As seen in Byte... R.I.P.

[Dave Cooper]

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1. INTRO: MS-DOS R.I.P.
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MS-DOS passed away Thursday, October 25, 2001, at the Marriott Marquis Hotel on Times Square in New York City.

MS-DOS was born in August 1980, in Tukwila, Washington, the creation of Tim Paterson and the Seattle Computer Company. Initially called QDOS 0.10 (short for "Quick and Dirty Operating System"), MS-DOS was a lifelong resident of the Seattle area. In late 1980, nonexclusive rights for 86-DOS 0.3, as the operating system was then known, were sold to Microsoft. In July 1981, as Paterson recounted in a June 1983 BYTE article entitled "A Short History of MS-DOS," Microsoft bought all rights to the DOS from Seattle Computer and changed the name of the operating system to "MS-DOS."

In the 1980s and early 1990s, MS-DOS was arguably the most widely used computer program in the world. There were many reasons for this, the least of which was the historical rise of the personal computer. But what set MS-DOS apart from other players in the personal computer operating system arena was Paterson's desire to make application development as easy as possible for for software developers. To this end, Paterson made the MS-DOS API similar to CP/M, an 8-bit operating system in widespread use at the time. Secondly, Paterson focused on making MS-DOS fast and efficient, something he achieved by writing it entirely in 8086 assembly language.

MS-DOS is survived by Windows 98, XP, Me, 2000, and CE, all of the same home. MS-DOS was preceded in death by Windows 1.0, 3.0, 95, and Windows for Pens.

In announcing MS-DOS's demise, Microsoft founder Bill Gates typed "exit" at the MS-DOS command line during the launch of Windows XP. He stated, "It's the end of the MS-DOS era," referring to the exorcism of 16-bit code from the Windows code base. Gates was joined on stage by industry leaders such as Gateway's Ted Wait, Dell's Michael Dell, Compaq's Michael Capellas, and Intel's Craig Barrett, all of whom have made millions of dollars from the late MS-DOS. TV personality Regis Philbin also appeared to pay his respects (or, more precisely, to be paid for paying his respects), and rock singer Sting led mourners in soulful renditions of "Ave Marie," "Take A Closer Walk with Me," and "Here I Am Lord" at nearby Bryant Park.

In lieu of flowers, we respectfully request that you make contributions to the charity of your choice.

Jonathan Erickson
Editorial Director, Byte.com