Microsoft UNIX Licensing.

1978 AT&T System 7 for XENIX

1991 Apple System 7 for Windows 3.1

1994 DEC UNIX for Windows NT

2002 SCO UNIX for Windows XP

After XP Microsoft moved away from UNIX Licensing and started International ECMA 335 & 336 Standard or .NET.

Microsoft Buys Into SCO Group’s Unix

Microsoft to license Unix code 

I licensed Windows NT, XP and 2003 code from Microsoft and have my original System Integrator contract.my startup is a Gold Microsoft Partner and Microsoft Bizspark Graduate. I'm a UVa Computer Science Alumni in 2013 with a 3.2 GPA and Scholar award. I need my Windows Vista, 7, 8/8.1 Source to complete my Microsoft contract and I have my software assurance

Startups … inside giant companies

Apple's Darwin Build

    

 In older macOS releases ending with Snow Leopard. You can use Apple's former build utility called Darwin Build to fetch releases of Apple sources here is a link to macOS Forge. You can still use Bash for Windows or the Git For Windows SDK. and step 6 & 7 on Windows.

https://www.macosforge.org/

 

 

1. install darwinbuild
2. mkdir 9G55 && cd 9G55
3. sudo -s
4. darwinbuild -init 9G55
5. for X in $(darwinxref version '*' | cut -d '-' -f 1); do darwinbuild -fetch $X; done
6. mkdir AllSource
7. for X in Sources/*; do tar zxvf $X -C AllSource/; done


 You can also boot Darwin 8.0 Panther on 2005 x86 hardware.

The UNIX Heritage Society

 https://www.tuhs.org/

UK Kent Mirror Service near Moore Castle in the UK

https://www.mirrorservice.org/ 

Code Plex

 MS CodePlex Archive ZIPs

I've been on Code Plex ever since the beginning and I was able to fit my codeplex,archive my entertainment and everything else on a 36 terabyte RAID 1 with a RAID Card. Also you might like 

FSCK Technology for older systems like OpenStep 

https://fsck.technology/

Windows Build Collection

Here is a list of windows Build Numbers. You might want to cache the beta wiki like I have 

Welcome to BetaWiki!

Name / Description	Version	Build Number	Public Release	RTM Release
Windows NT 3.1	3.10	511	1993-07-27
Windows NT 3.5	3.50	807	1994-09-21
Windows NT 3.1, Service Pack 3	3.10	528	1994-11
Windows NT 3.51	3.51	1057	1995-05-30
Windows 95	4.00	950	1995-08-24
Windows 95 OEM Service Release 1	4.00	950 A	1996-02-14
Windows 95 OEM Service Release 2	4.00	950 B	1996-08-24
Windows NT 4.0	4.0	1381	1996-08-24	1996-07-31
Windows 95 OEM Service Release 2.1	4.00	950 B	1997-08-27
Windows 95 OEM Service Release 2.5	4.00	950 C	1997-11-26
Windows 98	4.10	1998	1998-05-15
Windows 98 Second Edition (SE)	4.10	2222	1999-05-05
Windows 2000	5.0	2195	2000-02-17	1999-12-15
Windows Me	4.90	3000	2000-09-14	2000-06-19
Windows XP	5.1	2600	2001-10-25	2001-08-24
Windows XP, Service Pack 1	5.1	2600.1105-1106	2002-09-09
Windows Server 2003	5.2	3790	2003-04-24
Windows XP, Service Pack 2	5.1	2600.2180	2004-08-25
Windows Server 2003, Service Pack 1	5.2	3790.1180	2005-03-30
Windows Server 2003 R2	5.2	3790	2005-12-06	2005-12-06
Windows Vista	6.0	6000	2007-01-30	2006-11-08
Windows Server 2003, Service Pack 2	5.2	3790	2007-03-13
Windows Home Server	5.2	4500	2007-11-04	2007-07-16
Windows Vista, Service Pack 1	6.0	6001	2008-02-04
Windows Server 2008	6.0	6001	2008-02-27	2008-02-04
Windows XP, Service Pack 3	5.1	2600	2008-04-21
Windows Vista, Service Pack 2	6.0	6002	2009-05-26	2009-04-28
Windows Server 2008, Service Pack 2	6.0	6002	2009-05-26
Windows 7	6.1	7600	2009-10-22	2009-07-22
Windows Server 2008 R2	6.1	7600	2009-10-22	2009-07-22
Windows 7, Service Pack 1	6.1	7601	2011-02-22
Windows Server 2008 R2, Service Pack 1	6.1	7601	2011-02-22	2011-02-09
Windows Home Server 2011	6.1	8400	2011-04-06	2011-04-06
Windows Server 2012	6.2	9200	2012-09-04	2012-08-01
Windows 8	6.2	9200	2012-10-26	2012-08-01
Windows 8.1	6.3	9600	2013-08-27	2013-10-17
Windows Server 2012 R2	6.3	9600	2013-10-18	2013-08-27
Windows 10, Version 1507	10.0	10240	2015-07-29	2015-07-15
Windows 10, Version 1511	10.0	10586	2015-11-10
Windows 10, Version 1607	10.0	14393	2016-08-02
Windows Server 2016, Version 1607	10.0	14393	2016-08-02
Windows 10, Version 1703	10.0	15063	2017-04-05
Windows 10, Version 1709	10.0	16299	2017-10-17
Windows Server 2016, Version 1709	10.0	16299	2017-10-17
Windows 10, Version 1803	10.0	17134	2018-04-30
Windows Server 2019, Version 1809	10.0	17763	2018-10-02
Windows 10, Version 1809	10.0	17763	2018-11-13
Windows Server 2008, Service Pack 2, Rollup KB4489887	6.0	6003	2019-03-19
Windows 10, Version 1903	10.0	18362	2019-05-21
Windows 10, Version 1909	10.0	18363	2019-11-12
Windows 10, Version 2004	10.0	19041	2020-05-27
Windows 10, Version 20H2	10.0	19042	2020-10-20

 Microsoft Windows 98

 Microsoft Windows 95 

Microsoft Windows Me

Windows NT 4.0 Workstation

Microsoft Windows Whistler

The Windows Longhorn/Vista Archive

Microsoft Windows 7 

Microsoft Windows 8 

Windows Interoperability

 In 2009 Microsoft tried there Interoperability with UNIX/LINUX with not much success with the publicin Windows 10 it is getting better please read Microsoft learn for complete details. Some of the open group projects are openpegusus for WBEM and motif for a standard window.

Open Specifications Dev Center

Microsoft Windows 7

For Windows 7. So far you need you Windows API Code Pack, Windows 7 SDK and WDK and you .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 Reference source which shipped with Windows 7 and in support until 2029. Which I have I'll try to put it on my github when my company is funded. Until then you can use this tech incident that I and Microsoft worked on below. The .NET Framework 4.6.1 is in support until 2027 so look for a switch from Linus after that its still Dependency hell in Linux and .NET not the .NET Framework there is a difference. 

.NET Referance Source 

Windows-API-Code-Pack-1.1  

Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4 

Other WDK downloads 

msdn-code-gallery-microsoft  

Samples are still being gathered from NT 4.0 to 11 stay tuned.

Microsoft .NET Framework Lifecycle

 

 

Visual C++ 4.0

     You need Visual C++ 4.0 to build the NT 4.0 source kit again with the 4.0 SDK and DDK again using windiff to combine directories. In my opinion Visual C++ 4.0 would be the version to buy with 2005 for XP/2003. As 4.0 comes with the Mac Cross Platform Version, RISC edition and the Embedded Version. XP is in Visual Studio 2019 Compatibility support until 2029 so don't look for Windows 7 source anytime soon. Maybe the Enterprise Source Licensing Program if your company has 10K windows seats. It used to be 700 resource hours.  I'm a member of the .NET Foundation and am trying with the Shared Source initiative again. You need your desktop optimization packs with software assurance.

Visual Studio 2019 Platform Targeting and Compatibility

XP in support in VS 2019 until 2029.

Installing Darwin on QEMU

 

1. Darwin 8.0.1 (corresponding to Mac OS X 10.4) seems to be the latest available full installer image, at least, until the PureDarwin project produces a new one.

   • List of available ISO images

2. More recent versions of packages are available in source form:

   • Open Source website (links by OS release)

   • Full list of packages (some aren't linked under any OS release)

Installing

1. Download and extract installation CD image:

   • Darwin 8.0.1 (was under “Darwin 8.0.1 Installer CD” on old website)

     • MD5: dbd260dda994093a11c31afbe624aa34

     • SHA-256: a26f9f14795fe0687bd647d41b712464c9a61430736fae4aa0fdb89207e1a62a

   • $ gunzip darwinx86-801.iso.gz

2. Set up QEMU VM:

   • $ qemu-img create -f qcow2 darwin.qcow2 10G

3. Start VM:

   • $ qemu -net none -drive file=darwin.qcow2,cache=writeback -cdrom darwinx86-801.iso -boot d

   • Other useful qemu options: -m 512 and -enable-kqemu

4. Installation steps:

   • First boot:

     • Select disk

     • "2" (manual partitioning)

     • "y" (initialize MBR)

     • In fdisk:

       • > auto hfs

       • Ignore the warning

       • > update

       • > write

       • > quit

     • Enter partition name

     • "yes" (clean install)

     • "darwin" (volume name)

     • Continue (reboot)

   • Second boot (make sure to boot from CD again):

     • Select disk

     • "3" (existing partition)

     • Enter partition name

     • "hfs" (HFS+ filesystem)

     • "yes" (clean install)

     • "darwin" (volume name)

     • Wait for installation to complete...

     • Enter root password

     • "darwin" (hostname)

     • "3" (spawn shell)

     • # halt

5. Configure VM for normal startup:

   • Remove QEMU flags -cdrom darwinx86-801.iso -boot d

Basic configuration

Enable VM networking

• Change QEMU flags: -net none → -net nic,model=rtl8139 -net user

SSH access

1. Change QEMU flags: -net user → -net user,hostfwd=tcp:127.0.0.1:10022-:22 (pick any port instead of 10022)

2. Log in to VM, enable SSH:

   • # service ssh start

3. Connect to VM with

   • $ ssh -p 10022 root@localhost

4. Optionally add an alias to host ~/.ssh/config to simplify connecting:

   • Host darwin-vm
     HostName localhost
     Port 10022
     User root

   • Connect to VM with

     • ssh darwin-vm

5. Install public key to simplify logging in:

   • $ cat .ssh/id_rsa.pub | ssh darwin-vm 'mkdir .ssh; cat >>.ssh/authorized_keys'

6. Add -nographic to QEMU flags to disable console window, which is no longer required

Some familiar aliases

• # echo "alias ll='ls -l'" >>/etc/bashrc

• # echo "alias la='ls -lA'" >>/etc/bashrc

Timezone

• # ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/UTC /etc/localtime

Temporary filesystem

Using a temporary disk image to build software helps keep the main disk image file smaller.

1. $ qemu-img create -f qcow2 scratch.qcow2 10G

2. Add QEMU flag: -drive file=scratch.qcow2,cache=writeback and boot

3. Figure out which disk number corresponds to the scratch drive:

   • # mount

   • # ls /dev/rdisk*

   • It's the one that isn't mounted and doesn't have any partitions (sn-suffixed files)

   • It's usually, but not always, /dev/rdisk1

4. # newfs_hfs -v scratch /dev/rdisk1

5. # reboot

6. Available as /Volumes/scratch on next boot

Notes

1. The VM sometimes fails to boot with "panic(...): nfs_boot_init failed"; if this happens, restart it.

Updating the system

Kernel (xnu)

• It breaks support for FAT (and thus the QEMU virtual FAT drive)

  • Support for FAT is in the msdosfs package which requires Xcode to build

  • An alternative to the virtual FAT drive for transferring files is writing tar archives directly to an unpartitioned drive

  • SSH scp is another alternative

• Requires:

  • corresponding cctools (e.g. initially installed version or cctools-590.42.1, but not cctools-667.3)

  • gcc 3.3 (revert if changed with gcc_select 3.3)

• Source package: xnu-792.6.76.tar.gz (update to version listed under “Mac OS X 10.4.3”)

  • MD5: 854f44519778e8bde4283e275ed154e6

  • SHA-256: 35c5ed2f1399c770583a229a733d064dc302ae6327a7fcb40996e1f3c474f568

• Building:

  • # cd /Volumes/scratch

  • # tar xzf xnu-792.6.76.tar.gz

  • # cd xnu-792.6.76

  • Patch to help build gcc_42-5577:

    • # sed -i.tmp 's/defined *(__i386__)/& || defined(__x86_64__)/' bsd/{machine,sys}/*.h

  • # make DSTROOT= install

• Reboot. uname -r is now 8.7.0.

Standard library (Libc)

• Requires updated xnu (xnu-792.6.761).

• Source package: Libc-391.2.10.tar.gz (update to version listed under “Mac OS X 10.4.3”)

  • MD5: 7a1a08d1b68668fc41916d6cf39182a4

  • SHA-256: e90b78d310235544623f26c6f18e27b329b5bc778deab8e57332e8e90ab92f11

• Building:

  • # cd /Volumes/scratch

  • # tar xzf Libc-391.2.10.tar.gz

  • # cd Libc-391.2.10

  • # sed -i.tmp s/NOTIFY_STATUS_OK/0/g gen/{asl.c,syslog.c}

  • Patch to help build gcc_42-5577:

    • # sed -i.tmp 's/defined *(__i386__)/& || defined(__x86_64__)/' include/machine/*.h

  • # make OBJROOT="$PWD"/obj install

Upgrading GCC

dyld

• This is optional.

• Source package: dyld-46.16.tar.gz (under “Mac OS X 10.4.11.x86”)

  • MD5: a97d4d2a77b3e5f2ff9757007cae0596

  • SHA-256: cf753c3a2cef239b1334c56603b36d206f54d613daa078ce0f2d73c3e2a0dd82

• Makefile: dyld.mk

  • Darwin doesn't include Xcode, which is required to build this package. This makefile provides alternative build instructions.

• Building:

  • # cd /Volumes/scratch

  • # tar xzf dyld-46.16.tar.gz

  • # cd dyld-46.16

  • # sed -i.tmp '/case CPU_TYPE_X86_64:/,/break;/d;/__pthread_tsd_first/d' src/dyld.cpp

  • # ln -s libstdc++.a /usr/lib/gcc/i686-apple-darwin8/4.0.0/libstdc++-static.a

  • # bsdmake -f dyld.mk VERSION_DYLD=46 install

cctools

• Choice of version:

  • cctools-667.3

    • Too new to build xnu.

    • Source package: cctools-667.3.tar.gz (under “Mac OS X 10.5.8”)

      • MD5: 518166e6ddbd0287bebee3d00fddee7d

      • SHA-256: 1ba43a3d3bcf138a196e714666927c706857226adccf2e69db4f08e940631c0d

  • cctools-590.42.1

    • Too old to build gcc.

    • Source package: cctools-590.42.1.tar.gz (update to version listed under “Mac OS X 10.4.3”)

      • MD5: 6d875c5483699fd0f1e150facae35256

      • SHA-256: 61c86c4dc556daafbabebd8162bfbce8214843b218fefbd15c6c1ba03d225a10

• Building:

  • # cd /Volumes/scratch

  • # tar xzf cctools-667.3.tar.gz

  • # cd cctools-667.3

  • # sed -i.tmp '/install.*strip/{h;s/strip/seg_hack/gp;g;s/ -s / /;}' misc/Makefile

  • # sed -i.tmp s/ld_classic/ld/ ld/Makefile

  • # make install

• The new assembler will often show the warning "indirect jmp without '*'" on code generated by the old GCC.

gcc

• Choice of version:

  • gcc_42-5577

    • Latests gcc_42 package (newer packages are named gcc). GCC 4.2.1. Requires patched system include files, which can be done when upgrading xnu and Libc (see above).

    • Source package: gcc_42-5577.tar.gz (update to version listed under “Mac OS X 10.5.8”)

      • MD5: dab7ad45f76919f058a6f1cf3a0e91d8

      • SHA-256: fd6459ab701b41dc1297cdbc27f302c558d766505cfe8dd1d6ec0d257fef0e81

  • gcc_42-5531

    • Slightly older version. Doesn't require any changes to include files.

    • Source package: gcc_42-5531.tar.gz (under “Mac OS X 10.5.8”)

      • MD5: 959ecd224cea2477d57b1c3026fe05ee

      • SHA-256: 924862e2092fa11754ec9226a0de4772d831c40500231728055d00d1bb3a632e

• Requires cctools-667.3 and optionally dyld

  • Building:

    • # cd /Volumes/scratch

    • # tar xzf gcc_42-5577.tar.gz

    • # cd gcc_42-5577

    • If dyld isn't upgraded, patch to revert debugging format from DWARF to stabs:

      • # sed -i.tmp 's/\(#define PREFERRED_DEBUGGING_TYPE \).*/\1DBX_DEBUG/' gcc/config/darwin.h

      • # sed -i.tmp '/darwin_macho_att_stub/s/Init.*//' gcc/config/darwin.opt

    • # sed -i.tmp '/x86_64/s/|| exit 1//' build_gcc

    • # ln -s true /usr/bin/dsymutil

    • # gnumake RC_ARCHS=i386 install

      • Don't try to set DSTROOT=/, it deletes everything.

    • # cp -pR dst/* /

    • # cp -pR obj/dst-i686-i686/usr/lib/libgcc_s* /usr/lib/gcc/i686-apple-darwin8/4.2.1/

• GCC is now installed as gcc-4.2.

  • It can be made default with gcc_select 4.2. 

    
    

    

Making a Cygwin Mac Virtual Machine

 

VirtualBox/Setting up a Virtual Machine/Mac OS X

The following installation script:

• ...is free and open-source
• ...requires only VirtualBox with its Extension Pack and dependencies that can be easily installed in a single command with most open-source package managers
• ...downloads macOS Catalina, Mojave and High Sierra directly from Apple's servers
• ...installs macOS without modifying the original Apple binaries and without third-party bootloaders
• ...creates a VM that is compatible with OpenCore and can be exported (with manual modifications) to KVM/QEMU for near-native performance
• ...runs on Linux, Windows (WSL 1, Cygwin), and macOS 
• You will be asked to enter your Apple ID. Even if you have an Apple ID, do not enter now.

The Spaghetti Tech Incedent 

You dont have to hack it anymore at least by Cygwin or POSIX standards.

 

My Knowledge Work

From 2000-2021 I did a lot of knowledge work for my self and Microsoft I was even followed by MSFT Research before the invasion of the urkaine.A war over viking land if you will. I did knowledge work and built various Microsoft software including Windows. I am Windows Internals Certified for Windows 7 in 2011.

My Knowledge Work

How knowledge workers use the web 

 

Building Windows XP/2003

    

    To build Windows XP or 2003 32- bit first you need to make a Windows XP/2003 Oracle Virtual Machine. Mount a shared folder with the files in them. Also install the Services for UNIX. And the SFU SDK. Use the System Integrator XP or 2003 Source Kit with the 2003 DDK and Platform SDK  and combine them using Windiff or SDKdiff.

 

• 1. Set the date to August 1st 2003 by typing 'date' in the cmd window
• 2. Make sure the files are not read only.
• 3. Install the 2003 SP1 driver certificate.
• 4. chdir to the 2003 root as admin.
• 5. type 'tools\razzle free offline'
• 6. type 'path tools\sp;%path%'
• 7. type 'tools\checktestroot.cmd and checktestca.cmd'
• 8. type 'perl tools\timebuild.pl -NOCLEANBUILD -NOSYNC -NOSCORCH'
• 9. type 'BUILD /ZP' after you fix errors
• 10. If you need to use 'expand /r' to X:\ENGLISH\WIN2003\ENT\I386\* C:\binaries.x86fre from a retail DVD.
• 11. certmgr.msc, go to Trusted Root Certification Authorities\Certificates and remove the Microsoft Test Root Authority certificate, Sign out and Sign in again.

 

 

 

You might want to download skunkware from SCO and try to build it in SFU in 32-bit Windows XP or 2003 for extra points.

https://www.sco.com/skunkware/

Windows Embedded Standard 2009

When I was in college at the University of Virginia I obtained Windows Embedded 2009 Standard. Here I will provide the steps necessary to build a Windows XP Embedded Thin Client and ISO.

Step 1 Install Windows Embedded Standard 2009.

Step 2. Create a small 650MB FAT partition and run sysprep on the partition.The partition needs to be FAT because sysprep is 16 or 32 bit.

Step 3. Open the Target Designer.

Step 4. Save your file as 'Thin Client.slx" and drag an thin client template from the designer templates to the workspace.

Step 5. Go to Configuration -> Check Dependencies or press F5.

Step 6. Go To Configuration -> Build Target Image after you perform the necessary tasks.

Step 7. Run 'hd2iso' from the command line and follow the on screen instructions.

Before you build the image you might have to correct build warnings.such as finding missing components and putting them in the workspace.

Windows CE Embedded

There are several great books on Embedded Windows OS design I'll post more when I find better ones. I started Embedded design in college With Microsoft in Platform Builder and CE 3.0 at a vocational college in Elizabethon TN recognized nationally by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Some books include

1. Windows CE 6.0 Fundamentals,
2.  Professional 
3.  Windows Compact CE 7.0 

 I haven't done any Embedded design since 2001. After a 5 year music career and good ambient music I'm becoming a Microsoft Partner again and .NET foundation team member. My domain is paid with unlimited SSD storage for 5 years. I do like computer nostalgia and may turn my Windows Server installation into a type 1 hypervisor. for now I'm using Virtual Box. Here is the Shared Source Initiative for Embedded and MVP which is what I have we will get into 2013 later maybe in 2021.

Azure Student Starter

After being and MSDN Subscriber since 2003. and on Bizspark I'm stopping my Microsoft software as of 2019 and saving for when I'll really need the new mac or Windows OS I'm on Windows 10 Enterprise 2019 LTSC With a Quadro FX series HP Desktop. and have only used Visual Studio 6.0 2008 team system 2012 ultimate and noe 2017. Microsoft has sent me hundreds of DVD I don't even use I finaly found my Adobe Creative Suite on DVD with 8 DVD's in a Box CS2 and I have my CS6 Master Collection with Gold Plan. Adobe apparently is on the S&P 100 and doesn't make many boxes more on my Adobe contract later. Here is Microsoft Azure student Starter for students and Alumni. Next week I'm plying my Softimage 2015 and just stopping it does work on Windopws 10 and 10 is the last version of Windows reportedly. It is Microsoft's Adaptive Systems group and project 'Brass' from DARPA that looks hopeful making software last hundreds of years.

2011 MVP and Shared Source

    In 2011 A Microsoft employer named Jason Gayler then a friend on Facebook nominated me for a Microsoft MVP but never heard back and I was able to download public reference shared source which I still have today. I'll write more and I go though my files. I think I have .NET 8.0 which has more Windows source.And is digitally signed by Microsoft. I also still have all of my books written by Brad Abrams.

Microsoft Design Principles and Scenarios Star 2011

In 2011 I complete a course and in Microsoft's eyes became a design principles and scenarios star. More on this as I remember it, it was the design toolbox and I still have all of the files. And here was my avatar. I do still have my Design ToolBox and MIX 09 Videos but they are Microsoft Copyright and I can't put them on You Tube and the rest was Blend and Silverlight.

Building Singularity

    

    In 2010 I downloaded and read about a Microsoft research Operating System called Singularity. Now I'm going to tell you how to build it. First you can download it from Codeplex here. Now in on the internet archive.

 

Next unzip the RDK and open a cmd prompt as administrator and run the

 

configure.cmd 

 

 

and run as administrator, accept the defaults and press enter. 

 

    This should place a Singularity shortcut on your desktop. Next open the the shortcut placed on your desktop and type

 

msb Distro\World.proj

 

allow about 25-30 min depending on your machine to build.

 

    If you have other virus protection software on your computer other than Windows defender remove it. As the build requires privileged access to the machine such as assembly language.  You should now better by now how not to get viruses off of the internet.

 

    After it is built you should be able to run it in a Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 32-Bit on a Microsoft Windows XP 32-bit Virtual Box VM use VHD for Hyper-V Compatibility.or Server 2003 32-bit to also run Windows UNIX Services.

 

    I might go into more detail later. If you really want to have fun read up on MSBuild and and how to add you own CLI projects to the Applications folder. The Singularity build requires .NET 3.5.You also might need to add "C:\Windows System32;" to your PATH environment variables. 

 

    You also can find many of the build tools like boogie and the CLR Profiler on Codeplex. You might want to sandbox your modifications so if Microsoft releases another Singularity variant in the future it will be compatible. Again read up on MSBuild. You can turn on your virus protection after the build. Because many viruses are written in assembly.

 

Singularity Stack:

 

 

Future of Concurrency and Parallelism

Here is a Joe Duffy interview. I first read Concurrent Programming on Windows in 2013. Here are the CHESS Tools There is also Midori which I haven't heard that much about lately but there is a C# OS called Cosmos and MOSA. I really haven't had much time to work with CHESS. Other than to write my own MSBuild wrapper.

COM

I first learned about Microsoft's Component Object Model in 1999. I read and learned the model through MSDN libraries and magazines. I think my first was a MSJ. I have all of my DVD archives. About three or four years ago I bought Don Box's "Essential COM".I partly read this book in an old MSDN library. And used Microsoft's M Language.

How to luanch the old style Control Panel in Windows 10.

To launch the old style Control Panel in Windows 10. You could go into the system files and find "control.exe" and pin it to the start menu. One good improvement in Windows 10 was the improvement to the environment variable settings. You can also launch the old -sytle control panel following this article.

Building Sandcastle Documentation in Visual Studio

Here is a nice article on building MSDN style documentation with sandcastle from The Microsoft Gulf Technical Community.

Building the Windows Research Kernel.

To build the Windows research kernel after to obtain it legally from your academic institution like I did. You may need to download some Visual C/C++ runtime libraries but after that the kernel should kinda be sandboxed and build on Windows XP or later. I'm building it on Windows 8.1. We will be building WRKv1.2.

So open a command prompt and enter:

 set wrk= "path to WRK1.2"  
 set arch=x86 [or amd64]  
 path %wrk%\tools\%arch%;%path%  
 cd %wrk%\base\ntos  
 nmake -nologo %arch%=  

This will produce kernel files in BASE\NTOS\BUILD\EXE\%arch%

I really don't recommend booting the kernel on anything other than XP, but you can try and there should be instructions that came with the WRK 1.2 on how to do that. Pius you can read David Cutler's original design notes. Also you might get like I did a project called "Project OZ" which you can use the kernel with.