OpenDOS

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OpenDOS

OpenDOS is a freeware

Freeware

Freeware is computer software that is available for use at no cost or for an optional fee. Freeware is different from shareware; the latter obliges the user to pay ....
DOS

DOS

DOS, short for "Disk Operating System", is a shorthand term for several closely related operating systems that dominated the IBM PC compatible market between 1981 and 1995, or until about 2000 if one includes the partially DOS-based Microsoft Windows versions Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Me....
-like and MS-DOS

MS-DOS

MS-DOS is an operating system commercialized by Microsoft. It was the most commonly used member of the DOS family of operating systems and was the main operating system for personal computers during the 1980s....
-compatible operating system

Operating system

An operating system is an interface between hardware and applications; it is responsible for the management and coordination of activities and the sharing of the limited resources of the computer....
. It was originally Digital Research

Digital Research

Digital Research, Inc. was the company created by Dr. Gary Kildall to market and develop his CP/M operating system and related products. It was the first large software company in the microcomputer world....
's DR-DOS

DR-DOS

DR-DOS is a DOS-type operating system for IBM PC-PC compatible personal computers, originally developed by Gary Kildall's Digital Research and derived from CP/M-86....
. Shortly after the release of DR-DOS 6, Digital Research was acquired by Novell

Novell

Novell Inc. is a global software corporation based in the United States specializing in enterprise operating systems such as SUSE Linux distributions and Novell NetWare; identity, security and systems management solutions; and collaboration solutions....
, who rebranded the product Novell DOS. The next version was marketed as Novell DOS 7.

The DOS product line was then sold off to a separate company, at that time known as Caldera Systems, owned by former Novell CEO Ray Noorda's investment firm The Canopy Group

Canopy Group

The Canopy Group is an investment firm founded by Ray Noorda, headquartered in Lindon, Utah. It serves as the parent company of various technology companies....
.

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Encyclopedia

OpenDOS is a freeware

Freeware

Freeware is computer software that is available for use at no cost or for an optional fee. Freeware is different from shareware; the latter obliges the user to pay ....
DOS

DOS

MS-DOS

Operating system

Digital Research

DR-DOS

Novell

Canopy Group

The Canopy Group is an investment firm founded by Ray Noorda, headquartered in Lindon, Utah. It serves as the parent company of various technology companies....
. Caldera renamed Novell DOS to OpenDOS and initiated a program of source code release, to link OpenDOS to Caldera's other OS, OpenLinux, a distribution of the Linux

Linux

Linux is a generic term referring to Unix-like computer operating systems based on the Linux kernel. Their development is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software collaboration; typically all the underlying source code can be used, freely modified, and redistributed by anyone under the terms of the GNU GPL license...
Unix-like

Unix-like

A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification....
OS.

Caldera released a free version of OpenDOS for non-commercial and evaluation use.

The initial source code released by Caldera was for version 7.01. Only the source code to OpenDOS 7.02 remains available and the company later took development back in-house. However, this is still available for download at no charge. It is more compatible with real MS-DOS than is the GPL

GNU General Public License

The GNU General Public License is a widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU project. The GPL is the most popular and well-known example of the type of strong copyleft license that requires derived works to be available under the same copyleft....
-licensed FreeDOS

FreeDOS

FreeDOS is an operating system for IBM PC compatible computers. FreeDOS is made up of many different, separate programs that act as "packages" to the overall FreeDOS Project....
, for example, and can run Windows

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is a series of software operating systems and graphical user interfaces produced by Microsoft. Microsoft first introduced an operating environment named Windows in November 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces ....
3.1 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 as well or better than Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is a multinational corporation computer technology corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of computer software products for computing devices....
's own product. Indeed, Caldera claimed that it had managed to get Windows 95 booting and running on top of OpenDOS in its internal labs, though this was never publicly released.

Subsequently, the DOS and embedded Linux division of Caldera was spun off into a separate company, Lineo

Lineo

Lineo Solutions, Inc. was the former thin client and embedded systems division of Caldera Systems.Lineo originally was spun out of Caldera Systems in September 1997, under the company name Caldera Thin Clients....
. Lineo realised that the old name of DR-DOS still had more market awareness than any of the other names. After OpenDOS version 7.02 was released, the product was briefly renamed to "DR-OpenDOS" (which quickly became pronounced as "droppin' DOS"). Soon after DR-OpenDOS 7.02 was released, the product was given back its former moniker, being released as "Caldera DR-DOS 7.03".

OpenDOS

See also

External links