OS/2-Based 'Arcanos 5.0' Has Finally Been Releas -- Oh Wait, No It Wasn't. Never Mind. (arcanoae.com) 42
"Because we want ArcaOS 5.0 to be the best that it can be, Arca Noae has made the difficult decision to delay release two weeks, with a new projected delivery date of April 15, 2017," reads a new announcement on the Arca Noae web site.
Because we don't believe in selling anything we are not ready to ship, we will not be taking pre-orders for ArcaOS 5.0. Please be patient while we get the last few things as they should be, so that your experience installing and using ArcaOS 5.0 is as smooth as possible.
One of last week's most popular stories was about the upcoming release of this x86 OS/2-based operating system (codenamed "Blue Lion") which will offer full backward compatibility with legacy OS/2, DOS and Windows 3.1 applications, as well as "ported Linux applications." It's still on its way, the developers explain, but "Finishing touches can often take longer than expected."
One of last week's most popular stories was about the upcoming release of this x86 OS/2-based operating system (codenamed "Blue Lion") which will offer full backward compatibility with legacy OS/2, DOS and Windows 3.1 applications, as well as "ported Linux applications." It's still on its way, the developers explain, but "Finishing touches can often take longer than expected."
OS/2 to be ported to AMD's ARM... (Score:2)
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and still be sub 64 bit and still have no win32 apps
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Yup, alas. The best things it still has are the object-oriented Workplace Shell and the patented "highlight everything I mouse over" (rather than a box lasso) technique, and I'm thinking the patent on the latter is nearing its expiration. Unfortunately, a lot of WPS code was Microsoft's, so it'll never see the light of day.
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Does give access to memory above 4GB, though only as a RAM disk currently and has Odin, mostly based on WINE. Flash is the Win32 binary and OpenJava is recompiled Win32 code.
Actual cause of the delay: (Score:5, Funny)
It's currently in the process of being integrated into systemd. ;)
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It won't be using New tech file system, it will be using the betterer HighPerfomance file system (hpfs).
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Actually it'll be the Journalism File System v2 (JFS), though not the GPLed Linux fork.
Re: Actual cause of the delay: (Score:2)
The non-GPL fork of Journalism File System has 90% less Fake News Files.
Re: HANS REISER JUST CALLED. (Score:2)
Killer comment.
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Yup!
BOHICA libtards!
LOL!
Better 2 Weeks Late Than A Faulty Release? (Score:4, Interesting)
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It would have been nice if they had made the release date, but I'd rather play with a bug-free ArcaOS release than one where the installer fails midway or similar..
Failing during install is pretty much what I remember the most about OS/2.
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Yup, same here. Really a pain when you were using floppies...
I remember when I was trying to install at a customer site who had a load of Compaq boxen; was with IBM, and we'd just managed to persuade this big customer to go with OS/2 instead of Dos&Win. Could not get the damn thing to install - due to being IBM and the high-profile nature of the deal, managed to get through to the devs.
"We've only ever tried to install on IBM machines...." (Remember the wonderful PS/2?)
Quit IBM shortly after.
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But to fair, I should add that - if you managed to get it working - it was streets ahead of windows.
Which is it? (Score:2)
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ArcaOS, as the company's name is Arca Noae.
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Is it "ArcanOS" or "ArcaOS"?
Taking into account the editing quality at /. I'd dismiss EditorDavid's "spelling" out of hand, and believe the quoted article's version; "ArcaOS", even without visiting the project's website for confirmation.
Supposed "geek/nerd" news website that can't even get such basic facts about an OS news item right.
Sad.
Slashdot Media's 'geek card' status: Revoked with extreme prejudice.
Strat
Why? (Score:2)
>"will offer full backward compatibility with legacy OS/2, DOS and Windows 3.1 applications, as well as "ported Linux applications."
So how is this better than just running free and open-source Linux? Then one gets all Linux applications, and can also run MS-DOS and 32 and 64 bit MS-Windows apps with WINE, Virtualbox, containers, whatever, under a very mature and stable OS. Are there even any useful or relevant OS/2 apps out there?
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You get the WorkPlace Shell, still considered one of the better graphical shells though the 2D graphics show its age. DOS (and Win3.1) programs run in Ring 2 which mostly gives them full access to the hardware, handy for some industrial controllers etc.
The killer OS/2 program that most of us run ended up being backwards, VirtualBox, designed to run OS/2 instead of run on OS/2, which due to using ring 2 as well as ring 0+3 was hard to virtualize.
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I really liked the WorkPlace Shell, but I still find this project pretty pointless. It's like trying to get more coal miners working again - the world has moved on. I don't have any 20 year old programs from Windows 3.1 that I want to run anymore.
It would have been better if they created a new WorkPlace Shell as a new window manager on Linux, Mac or Windows. A lot of people hate the Windows
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Arca Noae is mostly aimed at industries with legacy OS/2 systems that need updated. There is still a surprising amount of enterprise OS/2 systems chugging away in some backroom or running post offices, railroads and such. Hardware fails and software needs migrating and often it is cheaper to not port the software to a different system.
As for rewriting the WPS, there's been lots of talk and a few failed attempts. Unluckily it is a big project beyond a couple of programmers working in their spare time. As sta
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You get the WorkPlace Shell, still considered one of the better graphical shells though the 2D graphics show its age.
Only by OS/2 devotees. All I even remember about it is that it had some kind of annoying drag behavior. The only thing I remember being superior about OS/2 was that you could format a floppy and do stuff at the same time. But I had Xenix on a 286 and AmigaOS on a series of machines at home and had used NeXTStep on a turbo slab so I knew that there was nothing particularly remarkable about OS/2. What was remarkable was that Windows was so successful even though it sucked so badly, not that OS/2 was not more
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Yes, the drag'n'drop defaulted to hiliting with the left button and dragging with the right button, both could be changed from their defaults unlike any other system I've used. Generally the WPS was very customizable.
The network stack has been secure for close to 2 decades, ported from AIX, it was pretty secure and IBM fixed the couple of issues like being able to syn flood it. As for the rest of the network applications, they're like on most platforms, use the latest Samba, Apache, Firefox (which is fallin
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I am not hating anything, just asking questions.
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I'd buy it for $20 (Score:2)
without the subscription option. I just want to put it on old PCs because it is more stable than DOS/Windows 3.1 and Windows 95. I'm into retrocomputing and I'ved used OS/2 2.X and 3.X when I worked, and I like the virtual DOS machines and WINOS2 that runs 16 bit Windows software. I think there was an ODIN add on that worked like WINE but for OS/2 to run 32 bit Windows programs.
Windows 10 is big and bloated, and they added too much stuff to it. I had to downgrade from 10 to 7 using a different hard drive. I
Screenshots or it's not real (Score:2)