3 replies to this topic

[MedEvil]

Just out of curiosity. Which is the smallest DOS? Asuming of course same functionality in all contestants.
I used to use Dr-DOS 6 which was really small compared to M$-DOS. But then, which DOS isn't?

[wendy]

PC-DOS 7 is smaller than any of the DOS 6 versions. Its command.com also supports REXX programs, so it is much easier to write filters for pipes etc in it. But you can achieve the same effect by putting command,com from pc-dos onto ms-dos.

The edit in pc-dos is smaller than qbasic, and i think the help system is too. Since the help system is a standard OS/2 inf file, ye can get help viewers for Win16 and Win32, which is more than MS-DOS (which offers a help viewer for MS-DOS in OS/2).

If ye need LFN support, there are versions of IO.SYS without the logo, which clock in it around 110 kB, which is less than the standard 200+ for the usual version. You can start the full IO.SYS from Windows 98 off a 360k floppy, except that command.com has to be somewhere else. [Done this ]

The actual size of the distro depends on what needs to be thinned out. Based on the MSFT sale of DOS as two products (DOS, and "Additional Tools", DOS fits onto a single floppy disk (edit is an additional tool). One can likewise thin PC-DOS down to this size too.

[MedEvil]

Thanks wendy. PC-DOS7, you say? Think i still have somewhere a PC-DOS7 stash of floppies.

[was_jaclaz]

I guess that Datalight ROMDOS is still a bit smaller , and if I recall correctly, the "professional" or SDK version also has a "mini" version (of course with a few functionalities less).

Since it is Free for personal use (but you need to register), it is something that one can experiment with:
http://www.datalight...tdetails_su.php

Here is a dir>ROMDOS71.TXT, to have an idea of sizes:

Directory di C:\Downloaded\datalight\7107/02/2009  09.00    <DIR>          .07/02/2009  09.00    <DIR>          ..20/06/2008  07.10             3.418 ansi.sys20/06/2008  07.10            10.016 ata.sys20/06/2008  07.10             7.510 ATTRIB.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            24.250 BACKUP.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            34.320 CHKDSK.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             2.018 CHOICE.COM20/06/2008  07.10            50.376 COMM.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            46.122 COMMAND.COM20/06/2008  07.10            12.290 COMMAND.HLP20/06/2008  07.10            10.523 country.sys20/06/2008  07.10             6.738 DELTREE.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            17.900 DISK2IMG.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             8.162 DISKCOMP.COM20/06/2008  07.10            11.174 DISKCOPY.COM20/06/2008  07.10             9.377 DISPLAY.SYS20/06/2008  07.10            10.774 dump.exe20/06/2008  07.10            34.080 EGA.CPI20/06/2008  07.10            14.624 EGA3.CPI20/06/2008  07.10            21.349 EMM386.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            36.544 exe2bin.com20/06/2008  07.10            26.035 FDISK.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             4.557 FIND.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            27.029 FORMAT.COM20/06/2008  07.10             5.802 HIMEM.SYS20/06/2008  07.10             7.590 keyb.com20/06/2008  07.10            16.128 KEYBOARD.SYS20/06/2008  07.10             3.341 KEYBRD2.SYS20/06/2008  07.10             4.046 LABEL.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             7.708 MEM.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            15.082 MODE.COM20/06/2008  07.10             5.497 MORE.COM20/06/2008  07.10            11.492 MOVE.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            23.842 mscdex.exe20/06/2008  07.10            88.930 NED.EXE20/06/2008  07.10               791 NEDREMOT.CFG20/06/2008  07.10               176 NEDREMOT.COM20/06/2008  07.10             6.498 POWER.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             9.215 PRINT.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            24.030 RESTORE.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            77.713 ROM-DOS.SYS20/06/2008  07.10            57.432 rsz.exe20/06/2008  07.10            20.541 SERLINK.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            15.315 SERSERV.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             4.558 SHARE.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            21.256 SMARTDRV.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             4.693 SORT.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             1.302 stackdev.sys20/06/2008  07.10             6.208 SUBST.EXE20/06/2008  07.10            14.699 SYS.COM20/06/2008  07.10            69.632 sysxp.exe20/06/2008  07.10            39.570 TRANSFER.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             6.622 TREE.COM20/06/2008  07.10             5.298 UMBLINK.EXE20/06/2008  07.10             8.032 VDISK.SYS20/06/2008  07.10               256 VERSION.SYS20/06/2008  07.10            18.062 XCOPY.EXE              56 File      1.030.543 byte

jaclaz