Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 22:21:57 -0500 (CDT) From: Lars Eighner <luvbeastie@larseighner.com> To: scott mcclellan <rockabyeinn@yahoo.com> Cc: "freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org" <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: new to os Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.00.1108182221410.1428@abbf.6qbyyneqvnyhc.pbz> In-Reply-To: <1313705889.77615.YahooMailNeo@web45712.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> References: <1313705889.77615.YahooMailNeo@web45712.mail.sp1.yahoo.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Thu, 18 Aug 2011, scott mcclellan wrote: > I'm looking to try something different with my machine (or maybe I'm going >through a midlife crisis). Currently run Wimdows (point and click), and >would like to gravitate back to DOS (this is a thing of the ancient past >for me 30 years - on a TRS-80). I know remember extremely little of OS >vernacular. The main problem with DOS is lack of applications. If it was not so, I would be running it myself. You might, for example, still have your copy of WP 5 -- I do. But printers that work with the printer drivers are now museum pieces. There are work-arounds for this sort of thing -- including the hobby of maintaining ancient hardware -- but as for a working machine to do anything practical, there are stumbling blocks like this at every turn. > Am I biting off more than I can chew, or is there a OS commands for > dummies out there, or does FreeBSD have such a critter that one can go > through. Of course there are still many old DOS tutorials online in various archives and some games and stuff. But now you are asking about FreeBSD, I think. One of the virtues of all of the unix-like systems (the BSDs and Linuxices) is that there are many maintained command-line applications, and the basic stuff is well-domuented with the online manual (man command). These applications are very similar from one BSD or Linux system to another, and are often compiled from the same source code. They all have true multiprocessing so you can switch from one command line environment (virtual terminal) to another with a keystroke. They are a little short of command-line (launched) graphics programs (viewers, paint, etc.) but they have a choice of GUIs, some of which are very lightweight, when you have to have graphics, and you can switch between the GUI and a command line virtual terminal with a keystroke. > I'll pour through the FAQ and got hrough the online manuals for now. But > it all seems greek. Can someone point me in a diresction to degreek this > stuff for me. No ONE thing comes to mind. There are some web versions of the man command online, which is a good place to start. But the best thing seems to me is to find some disk space and make a small installation. Start by running #man man and go from there. -- Lars Eighner http://www.larseighner.com/index.html 8800 N IH35 APT 1191 AUSTIN TX 78753-5266
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?alpine.BSF.2.00.1108182221410.1428>