FreeGEM released in 1999 is a windowing system based on

Digital Research Digital Research, Inc. (DR or DRI) was a privately held American software company created by Gary Kildall to market and develop his CP/M operating system and related 8-bit, 16-bit and 32-bit systems like MP/M, Concurrent DOS, FlexOS, Multiuser ...

's GEM which was first released in 1985. GEM stands for "Graphics Environment Manager".

Overview

FreeGEM is the

free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

version of GEM developed after Caldera Thin Clients released the GEM code under the terms of the GNU GPL-2.0-only free software license in April 1999. Caldera Thin Clients owned the source code to GEM through

Caldera A caldera ( ) is a large cauldron-like hollow that forms shortly after the emptying of a magma chamber in a volcanic eruption. An eruption that ejects large volumes of magma over a short period of time can cause significant detriment to the str ...

's purchase of the remaining Digital Research assets from

Novell Novell, Inc. () was an American software and services company headquartered in Provo, Utah, that existed from 1980 until 2014. Its most significant product was the multi-platform network operating system known as NetWare. Novell technolog ...

on 23 July 1996, who had acquired Digital Research in June 1991. FreeGEM code works on almost every version of

DOS DOS (, ) is a family of disk-based operating systems for IBM PC compatible computers. The DOS family primarily consists of IBM PC DOS and a rebranded version, Microsoft's MS-DOS, both of which were introduced in 1981. Later compatible syste ...

, and runs on almost every IBM compatible PC. One can download all the FreeGEM binaries and source code in one package through the OpenGEM SDK. The OpenGEM SDK also contains language bindings, documentation, and compilers. There are additional FreeGEM resources available through John C. Elliott's GEM website. OpenGEM is a popular FreeGEM distribution. Other distributions include Owen's FreeGEM Distribution.

OpenGEM

OpenGEM is a non- multitasking

16-bit 16-bit microcomputers are microcomputers that use 16-bit microprocessors. A 16-bit register can store 216 different values. The range of integer values that can be stored in 16 bits depends on the integer representation used. With the two ...

graphical user interface A graphical user interface, or GUI, is a form of user interface that allows user (computing), users to human–computer interaction, interact with electronic devices through Graphics, graphical icon (computing), icons and visual indicators such ...

(GUI) for

. It is an extended distribution of FreeGEM that includes features of the original

GEM. OpenGEM is intended to provide a simple to install and use GUI system and windowing framework for the

FreeDOS FreeDOS (formerly PD-DOS) is a free software operating system for IBM PC compatible computers. It intends to provide a complete MS-DOS-compatible environment for running Legacy system, legacy software and supporting embedded systems. FreeDOS ca ...

operating system. Caldera Thin Clients (later known as Lineo), who owned the source code to GEM through

's purchase of the remaining Digital Research assets from

on 23 July 1996, released the source to GEM under the terms of

GPL-2.0-only The GNU General Public Licenses (GNU GPL or simply GPL) are a series of widely used free software licenses, or ''copyleft'' licenses, that guarantee end users the freedom to run, study, share, or modify the software. The GPL was the first c ...

in April 1999. OpenGEM was developed by Shane Martin Coughlan in collaboration with the FreeGEM Developer team, and is

released under the terms of the

. OpenGEM versions 3 through 6 are hosted on SourceForge and on the FreeDOS website. OpenGEM has not been actively developed since 2008 but is feature-complete as a basic GUI and includes a full SDK for future third-party development or extension.

Compatibility

OpenGEM works with

Beta 9 and above, DR DOS 5.0 and above, MS-DOS 3.3 and above, PC DOS 3.3 and above,

REAL/32 Multiuser DOS is a real-time multi-user multi-tasking operating system for IBM PC-compatible microcomputers. An evolution of the older Concurrent CP/M-86, Concurrent DOS and Concurrent DOS 386 operating systems, it was originally developed by ...

, and

DOSBox DOSBox is a free and open-source MS-DOS emulator. It supports running programs primarily video games that are otherwise inaccessible since hardware for running a compatible disk operating system (DOS) is obsolete and generally unavailab ...

0.65. OpenGEM will function on

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft and the first of its Windows 9x family of operating systems, released to manufacturing on July 14, 1995, and generally to retail on August 24, 1995. Windows 95 merged ...

Windows 98 Windows 98 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the second operating system in the 9x line, as the successor to Windows 95. It was Software ...

Windows 98SE Windows 98 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the second operating system in the 9x line, as the successor to Windows 95. It was released ...

, and

Windows ME Windows Me (Millennium Edition) is an operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the successor to Windows 98, and was released to manufacturing on June 19, 2000, and t ...

. It is not known to work with

Windows NT Windows NT is a Proprietary software, proprietary Graphical user interface, graphical operating system produced by Microsoft as part of its Windows product line, the first version of which, Windows NT 3.1, was released on July 27, 1993. Original ...

Windows 2000 Windows 2000 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft, targeting the server and business markets. It is the direct successor to Windows NT 4.0, and was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RT ...

and

Windows XP Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct successor to Windows 2000 for high-end and business users a ...

or later.

Overview

OpenGEM

Compatibility

See also

References

External links