Comparing the UI of Windows 1.x and Vista apps

[Denis W. Veteran]

I have this pack of Windows 1.0 apps that were converted to Windows 3.x EXEs, and compared them with their modern day counterparts:

Windows 1.0 apps (running in Vista)

(note: Paint's toolbar is messed up)

Windows Vista apps

It's nice to see what 20 years can do to UI design. Of course, four of those applications have had the same UI for 10 years. Alas.

(side note: At last, older applications don't fall back to the classic window borders, as is with the case in XP.)

[mrp04]

Wouldnt the OS run better without all this legacy code? I dont think anyone still uses a program from windows 3.1, why do they still work?

[Robin.B]

Wouldnt the OS run better without all this legacy code? I dont think anyone still uses a program from windows 3.1, why do they still work?

I can write some code in Qbasic, convert it into EXE, and it will work just fine. It doesn't matter how old the EXE is, and it has nothing to do with the OS having "legacy code".

[Buu]

Is quite amazing innit :) I wonder what the OS in 40 years will look like :p

[Ambroos]

within 40 years we'll probably have a 3d OS that you can see everywhere around you, that you can hear, that you can feel, and that you can use wherever you are because it's built in in our brains or something :p

[jus1haz2]

Well hopefully then our brains dont get viruses or bsod lol ><

[Meraklis56]

see the difirences of the clock in win 1.x and vista...nothing changed lol :p

[crimsonhead]

I still find calc ugly. :p

[whitebread]

What, exactly, would you like the programs to look like? :blink: I agree some additional features would be great, but come on!

[Julius Caro]

Notepad hasnt changed much :p

[John Ericson]

Wow Reversi has changed to Minesweeper, that's quite a huge change ;)

[Alex Suraci]

Ugh, I hate how pre-win2k apps look :x

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Wouldnt the OS run better without all this legacy code? I dont think anyone still uses a program from windows 3.1, why do they still work?

No not really.

DOS, Win 3.x, and non-Win32 Win9x apps run in a Virtual Machine called "Windows On Windows". It's just so transparent that you don't really notice.

[John Ericson]

You've been blogged! :)

[Hello1024]

No not really.

DOS, Win 3.x, and non-Win32 Win9x apps run in a Virtual Machine called "Windows On Windows". It's just so transparent that you don't really notice.

Um - except the "8 NTVDM.EXE" in the taskbar - that must be a bug - NTVDM's shouldn't be grouped like that.

Does anyone have a copy of windows 1.0 or 2 or 3 or 3.1? - I'd like to test it on a new pc - I don't think ms will sue for piracy on that!

[jb23fan]

haha.. very cool!

[garbagestrike]

Wouldnt the OS run better without all this legacy code? I dont think anyone still uses a program from windows 3.1, why do they still work?

ever heard of backwards compatibility? some people still use DOS in their businesses

[XerXis]

i love the win 1.x control panel :D

[Denis W. Veteran]

Does anyone have a copy of windows 1.0 or 2 or 3 or 3.1? - I'd like to test it on a new pc - I don't think ms will sue for piracy on that!

Windows 1.0's boot disk is on the same site I got those Windows 1.x -> 3.x applications from. (Not too sure if linking to this old stuff is illegal. Please remove this link if need be.)

Edited November 10, 2006 by rm20010

[Buzz99]

I just discovered at the office that a pc (IBM PII) still running windows 3.11 because of a software called (if I remember it) Data Express or something like this.....

[mindscape]

Frys Electronics still uses DOS i believe.