FreeDOS

FreeDOS
Developer	Jim Hall, FreeDOS team
Publisher	https://www.freedos.org/
Platforms	x86
Released	1998-present
Added to Museum	1.3 CD: July 16, 2022

FreeDOS, formerly known as PD-DOS and Free-DOS, is a free DOS operating system for computers that run on x86 architecture.

Jim Hall releases a manifesto for a free version of DOS

In June 1994, following the release of version 6.22 of MS-DOS, Microsoft announced that it discontinued the development of the aforementioned operating system.

As a result, on June 29, 1994, Jim Hall posted a manifesto on the comp.os.msdos.apps newsgroup that outlined his intention to create PD-DOS, a public domain version of DOS.

On July 16 1994, the name of the project in the manifesto was renamed Free-DOS as the source code for the OS was to be licensed under the GNU General Public License, rather than as public domain.

FreeDOS version history

• FreeDOS Alpha 1 (September 16, 1994)
• FreeDOS Alpha 2 (December 1994)
• FreeDOS Alpha 3 (January 1995)
• FreeDOS Alpha 4 (June 1995)
• FreeDOS Alpha 5 (August 10, 1996)
• FreeDOS Alpha 6 (November 1997)
• FreeDOS Beta 1 (April 24, 1998)
• FreeDOS Beta 2 (October 28, 1998)
• FreeDOS Beta 3 (April 22, 1999)
• FreeDOS Beta 4 (December 29, 1999)
• FreeDOS Beta 5 (August 11, 2000)
• FreeDOS Beta 6 (March 30, 2001)
• FreeDOS Beta 7 (September 8, 2001)
• FreeDOS Beta 8 (April 7, 2002)
• FreeDOS Beta 8 H1 (September 15, 2002)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 RC1 (July 19, 2003)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 RC2 (September 1, 2003)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 RC3 (September 8, 2003)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 RC4 (February 5, 2004)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 RC5 (April 20, 2004)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 (September 28, 2004)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 SR1 (November 30, 2004)
• FreeDOS Beta 9 SR2 (November 30, 2005)
• FreeDOS 1.0 (September 3, 2006)
• FreeDOS 1.1 (January 2, 2012)
• FreeDOS 1.2 RC1 (October 31, 2016)
• FreeDOS 1.2 RC2 (November 24, 2016)
• FreeDOS 1.2 (December 25, 2016)
• FreeDOS 1.3 RC1 (February 3, 2019)
• FreeDOS 1.3 RC2 (December 9, 2019)
• FreeDOS 1.3 RC3 (May 31, 2020)
• FreeDOS 1.3 RC4 (April 30, 2021)
• FreeDOS 1.3 RC5 (December 8, 2021)
• FreeDOS 1.3 (February 20, 2022)