NewDos/80

"NEWDOS" redirects here. For the IBM and Microsoft PC operating system, see OS/2.

NewDos/80

Developer	Apparat, Inc.
OS family	DOS
Working state	Historic
Source model	Closed source
Initial release	1980 (1980)
Available in	English
Platforms	TRS-80
Kernel type	Monolithic
Default user interface	Command-line interface

NewDos/80 is a third-party operating system for the Radio Shack TRS-80 line of microcomputers released in 1980. NewDos/80 was developed by Apparat, Inc. of Denver, Colorado. NewDos/80 version 2.0 was released in August of 1981. It ran on the TRS-80 Model I and Model III.

Overview

The operating system had additional commands and features that were not available in TRSDOS, the native operating system for TRS-80 computers. NewDos/80 allowed TRS-80 computers to take advantage of advances in floppy disk storage that went beyond the initial 87.5KB 35-track, single-density, single-sided format. The system also corrected issues that early versions of TRSDOS had with arbitrarily losing data due to errors in how it communicated with the contemporary TRS-80 disk drives' 1771 disk controller.

NewDos/80 had many options for specifying specific low-level disk configurations. Settings such as diskette formats, disk drive types, track geometry and controllers could be configured using the PDRIVE command. In version 2.1, Apparat added support for hard disk drives via an external bus adapter.

NewDos/80 was written by Cliff Ive and Jason Matthews. Ive was the primary author of NewDos in all of its incarnations, Matthews wrote "patches" for various applications such as Scripsit and VisiCalc. Ive later retired and Matthews went on to other projects in the software business.

Commands

The following is a list of NewDos/80 commands:

NewDos/80 commands and counterparts in other operating systems

Command	MS-DOS, OS/2, Windows	UNIX, Unix-like
APPEND	type file1 >> file2	cat file >> file2
ATTRIB	attrib	chmod
AUTO	AUTOEXEC.BAT	~/.profile or ~/.login or /etc/rc*
BASIC2
BLINK
BOOT
BREAK
CHAIN
CHNON
CLEAR
CLOCK	prompt $t *	in some shells: PS1="...\t..." *
CLS	cls	clear
COPY	copy	cp
CREATE
DATE	date	date
DEBUG	debug
DIR	dir	ls
DO
DUMP
ERROR
FORMAT	format	mkfs
FORMS
FREE	chkdsk	df
HIMEM
JKL
KILL	del	rm
LC
LCDVR
LIB
LIST	type	cat
LOAD program	program	program
MDBORT
MDRET
PAUSE	pause
PDRIVE
PRINT	type file > prn	lpr
PROT	attrib	chmod
PURGE
R
RENAME	ren or rename	mv
ROUTE
SETCOM
STMT	echo	echo
PDRIVE
SYSTEM
TIME	time
VERIFY
WRDIRP

Reception

While criticizing NEWDOS's "nearly incomprehensible documentation", Jerry Pournelle wrote in 1980 that it was "a much better operating system" than the "needlessly complex" TRSDOS and stated that "Tandy ought to be marketing NEWDOS+ themselves".

See also

• List of DOS commands
• List of Unix commands

External links

• Mike's Virtual Computer Museum - NEWDOS/80 page
• Ira Goldklang's TRS-80 Revived Site - NEWDOS/80 Version 2 reference