THE FREEDOS BETA 9 ("Methusalem")  DISTRIBUTION

RELEASE NOTES

Jeremy Davis <jeremyd@computer.org>
19 July 2003

This document based on prior Release Notes
written by Jim Hall

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Welcome to the Beta9 distribution!

Please visit the FreeDOS web site ( http://www.freedos.org ) for more
information on FreeDOS, including updates or possible problems with
the Beta 9 distribution.  Please read the errata.  
Further information about FreeDOS Ripcord (HOT) distributions may
be found at http://www.fdos.org/ripcord/

Please read and understand the licensing information for all programs
you install and use.

For a list of programs available in this distribution see the file
programs.txt, which includes information such as program name, license
(copying information, note some programs may be available only for
non-commercial use), and primary location to obtain program.


In the meantime, some notes and things you need to watch out for:

* You should generally use the latest kernel with included programs;
  format 0.90f requires at least kernel build 2030 and emm386 0.6
  requires at least kernel build 2029.  Other programs may have
  similar requirements.

* Format now includes bad sector checking.  Support for FAT32
  partitions should be considered development only.

* The MINI and FULL distribution now use the same boot disk image.
  The choice of Mini or Full is presented at boot time.  MINI consists
  of just the BASE install set and boot disk; whereas FULL includes 
  the BASE install set, boot disk, and optionally the remaining install
  sets (EDIT, GUI, LANG, UTIL, and the source sets).  Other than
  the BASE set (which is required), you only need to download those
  sets you wish to install.

* The Fat32 enabled kernel, while may be available, should be
  considered experimental.  The included utilities may not support
  Fat32 and may exhibit other anomalies when using it.  It may
  also be compiled using 80386 specific instructions so only use
  on 386 or higher based computers.

* This distribution is provided only as an ISO image.  Though
  disk images may be provided in a form suitable for 3.5inch
  1.44MB floppies and others to allow booting from floppy and
  using the CD-ROM.  [Please use the Beta 8 distribution or
  check for a newer FreeDOS Ripcord distribution for floppy use.]

* About bootdisk:
  The contents of the first disk is small enough to fit on diskettes
  ranging from 360KB to 2.88MB (most common: 1.44KB).
  It provides you with a freeware (and almost completely GPL) bootable
  diskette that allows you to run the Memory testing program Memtest86,
  to install FreeDOS, or to add programs yourself (for example, freedos
  allows PartitionMagic to access fat32 and NTFS drives).
  
* About bootdisk creation:
  First, a diskette is completely cleaned using a quick-format,
  then we write the 360KB image using RAWRITE to the fat12 based filesystem.
  Afterwards, the proper bootsector has to be generated by SYS.com to make
  the diskette bootable (both bootsector and the MetaKern bootmenu).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

  FreeDOS is a trademark of Jim Hall. 
  It was claimed as a trademark to prevent its possible abuse or misuse.
  The name FreeDOS may be used by the FreeDOS community to refer to 
  programs that are part of the FreeDOS operating system, or to associate
  their programs with FreeDOS.
