Jim Hall

5850 points

Minnesota

Jim Hall is an open source software advocate and developer, best known for usability testing in GNOME and as the founder + project coordinator of FreeDOS. At work, Jim is CEO of Hallmentum, an IT executive consulting company that provides hands-on IT Leadership training, workshops, and coaching.

Open Sourcerer People's Choice Award People's Choice Award 2018 Author Linux Contributor Club

Authored Content

How to use FreeDOS as an embedded system

Many embedded systems today run on Linux. But once upon a time, embedded systems either ran on a custom, proprietary platform or ran on DOS.

Listen to music on FreeDOS

Mplayer is an open source media player that's usually found on Linux, Windows, Mac, and DOS.

Install FreeDOS without the installer

Here's how to set up your FreeDOS system manually without using the installer.

How to use the FreeDOS text editor

FreeDOS provides a user-friendly text editor called FreeDOS Edit.

Package wrapped with brown paper and red bow

Install and remove software packages on FreeDOS

Get familiar with FDIMPLES, the FreeDOS package manager.

Configure FreeDOS in plain text

Learn how to configure FreeDOS with FDCONFIG.SYS.

Authored Comments

Jim Hall

11 Sep 2020

Poll: What do you think of the save icon?

I agree! No one under 30 recognizes it as a floppy disk. It is just some funny-looking square that means "Save." Users have been forced to learn the meaning of an icon. But the icon is supposed to be obvious in its meaning.

The "Save" icon needs an update. We need to change the "Save" icon to be meaningful to a variety of users, not just those that grew up with the older technology.

Jim Hall

27 Aug 2020

Customize your GNOME desktop theme

Great article! I'm a GNOME user too and I always use GNOME Tweak Tool to update just a few things after I install Linux. The font is the first thing I change. The GNOME default font (Cantarell) is okay, but I find Droid Sans Regular is easier to read.