MSDOS is a disk operating system for the IBM range (or compatibles) of computers. The MSDOS system resides on diskette (3.5" or 5.25") and the system files may be transferred to a hard disk unit.
An operating system is a program which allows competing programs to share the resources of the computer (memory, disk, devices like printers and modems, and processing time). The operating systems first job is to initialise the hardware of the computer system, before running application programs.
For personal computers, MSDOS is a single user, single tasking operating system. Single user means only one person uses the computer at a time. Single tasking means that it essentially only runs one application program at a time, and has no inherent support for running more than one application program simultaneously.
An operating system provides mechanisms for running programs, handling errors, controlling devices, configuring the computer system, and for MSDOS, a user interface (sometimes called a shell).
MS DOS Interviews are getting tough these days as the technology grows faster. To get through the MS DOS interview one needs to update him/herself in a regular manner. Having said that, just before the interview, it is very important to have a quick glance of the reputed MS DOS questions and answers to make yourself comfortable during the interview process. This is where DoAnswers.com helps you in renewing yourself on MS DOS and various other technologies interview preparation.
31. What DOS is the best one?
Well, that's a quite silly question. Everybody likes the DOS best she/he uses. My personal opinion is that DR-DOS is the best and highest developed DOS. The second choice should be ROM DOS. Another really great DOS is FreeDOS . It's available under the terms of GPL and I really love it.
32. What is 4DOS?
4DOS is a command shell replacement for DOS. It allows more powerful batch scripts and is much more customizeable than the normal command.com. 4DOS is developed by JPSOFT, you can download a free evaluation version there. Klaus Meinhard is an expert for 4DOS, you can find his regularly updated website at http://www.4xbtm.de.
33. What is conventional memory?
The first 640 KB of your RAM are called "conventional memory" under DOS. DOS can only address this first 640 KB of RAM directly, the other part won't be recognized if you don't load a memory manager like himem.sys. Most programs need a special amount of conventional memory to run, so it would be good to have as much free memory as possible within this 640 KB. How can you do this? Well, that's not quite difficult, but it is not fairly easy.
34. What is DOS?
DOS is a Disk Operating System, that means it's an OS that uses a disk. Operating systems for IBM PCs since the early 1980s were called DOS. DOS consists of the command prompt, mostly command.com and two kernelfiles. That's a basic DOS system. DOS was a mainstream OS until Windows 95 (which also uses DOS, btw) threw it off the market.
35. What is DPMS/DPMI?
DPM stands for DOS Protected Mode. That means that you are able to use the memory above 1 MB for TSR programs or simular. Using DPMI, you will have more free convential memory.
36. what is MOE DOS
MOE-DOS is an experimental freeware-DOS by Martin Coleman which can be downloaded at http://moedos.net. Unfortunately, it's still in beta-version and not really MS-DOS compatible, but I think that will change soon.
37. what is PTS DOS / Paragon DOS
PTS DOS is a russian DOS, written in assembler. It's really fast. It comes on two floppy disks, one with the system and the utilities, the other one with Arachne as webbrowser. It claims to be MS-DOS compatible, but it's a bit strange in configuration and memory management but it is still developed. At http://phystechsoft.com/en you will find more detailed information about PTS DOS. On their website, they provide a PTS DOS FAQ and an online help, which is very useful in my opinion. There are two versions of PTS-DOS: One at PhysTechSoft (PTS DOS) and another one at Paragon called Paragon DOS. They seem to be the same, somebody told me that Paragon consists of former PhysTechSoft developers.... Paragon DOS has also the following features: supports harddrives bigger than 8 GB FAT32 support Partiton Manager package also contains source code! Wolfgang Elsässer published a website with a very big FAQ about PTS-DOS (http://www.almnet.de/ptsdos/). An english version is available.
38. what is RxDOS
RxDOS is a small DOS kernel with FAT32 and long filename support, but it's quite buggy. You can download the newest files at http://rxdos.sourceforge.net.
39. What you should know before running DOS
For those who always were happy with Windows it might be annoying to type a lot at the command prompt. But for those who want the computer do what it should do it's the first choice. DOS is small in size, very fast and everybody can effort a DOS system. For less than 100$ you can set up a system that is much faster than many Windows machines and is very stabile. You can do quite a lot with DOS and nearly all your system resources are free, DOS only takes a few kilobytes of your RAM. You can find a lot of programs and hardware for that OS. But if you always want to play the newest games and don't want "to give up" your buggy Windows 9x, you might be on the wrong place here.
40. Where can I download the OpenDOS source code?
Download it from http://www.drdos.net/download.htm.