ninguno, pero estoy buscando, supongo que el nuevo knopix lo incluye) o,

2.- Uso de PE Builder, con esto creamos un live cd de windows xp que nos puede ser de mucha utilidad a la hora de modificar cosas en una maquina infectada, solo debemos arrancar la maquina con ese CD y luego tendremos un entorno de trabajo parecido a windows xp, incluso hasta podremos navegar en internet, para bajarnos cualquier cosa que nos haga falta, y para borrar archivos se puede abrir una ventana DOS que a punta de comandos basicos pueden hacer de todo.

De mas esta decir, de seguro no es la unica manera, pero si han probado de todo (arranque a prueba de fallos, programas xxxx, etc) no esta de mas probar.

Como construyo el live CD de windows xp? en este misma pagina esta toda la información:

http://prog-asm.blogspot.com/2007/04/pe-builder-crea-cd-booteable-de-windows.html

Tambien se me ocurre pueden probrar freedos, este interesante proyecto tiene un live cd bastante interesante que vale la pena explorar, en esta pagina tambien la hemos tratado:

http://prog-asm.blogspot.com/search/label/FreeDos

This is indeed a cool site for those of us DOS lovers.

We are a generation born under the legacy of the DOS prompt . Yes! for  hundred millions of us, this is the reason why we still love the retro- speed and stability of DOS, rather than the monotonous interaction through zillions of mouse clicks in the slow pace of the Windows environment.

Many school graduates do not dive into the depth,  and do not taste the power behind the shell, saved for a few lines of commands learned in a hurry in order to pass the A plus exam;  sad but true.

Have fun!

http://oldfiles.org.uk/

and for those who love nothing but graphics here is a good site below with history of graphics environments:

http://www.guidebookgallery.org/index

Start-up revives once-vaunted DR-DOS

By Deni Connor, Network World, 12/16/02

LINDON, UTAH – A start-up is looking to dust off and buff up DR-DOS, a largely dormant operating system that still attracts a hardcore following but is best-known for a colorful past that some see checkered with missed opportunity.

DeviceLogics, a company co-founded last month by Bryan Sparks, former CEO and founder of Linux vendors’ Lineo (now Embedix) and Caldera Systems (now SCO Group), has bought DR-DOS, which once competed against Microsoft’s MS-DOS.

DeviceLogics purchased DR-DOS from Lineo, where it underwent minor functional development during the past few years. The start-up will develop a compact operating system – for kiosks, automated teller machines, point-of-sale devices, handheld computers and desktop PCs running legacy DOS applications. Observers say the operating system, which is expected to ship in the first quarter of next year, could be more efficient and less expensive than Windows XP Embedded, Windows CE or Linux.
Interest level high

“There are still a lot of people running DR-DOS on single PCs,” says Troy Tribe, vice president of sales and marketing at DeviceLogics. “We are going to revise DR-DOS for the desktop, as well as provide a kiosk, embedded, point-of-sale and a handheld version. People are now having to do that work on their own.”

Digital Research developed DR-DOS, a 32-bit operating system, in 1987 as a fully compatible alternative to MS-DOS for 80286- and 80386-based PCs. It succeeded creator Gary Kildall’s Control Program for Microcomputers (CP/M). The most popular legend told is that Kildall, the CEO of Intergalactic Digital Research (later shortened to Digital Research), was piloting his plane the day IBM approached the company about licensing CP/M for its first microcomputer – instead, IBM signed Microsoft’s MS-DOS.

In 1991, Novell acquired Digital Research, DR-DOS and CP/M, with plans to compete against MS-DOS in the DOS market. When Novell CEO Ray Noorda failed to capitalize on the plan to take over the DOS market, Novell sold DR-DOS to Caldera in 1996. Caldera, which Sparks founded with Noorda’s assistance, then sued Microsoft for lost sales and unfair competition and settled out of court for an unspecified amount.
Simple development

Analysts say embedded DOS is important in that the development environment is simplified because the code is compact and the devices that use it often do not require a keyboard, mouse or more-complicated Windows-like display.

“It would probably be much smaller [than XP Embedded], take less machine resources, and because it is inherently simpler, some tasks would run faster,” says Dan Kuznetsky, research director at IDC. “DOS runs very well in a small system by today’s standards.”
Challenges ahead

However, Kuznetsky says getting an embedded operating system such as DR-DOS accepted would not be without challenges.

“It would not necessarily have the same security or development tools that are up to today’s standards; that would be a challenge,” he says.

DeviceLogics says it will introduce a software developer kit in the first half of next year.

Users within IT organizations have mixed opinions about using DOS.

“We do have DOS applications running on legacy dedicated hardware that’s sitting on real-time control systems, which simulate the hardware they are controlling,” says Peter DaSilva, consulting engineer at ABB, a power and automation technology company in Houston. “We don’t have any anticipation of upgrading them – ever.”

Others say having a command-line operating system available such as DOS is still the most direct way to troubleshoot a system.

“DOS is still the best way to run recovery programs, low-level disk utilities, removal of computer viruses, the flashing of the system BIOS and diagnostics,” says Jeff Johnson, an IT consultant in Boca Raton, Fla.

Johnson says that if DeviceLogics added features to DR-DOS that eliminated the need for commonly used utilities such as 4DOS and the Quarterdeck Expanded Memory Manager, while maintaining a small conventional memory footprint and compatibility, it would increase the chances of use by end users, PC hobbyists and developers.

DR-DOS will compete against a variety of other DOS implementations, including DataLight’s ROM-DOS, Paragon Software’s PTS DOS 2000 Pro and IBM’s PC DOS for Embedded Devices. In addition, an open source version of FreeDOS is available.

Click to see:
PROFILE: DEVICELOGICS
Location: Salt Lake City
Founded: November 2002
Product name: DR-DOS
Product type: Embedded operating system
Ship date: First quarter 2003
Founders: Bryan Sparks, CEO; Troy Tribe, vice president of sales and marketing; Bryce Burns, vice president of operations.
Funding: Self-funded
Fast fact: Sparks’ Caldera started the first of two antitrust trials against Microsoft.

All contents copyright 1995-2007 Network World, Inc. http://www.networkworld.com

O programa está quase usável. A parte da porta serial está pronta mas em relação à paralea estamos (estou) tendo problemas para conseguir acessar os dados de fora do QEmu. Tentei redirecionar para arquivo, console, tcp e nada. No caso do TCP (Que é o mesmo que estamos usando para a serial), o QEmu simplesmente some, apenas às vezes deixando a mensagem de falha de segmentação…

Alguma sugestão?

Seither wurde an FreeDOS gearbeitet, mit dem Ziel, ein vollständig zu MS-DOS kompatibles “Betriebssystem” zu implementieren (inklusive FAT32-Unterstützung und integriertem CD-ROM-Treiber). Dies scheint nun gelungen — dieser Tage wurde FreeDOS 1.0 freigegeben!

Wozu denn das? Nun ja — man kann es prima in einem PC-Emulator seiner Wahl starten und alte Programme ausführen. Beispielsweise das famose FFKalk, ein FFA-konformes Filmkalkulations- und -abrechnungsprogramm aus meiner Feder (Kalkulation, Abrechnung, Nachkalkulation, Reports entsprechend den FFA-Formularen). Das Programm war bis vor einigen Jahren im Vertrieb von Peter Kriegs Barfuss Film. Nach mäßigen Vertriebserfolgen sind die entsprechenden Rechte wieder bei mir — vielleicht sollte ich FFKalk ein neues Leben einhauchen, nachdem die Plattform wieder Zukunft hat?

(FreeDOS is a trademark of Jim Hall.)

Unindo o útil ao agradável, pelo menos nessa primeira parte do curso pretendo utilizar o FreeDOS juntamente com o Qemu. Essa solução permite uma agilidade muito maior que a utilizada anteriormente (um PC com Windows 98…).

O primeiro problema que enfrentei foi copiar os arquivos necessários (ferramentas) para a imagem do FreeDOS que utilizei. Após algumas tentativas frustradas em montar a imagem, resolvi seguir este artigo (pdf) da Linux Magazine e criar uma iso de CD (mkisofs) com os arquivos, copiando em seguida durante a execução do FreeDOS.

Outro problema foi a questão do teclado, que não funcionava o layout ABNT2. Dando uma olhada no autoexec.bat, havia a opção “xkeyb fr”. Bastou mudar o “fr” para “br” que as teclas funcionaram perfeitamente (apesar de não suportar acentuação).

Após alguns testes, as ferramentas funcionaram bem, incluindo mudança no modo de vídeo. O proximo passo é testar no Windows (minha plataforma em casa é Ubuntu 6.06) e procurar alguma forma de montar a imagem também no Windows para poder utilizar outros editores, “abolindo” o edit…