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Created July 18, 2019 06:59
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Installing DOS Navigator ( dn ) on FreeDOS
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Answer.md

  1. Ok first of all if you have issues installing FreeDOS on VirtualBox and you get weird infinite loop Invalid Opcode errors, here I wrote a small instruction how the installation should be done.

  2. Now when you have FreeDOS booted, from here you need to install the networking software and reboot.

  3. then you can run fdnpkg update to update the installed packages

  4. but you don't need to install dn as it comes with the FreeDOS iso file. all you need to do is:

  5. run FDIMPLES package manager

  6. go to Utilities

  7. find DN2 and select it

  8. reboot
  1. From here, now you need to add the C:\FDOS\DN2 folder to the PATH
  2. run Edit Autoexec.bat while on root C:\>
  3. edit the line SET PATH=%dosdir%\BIN to SET PATH=%dosdir%\BIN;%dosdir%\DN2
  4. reboot

now you can run dn!

P.S. Another instalation method offered here on Reddit.

Raw
Question.md

When I was very young (the late 90s), the real geeks used to use DOS Navigator (dn) on their DOS or Windows machines, and I remember people kept using it till after 2000.

          
               DOS Navigator UI (image courtesy of Wikimedia).

While ago I learned about this cool FreeDOS project and I thought how cool it could be if I could try dn on this OS. So I have FreeDOS installed on VirtualBox (and oh boy it takes so much time to be installed!). Now I want to know if/how I can compile or install dn there.

Apparently, the dn project is now being maintained by DOS Navigator Open Source Project. I also found this link with some downloadable files as a "package for FreeDOS". Now my questions are:

  • How can I compile the latest version of dn on FreeDOS?
  • Is there a binary version of dn available for FreeDOS? If yes how one can download it on FreeDOS and install it? (there should be something like wget I guess)
  • Does FreeDOS have some sort of package manager like Chocolatey for Windows or HomeBrew for macOS where one can add dn as a package and make sure others can easily install it later?

I would appreciate if you could help me with these questions. Thanks in advance.

P.S.1. I posted this question on dn forum, Tweeted this to FreeDOS guys and shared here on Reddit.

P.S.2. The problem with the long instalation of FreeDOS, is actually it not being installed which is known and explained here.

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