For the October 2019 Retrochallenge, this will be an attempt to run a version or emulation of DOS, running a web server, in AWS.
I am looking around for different software resources to make this work.
I started by installing FREEDOS in QEMU. This went pretty smoothly, until I was time to set up networking. I installed both FDNET and MTCP using FDIMPLES, and I could not get the network card to work. I was using ne2k emulation, both PCI and ISA modes, and I could not get DHCP to work. I was using the -net user option, which puts the emulated PC on its own network and runs a virtual DHCP server, but it wasn't working for me. I tried RTL2139, but for some reason FDNET.BAT was trying to load a driver that didn't get installed. Maybe freedoes doesn't ship with rtl drivers? Looking in the FDOS\NETWORK directory, I did find that in addition to NE2000.COM, freedos came with PCNTPK.COM, which I Googled around to find they are for PCNet cards. So I tried qemu pcnet emuation, and that seemed to work.
qemu-system-x86_64 -m 64 -hda doshdd.img -cdrom FD12LGCY.iso -net user -net nic,model=pcnet -curses
Above, I am using an option called curses, that emulates VGA text mode in the console. This is because my goal is to run this in AWS, and I will not have graphics. I could run in VNC, but that is not necessary. I was finally greeted with an IP address:
mTCP DHCP Client by M Brutman (mbbrutman@gmail.com) (C)opyright 2008-2013 Version: May 23 2013 Timeout per request: 10 seconds, Retry attempts: 3 Sending DHCP requests, Press [ESC] to abort. DHCP request sent, attempt 1: Offer received, Acknowledged Good news everyone! IPADDR = 10.0.2.15 NETMASK = 255.255.255.0 GATEWAY = 10.0.2.2 NAMESERVER = 10.0.2.3 LEASE_TIME = 86400 seconds Settings written to 'C:\FDOS\MTCP.CFG' Done processing startup files C:\FDCONFIG.SYS and C:\AUTOEXEC.BAT Type HELP to get support on commands and navigation. Welcome to the FreeDOS 1.2 operating system (http://www.freedos.org) C:\>
C:\>cd mtcp
C:\MTCP>htget -o a.htm http://mwsherman.com
mTCP HTGet by M Brutman (mbbrutman@gmail.com) (C)opyright 2011-2013
Version: May 23 2013
Server return code: 200 OK
C:\MTCP>head -N 10 a.htm
<html><head><style>
.header {
box-shadow: 10px 10px;
}
Perfect... Freedos is up and running and connected to the internet. I also tried the hostfwd option with NC (mTCP's netcat), and was able to get a port on my host machine successfully forwarded to the VM. But will it run in aws?
mark@ip-172-31-17-205:~$ qemu-system-i386 -m 64 -hda doshdd.img -net user,hostfwd=tcp::8000-:80 -net nic,model=pcnet -curses
I got an ip address... so there was one thing to try...
mark@ip-172-31-17-205:~$ qemu-system-i386 -m 64 -hda doshdd.img -net user,hostfwd=tcp::8000-:80 -net nic,model=pcnet -curses
It got an ip address... So what happens if I do this?
In amazon qemu:
C:\>cd mtcp
C:\MTCP>nc -listen 80
mTCP Netcat by M Brutman (mbbrutman@gmail.com) (C)opyright 2007-2013
Version: May 23 2013
Waiting for a connection on port 80. Press [ESC] to abort.
Connection received from 76.235.21.58:44312
Hello DOS
at home:
[mark@octothingy ~]$ nc mwsherman.com 8000 Hello DOS
My original plan, was after getting MTCP working, I was going to implement a simple www server. But, it turns out recent versions of MTCP already have a web server... I downloaded that newest version MTCP, and ran HTTPSERV on a folder containing a simple text file. It seems to work just fine!
This happened a lot quicker, and easier, than I thought it would. I have a simple DOS-based HTTP web server running in AWS. I think I would like to package it all up a bit nicer, release a disk image. I have a few ideas. Maybe instead of a disk image file, use a FAT-formatted EBS volume. Can you even have FAT-formatted EBS? And maybe work it out so all you need to specify is a disk volume containing your application for use on the 'D' drive, and an autoexec.bat file.
"Real Life" got in the way of doing everything I wanted to do on this retrochallenge. I did have pockets of free time I could have put to work on this... but honestly, I lost a lot of motivation to work on this. For me, the Retrochallenge has been a friendly competition. At the start, everyone's blog URLs are published, and I watch what other people are working on. Seeing others make progress on their interesting projects gives me motivation to continue working on mine. I feel many others share a similar view. This time around, without the entrants published at the start, I felt like I was working alone. So, I didn't want to do anything on it. It is already November 4, and there is no page of entries.
When the retrochallenge is running, I check on other people's projects every few days. Perhaps I can be recruited as siterunner next time...