主题：【原创】不该遗忘的DOS 之 DOS历史和简单命令 -- 我心飞翔

SEE:

Tanenbaum, Andrew S., Modern Operating Systems, Prentice Hall, New Jersey, 1992, (pp 315 - 321)

A summary of the information regarding the OS present on IBM's first PC is as follows:

BEGIN QUOTE

Although IBM had little interest in building its own chips for its personal computer, it had even less interest in writing the software. IBM knew that BASIC was popular among microcomputer users, so it went to Bill Gates, who had now formed a company called Microsoft, to license his BASIC interpreter for use on the IBM PC. It also asked Gates if he happened to have an operating system for them.

At that time, Microsoft was engaged in selling UNIX under license from AT&T Bell Labs, but UNIX, which originated in the minicomputer world, needed 100K just for the operating system alone and also needed a hard disk. The IBM machine had a total of 64K and no hard disk. Gates suggested that IBM use Digital Research's CP/M-86 operating system. IBM talked to Digital Research about this, but CP/M-86 was way behind schedule, and IBM could not wait.

Then IBM went back to Microsoft and asked them if they could write an operating system like CP/M. Gates knew there was no time for that, but he also knew of a nearby company, Seattle Computer Products, that had written a CP/M-like operating system called 86-DOS, primarily to test the memory boards it was manufacturing and selling. Microsoft then bought 86-DOS and in April 1981 hired its author, Tim Paterson, to fix it up a little. They renamed it MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System) and delivered it to IBM on schedule. When the IBM PC was announced in August 1981, MS-DOS was there with it.

...

The rest is the history.