Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!ll-xn!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!decwrl!decvax!tektronix!tekgen!stever
From: stever@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM (Imants Golts)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: DOS 4.0
Message-ID: <3301@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM>
Date: 28 Jul 88 06:31:32 GMT
References: <611@wa3wbu.UUCP> <6065@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <4530@ut-emx.UUCP>
Reply-To: stever@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM (Steve Rogers)
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.
Lines: 24


Whatever "Inside OS/2" says about DOS 4.0 is now seemingly outdated by IBM's
offering of PC-DOS 4.0.  It is my understanding that Microsoft has
offered MS-DOS 4.0 for quite a while to OEM's in Europe primarily
as a multitasking operating system.  This MS-DOS 4.0 is not the
PC-DOS 4.0 now being offered by IBM.   From a recent blurb in a
trade paper Microsoft will now release their own version of the 
IBM PC-DOS 4.0 as MS-DOS 4.0.  However, this second MS-DOS 4.0 will
not be offered in the stores, but will be available only through
OEM's.  So I will have to go to AST to get it since that is the
machine I have.

So the question is, will the new MS-DOS 4.0 have undocumented 
multi-tasking?  (I doubt it since multitasking is the intended
domain of OS/2 where it is designed into the OS  from the start,
and IBM and MS would certainly want some reason for the customer to
go to OS/2!)

And what is Microsoft going to call the old (multi-tasking) MS-DOS 4.0?

Anyone at Microsoft willing to give a definitive answer to:
"Will the real MS-DOS 4.0 please stand up?" ? 

--sdr