Summarizing my ways to access old environments
Sometimes, I want to run old software from my non-free days.
DOS
I can use Dosbox or FreeDOS. These have always worked and are readily available.
Windows 3.1
I use DOSBox for this, already in my internal package win31games.
Windows 9x
There's no need for Windows 95 when Windows 98SE will work in Dosbox-X and 99.99% of software worked on the latter.
Windows XP
While I have a Thinkpad G40 somewhere with a real floppy disk drive and that runs Windows XP, I haven't need this environment specifically. Most XP-targetting software runs just great in wine.
Windows 7
If Wine does not suffice, then I have Windows 7 running in a qemu spice-enabled VM on EL9 which should be supported to approximately 2029. I haven't really needed Windows 7 specifically in a very long time, and I suspect my need for it will only dwindle.
Comments