Windows 2.0

Windows 2.0
Developer	Microsoft
OS family	Microsoft Windows
Codename	Windows 1.5
Source model	Closed source
Announced	December 9, 1987
Final release	2.03 December 9, 1987
Licensing	Commercial software
Released to manufacturing	December 9, 1987
General availability	December 9, 1987
Preceded by	Windows 1.0 (1985)
Succeeded by	Windows 2.1 (1988)
Support status
Unsupported as of December 31, 2001

Windows 2.0 is a 16-bit operating environment from Microsoft released on December 9, 1987. Windows 2.0, 2.01, and 2.03 are shells for the MS-DOS system, providing a graphical user interface for improved interaction over the command-line interface of DOS.

Windows 2.0 was officially released on December 9, 1987, superseding Windows 1.0. It was succeeded by Windows 2.1 in 1988, then Windows 3.0 in 1990. Windows 2.0 was officially supported by Microsoft until December 31, 2001.

Release versions

The operating environment came in two variants with different names and CPU support. The basic edition supported the 80386 microprocessor's virtual 8086 mode. Despite its configuration, the variant was fully operational on an 8088 or 8086 processor, although the high memory area would still not be available on an 8086-class processor; however, expanded memory could still be used. IBM's PS/2 Model 25, which had an option to ship with a "DOS 4.00 and Windows kit" for educational markets, shipped with Windows with 8086 hardware. The basic edition would later be renamed to Windows/286 with the release of Windows 2.1 in 1988.

The other variant, named Windows/386, was available as early as September 1987, pre-dating the release of Windows 2.0 in December 1987. It was much more advanced than its other sibling. It introduced a protected mode kernel, above which the GUI and applications run as a virtual 8086 mode task. The variant had fully preemptive multitasking and allowed several MS-DOS programs to run in parallel in "virtual 8086" CPU mode, rather than always suspending background applications. Except for a few kilobytes of overhead, each DOS application could use any available low memory before Windows started. Windows/386 also provided EMS emulation, using the memory management features of the i386 to make RAM beyond 640k behave like the banked memory previously only supplied by add-in cards and used by popular DOS applications. There was no support for disk-based virtual memory, so multiple DOS programs had to fit inside the available physical memory. Users could run more applications on the 386 version.

Neither of these versions worked with DOS memory managers like CEMM or QEMM or with DOS extenders, which have their own extended memory management and run in protected mode as well. This was remedied in version 3.0, which is compatible with Virtual Control Program Interface (VCPI) in "standard mode" and with DOS Protected Mode Interface (DPMI) in "386 enhanced" mode. Microsoft ended its support for Windows 2.0 on December 31, 2001.

New features

• Overlapping windows (Windows 1.x could only tile windows)
• Minimization and maximization of windows.
• Better keyboard shortcuts
• Improved shell design
• VGA graphics support
• EMS memory support

Application support

The first Windows versions of Microsoft Word and Excel ran on Windows 2.0.

Applications that shipped with Windows 2.0:

• CALC.EXE
• CALENDAR.EXE
• CARDFILE.EXE
• CLIPBRD.EXE
• CLOCK.EXE
• CONTROL.EXE
• CVTPAINT.EXE
• MSDOS.EXE
• NOTEPAD.EXE
• PAINT.EXE
• PIFEDIT.EXE
• REVERSI.EXE
• SPOOLER.EXE
• TERMINAL.EXE
• WRITE.EXE

Screenshots of Windows 2.x

The Windows 2.03 logo screen

Windows 2.03 desktop.

Windows 2.03 dialog box.

Windows 2.03 MS-DOS Executive.

Miscellaneous open Windows 2.03 programs.

Windows 2.03 Notepad program.

Windows 2.03 dialog box.

External links

• Windows Version History (1.x-3.11) at Microsoft (archived 2005-05-25)
  • A history of Windows (1975-2015) (archived 2016-06-18)
  • Microsoft History: 1987 at Microsoft Library (archived 1996-10-17)
• Windows 2.0 at GUIdebook
• Microsoft Windows history at Computer Hope
• Microsoft Windows/386 2.01 at PCjs Machines