[fpc-pascal]Re: fp under Windows

[Matt Emson]

>so it will work regardless of whether NT or any other Windows has 
>or will have a genuine DOS box or not.

Yeah, the Win32 version.. I wasn't talking about the Win32 version though. Neither
was the original poster IIRC.

>Actually, I can use both. I don't remember whether this comes with NT 
>automatically or I added it to the Start Menu later myself (I installed my

>system several years ago), but I can start either SYSTEM32\CMD.EXE or 
>SYSTEM32\COMMAND.COM. The first is the Command Prompt, the second a DOS 
>Window.

You must have added it.. NT only comes with CMD.EXE. Generally if you try to
run COMMAND.COM you get a 'Wrong DOS version' error.

>But when I use FPC, I *don't* start a Command Prompt...

Neither do I, but then I wasn't talking about the Win32 version. There is a
DOS version as well y'know. This is the version that will fail to run at some
point if the DOS support get's any worse.. It already kills a lot of straight
DOS apps with its DMPI support.

>This functionality will not disappear from future versions of Windows, this
is 
>for sure. But even if it does, the only thing to do would be to add a GUI 

>front layer to FPC, and that would be fairly easy.

Don't be so sure! .NET for one will kill traditional Win32. 64-bit version of
Windows will most likely only 'Emulate' Win32.. That will be phased out in time.


>The console has nothing to do with DOS, there is no link between the two. 


Appart from the sole reason it exists is to Emulate DOS. There's absolutely
no other reason for it to exist. Look at the MAC for an example of an OS without
a Command Prompt.

>The Command Prompt is a 32-bit console application (CMD.EXE in NT) which 
>happens to reproduce some functionality of the old DOS command interpreter

>(COMMAND.COM). 

Lol.. If it didn't emulate DOS, no one would have switched to NT3.x.

>It is a completely independent program, requiring no DOS to 
>rely on. 

True.

>Anybody could write such a CMD.EXE, in FPC for instance, that asks 
>for commands, interprets and executes them, starting other programs if 
>necessary.

As NT is completely Modular in Design, anyone could replace any part of it (bar
 maybe some of the Kernal stuff I suppose.)

Microsoft themselves xrote a Unix based replacement module for NT.. it just
didn't catch on..

>DOS can go (actually, as you mentioned, NT has no real DOS, never had, from

>day one it was only a DOS interface of documented DOS functions, meaning 
>that well-behaved DOS programs ran without any problem but ill-behaved ones,

>especially games, did not; NT was never intended to be a gaming platform, 

>fortunately, I might add), and the console can and will stay.

Appart from the fact that it will.. because 2000 (or 2001 or whatever) will
replace 9x at some point.