Excellent archive of Watcom C/C++ CD-ROMs on Archive.org (2018) | Hacker News Reader

Excellent archive of Watcom C/C++ CD-ROMs on Archive.org (2018)

virtuallyfun.com

27 pointsfm7710 comments

If anyone reading has access to versions 9, 9.01, or 9.5B, I'd really appreciate you getting in touch here or using the info in my profile. I want the version of the compiler that was used to build the original Doom, which shipped in 1993 and was patched in 1994/1995.

In addition to this archive.org bundle, versions 7.0, 8.5a and 9.5 are floating around. Looking at compiler output for standard library functions, it seems DOOM.EXE was compiled with one of the in-between versions.

You'd probably find this interesting:

https://bitbucket.org/maraakate/doomnew-for-dos/src/master/

I believe that there is patch disks for the 9.5 to bring it to 9.5a and 9.5b?

C32_B.ZIP Update for Watcom C/C++, 32-Bit, PatchLevel B

Stuff like this is all over arhive.org as well..

I've been searching for the original Phar Lap 386 stuff along with 1st gen 386 Watcom for years..

Thanks. On reflection, I have something that identifies as "9.5" but it might be 9.5B. I've found C32_B.ZIP and I suppose I can try to compare it against the install. I'm quite confident I don't have 9.5A!

I've been watching eBay for years and only ever see boring SQL products and the same tshirt.

I found the non surprising names of c16_a.zip and c32_a.zip ... like all crap on the internet it’s a matter of knowing the magical patterns of what you want (lol assuming that you knew what you wanted!)

I almost bought that stupid shirt to just get it off of fleabay but I fear that they have more than one....

It lives on as OpenWatcom. It’s fun to think that with a DOS extender, you can write pretty much anything that does not need to be 64-bit, and it will run under (Free)DOS (which by today’s standards is almost bare metal)!

> it will run under (Free)DOS (which by today’s standards is almost bare metal)!

This statement holds for raspberry pi’s too.

I've still got my Watcom C/C++ CDs on my book shelf although I've not used them for decades.

AFAIK there is no significant effort to implement full C99 compatibility (let alone the newer C standards, and C++ as well).

I always thought of the logo as a lightening bolt, but looking at the thumbnail it’s clearly a W.

Back in the day it was an incredible tool, allowing you to target so many environments. Too bad it imploded onto itself.

Yeah. I remember using it a toy graphics engine. I ported to DJGPP (32 bits) one day, and everything was 10x faster. Never looked back, but it’d be nice to have an independent compiler company.

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