The number of systems still running DOS is small, but shockingly stable.
I worked at a book store on my university campus in 2011 and the entire inventory management system was on a DOS system, I believe running on a VM (but possibly not...).
Maybe it was on a FreeDOS VM, I cant remember the name but I could of sworn there was a software that also simulated DOS and ran as a regular windows program.
From my reading of that piece, Win9x had its own kernel that was a descendent of DOS; it was not just an application running atop DOS like Win 3x. Consequently it lacked proper memory isolation and security features compared to NT but it did at least bring preemptive multitasking.
Still longing for the source leak or dump like Apple did with LisaOS so we can have the theory confirmed, then have a play with it ourselves.
If you need to stick and turn the ignition key for the car to work, would that mean what the car runs on the key?
I like what you and other sibling just regurgitate Wiki content. As another sibling properly notes - it run in a protected mode and had it's own drivers. It used DOS as a mere bootloader. Is your favourite Linux distro just a shell on top of GRUB?
Please, educate yourself about this part and don't just copy-paste stuff someone managed to butt in Wiki article.
Windows NT has absolutely nothing to do with MS-DOS.[1]
This was a rather sore point back in the days of Windows NT 3.1 and NT 4.0, when a lot of software was still written for DOS and simply couldn't execute on NT.
All 32-bit versions of Windows NT up through Windows 10 have NTVDM (NT Virtual DOS Machine), which as the name suggests is a virtual machine which virtualized DOS.[2]
However, this "compatibility" afforded by NTVDM still failed in most practical situations because most DOS programs were written with the assumption of direct hardware access being available. NTVDM's purpose was instead to facilitate running 16-bit software originally written for the likes of Windows 3.1 and early days of Windows 9x.
All 64-bit versions of Windows NT do not incorporate NTVDM due to hardware limitations and consequently cannot execute any 16-bit programs, including software for DOS.
At that point just use any of the DOSBox variants. DOSBox Pure made for libretro is the best imo (as far as gaming is your concern) https://github.com/schellingb/dosbox-pure
Monkey Island was just an example. OFC I know ScummVM (now it supports even some Macromedia Director based software). But lots of legacy software for DOS/Win 3.1 (these infamous "Multimedia CD's) could be preserved thanks to that.
Retroactive programming; where whether we could always trumps whether we should. And who will question the unholy offspring? It is equal parts glorious and terrifying.
Now Win 3.11 can be run on a GIT built FreeDOS. If anyone wrote some Win 3.11 replacement for DOS by reusing some Wine code, (and Calmira Desktop on top) it would be great for legacy 386 machines.
It's not like we have _that_ many 386 machines. Like 80% of the mobos around got some traces damaged because of battery leaks. Capacitors in ancient AT power supplies explode out of blue, etc, etc.
It's not just about CPUs, but also about peripherals and multiple quirks. I wonder who might have enough resources to re-implement a dos-era machine with modern components without any potential commercial applications.
Simpler projects (e.g. Commanderx16) weren't successful so far.
These machines exist, they're common in industrial applications and also used by retro gamers. They're basically a i586-based PC in modern SoC form. Of course if you want to run literally anything that's more modern and not specific to old x86, current hardware is way better.
I worked at a book store on my university campus in 2011 and the entire inventory management system was on a DOS system, I believe running on a VM (but possibly not...).