Re: How to determine GS/OS version

[Mitchell Spector <mitch2gs@hotmail.com>]

dempson@actrix.gen.nz (David Empson) wrote:

>CC Rider <alaskacc@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> One of my hard drives boots to a ProSel screen.  I am trying to find
>> out what version of GS/OS is in the background.  The initial IIGS
>> splash screen does not have any version on it, unlike the 6.01 that I
>> see on some boot-ups.  Is there a place to check in the finder or via
>> a block editor that would reveal the version?
>
>It is probably System 4.0, since 5.0 and later advertised their version
>number during boot, if I remember right.

    Not quite. It was only System 6 that displayed the version number 
on the splash screen, and then only the System "package" release 
number (i.e. 6.0 or 6.0.1) not the OS version per say.

>Press the space bar right at the beginning of startup. GS/OS will start
>up in text mode, displaying its version number at the top of the screen.

    Or pressing any key would do the same. You'd see a text screen 
with "Welcome to the World of GS/OS  vX.xx" with a copyright date,
OS release date and all the toolset version numbers as they load up.

    I'd advise using something other than the space bar, as that is the
command to disable the RamFAST SCSI from booting if you have
one installed. :) (i.e. not only will you not see this screen, your SCSI
devices won't boot until you restart the machine).

>I don't have my detailed list of version numbers handy, but from memory,
>the major version number of GS/OS is 2 behind the major system version
>(i.e. System 4 has GS/OS 2, System 5 has GS/OS 3, System 6 has GS/OS 4).

    Yep, that is correct. I always thought they should have called the
first release of GS/OS (released in System 4) version 1.0, since it was
essentially a brand new operating system written from the ground up 
rather than a mere update of ProDOS 16 version 1. And of course it
was a true 16-bit operating system, whereas ProDOS 16 was not (it
was a hacked 16-bit shell around an 8-bit operating system if memory
serves right).

    I've always immediately identified the OS version by quick visual 
clues on the splash screen. 

- GS/OS version 2 -  the screen background color around the 
"Welcome to the IIGS" box always matches the border color
(i.e. yellow border, gives you a yellow splash screen) and is
solid/non-dithered.

- GS/OS version 3 - the screen background color is the standard
periwinkle blue of the Finder desktop, but there is NO version 
number reported below the "Welcome to the IIGS".

- GS/OS version 4 - same as version 3, however you will now
see "version 6.0.x" printed below the "Welcome to the IIGS".

Mitchell Spector