[Technical] MS Windows 1.0.3

[Jim Maunder]

At 04:33 PM 12/12/2006, you wrote:
>----
>From: tech-bounces at edulists.com.au 
>[mailto:tech-bounces at edulists.com.au] On Behalf Of Roland Gesthuizen
>
>PS:    I am curious if it can run under VMWare / VirtualPC and 
>tracking down the software to try this out.
>----
>
>Hi Roland,
>
>I would think that there would have been almost no copies of Windows 
>1 imported into Australia ... certainly, I don't think you would 
>have found one in a school ... lots of rivals at the time, even on DOS PCs ...

About 1984/5 I bought a MS Windows 1 and MS Mouse package from the 
computer shop near Collingwood Town Hall in Hoddle St. It came on 2 
or 3 360Kb 5.25" floppies (hmmm - that web site says it was 5 - maybe 
Windows was 2 or 3 and the other apps were on separate disks). I 
installed it on the Council's PC (a $12,000 'Earth Computer Systems' 
286 bought for CAD) to play with. It took me a while to get used to 
using the mouse as I found that using the left mouse button was 
counter intuitive. I remember playing with PaintBrush and the piano 
keyboard thing.

The look and feel of the installation routine was typical of 
Microsoft software at the time - we used MS Word, MS Multiplan (I 
liked it better than Lotus123), MS Project, as well as dBASE11 and 
111 and later AutoCAD. Later, when we got more PCs the accounts 
section used Excel and Windows 2 to prepare the Council budget. Excel 
could be used without Windows, as it came with a 'Windows run-time' option.

About that time I took over the running of the Council's brand new 
MicroVAX system.

Yes, 'MSDOS Executive' came with Dos 4, and can stay there afaic.

At the time schools used Vic 20s, Commodore 64s or Microbees and 
funded them themselves - but I seem to recall a $ for $ deal from 
somewhere. My kids were in primary school at the time. A few years 
later there were Apple IIs in many schools - still some remnant parts here.

Well that's worn out this old frat's TK50 drive for a while.

rgds
Jim



-----------------------------------------------------------
We have to use this Disclaimer

Views, opinions, etc. expressed reflect those of the author and not
Ruyton Girls' School
-----------------------------------------------------------

Jim Maunder
Ruyton Girls School
Melbourne, Australia