Windows95
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After Math: Gaming the system
With Gamescom 2018 now wrapping up and IFA 2018 just getting started, there's more than enough video game news to go around. But the latest salvos in the console wars weren't the only things going on in the tech industry this week. VW announced that it's investing $4 billion in a proprietary connected car architecture, Facebook phased out 5,000 ad options in an effort to fight discrimination on its platform and the CBP actually did something right for once. I know, I'm shocked too.
Windows 95 app brings nerd nostalgia to macOS, Windows and Linux
If you're nostalgic about old tech and software, then get ready: Slack developer Felix Rieseberg has created an app that allows you to run Windows 95 on Windows, macOS and Linux (which is perhaps more practical than running it on an Apple Watch). If you're interested in downloading it, you can grab it over at GitHub.
Recreate the thrills of '90s PC admin in this browser game
Video games can be hard work. With all the grinding, stat chasing and repetition that defines many modern games, sometimes toiling away in a virtual world can feel like a second job. Well, it seems like for design professor Pippin Barr this hasn't gone unnoticed, as he's taken the concept of digital busy work one step further. In his latest game It Is As If You Were Doing Work, players find themselves logging in to a brilliantly realized Windows 95 backdrop as they're tasked with clicking boxes and doing completely pointless 'work'.
Windows 95 on an Apple Watch is wonderfully impractical
The quest to put Windows 95 on seemingly everything just achieved one of its biggest -- or rather, smallest -- feats to date. Nick Lee managed to get Microsoft's classic operating system running on an Apple Watch by modifying a WatchKit app to load his own code (in this case, the Bochs x86 emulator) instead of Apple's usual foundations. The interface is incredibly miniscule, of course, but it works. While you don't have a true mouse pointer, you can use the touchscreen to navigate the Start menu and open apps.
Windows 95 on a Nintendo 3DS is as strange as you'd think
The trend of putting PC software on wholly impractical devices isn't stopping with the new year, folks. GBATemp fan Shutterbug2000 has managed to get Windows 95 running on a New Nintendo 3DS XL thanks to both DOSbox emulation and some ingenuity. You won't be doing a whole lot with this right now -- Microsoft wasn't designing for touchscreens and analog sticks two decades ago -- but it really does work on a basic level. It looks more than a little odd, too, between the tiny desktop and the emulator status on the second screen.
The After Math: Spam kings, Microsoft milestones and a bionic penis
It's been a wild week, and not just for our stock portfolios. The internet's self-described "Spam King" admitted to posting more than 27 million ads on Facebook. Microsoft celebrated the 20th anniversary of Windows 95 by dredging up a promo video featuring Jennifer Aniston and Matthew Perry. Because Friends is never not topical. And a British man endured an 11-hour surgery to have the world's first bionic penis installed. Good times!
Happy 20th birthday, Windows 95!
When Windows 95 launched on Thursday August 24th 1995 (the clue's in the name), Mortal Kombat was the surprise box office hit, TLC was top of the charts, and Microsoft was pushing its new operating system with a $250 million publicity campaign. Start buttons everywhere, buying the rights to The Rolling Stones' "Start Me Up" and a cyber sitcom starring Jennifer Anniston and Matthew Perry.Yes, a cyber sitcom.
'Windows 93' is like your childhood computer on acid
Flat design. Pfffft. You know what's really cool? ASCII renditions of Star Wars: A New Hope in what appears to be its entirety. This bonafide internet gem (and who even knows how many others) are hidden in Windows 93, a web app spotted by The Verge that mimics a bygone time of cathode-ray tube monitors and dial-up internet connections. The Redmond-inspired desktop has all manner of callbacks in addition to that ultra-low-fi version of Episode IV. Easter eggs include a game of solitaire with a twist, a pop-up "virus" and too many other goodies that we don't want to spoil. What were you able to find, dear readers? Let us know in the comments.
Rumor calls out Windows 95 as the reason Microsoft skipped version 9
Still confused about why the new version of Windows is 10, instead of 9? Beyond the loosely defined numbering schemes that are all too common in tech (how many iPhones did it take to get to 6?), a note posted to Reddit could provide an answer. Reddit user cranbourne claims to be a Microsoft developer, and cites rumors that early testing with the name "Windows 9" ran into problems with code some third-party developers used as a shortcut to detect when apps are running on Windows 95 or Windows 98. The problem, is that it wasn't written to actually check for the extra character. Whatever the real reason is Microsoft isn't saying, and it gave Gizmodo a vague non-answer about the new name so your conspiracy theory is as good as ours (we think they were avoiding a Tolkien nine rings of power reference, and we have evidence to prove it.)
APK puts Windows 95, 98 and XP, plus Linux on the EVO 3D
And here you thought Microsoft bringing Windows 8 to ARM was big news. Turns out, a member of the xda-developers forum has managed to make an APK that puts a variety of Redmond's x86 operating systems on the HTC EVO 3D and its 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon silicon -- Windows 95, 98, XP and even your favorite flavor of Linux are all available for the three dee-equipped handset. All you need to do is install the Bochs Pentium emulator APK and the OS disk image of your choice, modify a couple files, and you'll be doing yesteryear's desktop computing on a handheld in no time. Feeling nostalgic? Detailed instructions how to do it yourself and the necessary files can be found at the source link below, but all we want to know is: does it do the blue screen of death or the force close dance when things go awry?
Found Footage: Windows 95, 3.1 running on jailbroken iPad
If you can get past the sight of Windows 3.11 (gack...) and Windows 95 (hurl!) running on an iPad, then hit the play button in the YouTube embed above and be prepared to be visually and audibly assaulted (by no less than Metallica). YouTube user MSComputerVideos provides a complete tutorial on how to make your iPad look like a relic from the 1990s by using a jailbroken iPad and the open-source Bochs emulator (frequently used for such efforts). A rip of the 'Kill 'Em All' t-shirt to tipster MS.
Windows 95 on iPad completes the Bill Gates vision (video)
Ok, ok, it's just Windows 95 running in an x86 emulator according to its creator. But even with such clumsy performance you know you love seeing it. Party like its 1995 without the Aqua Net after the break. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Windows 95 on iPhone: the worst Parallels installation you've ever seen
Give a guy an iPhone, a jailbreak, and an open-source, cross-platform x86 emulator, and it's just a matter of time before hilarity ensues. In this case, said hilarity involves getting Windows 95 to boot on an iPhone 3G, a process that takes 5-10 minutes worth of pure boot time only to yield an environment useless for... well, actual use. In the video, we see the hack demonstrated both on an actual iPhone and within the Mac-based emulator, which we reckon is just about the most terrifying Parallels / VMware replacement we've ever encountered. Apparently, XP emulation and 3GS tests are up next -- the 3GS should perform marginally better on account of its faster core and more capacious RAM -- but that still won't cure the sting of being handily beaten to the milestone by the N95, will it? Follow the break for video of the mind-twisting Microsoft-on-Apple-on-Apple emulation in action.[Via Gizmodo and Good iPhone]
Windows 3.1 on S60 dude says 'why stop there,' ups the ante with Win95
Hey, look, it's Windows... mobile. Get it? You know, Windows 95 on a mobile device -- ah, never mind. Point is, the S60 port of DOSBox seems to be doing some really crazy, insane, questionably-useful things for Symbian-powered devices around the world, and when running Windows 3.1 on a 320 x 240 display just doesn't do it for you anymore, you can apparently step up to a harder drug like Windows 95. The video shows good ol' 95 getting demoed on an N82, but given the molasses-like pace of absolutely everything, we'd say this is strictly a for-the-hell-of-it sort of experiment. Translation: there are better ways to run your BBS from the road. Follow the break for video. [Thanks, Daniel]
Save the Open Apple key (or should we?)
Thomas from the German site Rettet die sent us this English version of his petition to save the Open Apple key-- that little Apple icon on the Command key that's missing from the new Apple Keyboards. Already, he's received 1600 German comments in favor of keeping the Apple key, and he asked us to bring the petition to America and join the fight to save the Apple key.But is it a fight we want to join or not? Sure, the Open Apple key is a tradition by now-- ever since I was a kid, I've learned to use the Open Apple key instead of the Ctrl key on Windows keyboards, and even when Microsoft trotted out their "Windows key" in Windows 95, it was just a copy of the classic-- their flag didn't come close to the icon design of the bitten apple.But Apple has to have a good reason for taking the key off, don't they? So far, all I've heard is that they did it from a design standpoint-- they didn't want Apple logos all over the place, and the Command key is (and works) exactly the same anyway.For me, that's not a good enough reason. Having a logo on the Command key is a uniquely Apple standard, and no one said that it cluttered up the keyboard before now. Of course, Apple is Apple, and they'll do what they want-- even 16,000 petition signatures probably won't get them to change their product. But that doesn't change the fact that they're wrong to kill the Open Apple.
