DOS

See also: Appendix:Variations of "dos"

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dɒs/, /dɔːs/
• (Canada) IPA^(key): /dɑs/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒs, -ɔːs

Proper noun

DOS

1. (computing, historical) Acronym of Disk Operating System, a family of disk-based operating systems.

   Coordinate term: CP/M

   • 1993, Kris A. Jamsa, DOS: The Complete Reference, McGraw–Hill Osborne Media:

     Next, using your word processor or the DOS text editor, you can edit your AUTOEXEC.BAT file.

   • 1993, Doug Lowe, The Only DOS Book You'll Ever Need, Mike Murach & Associates Incorporated, →ISBN, page 95:

     One way to do that is to turn the PC off and turn it back on again. Then, the PC performs its self-test and boots DOS.

2. (US politics) Initialism of Department of State.

   Synonym: Foggy Bottom

Usage notes

• Normally applied to operating systems available for IBM and IBM-compatible personal computers from the early 1980s (PC-DOS, MS-DOS, DR-DOS, Novell DOS, FreeDOS), although the term was also used before and after this to refer to any disk-based operating system (such as the Data General Diskette Operating System for their minicomputers, or for the TRS-80 DOS used when the computer was upgraded from cassette data storage to diskette).

Derived terms

• DR-DOS
• PC-DOS
• MS-DOS

Translations

Disk Operating System

• Arabic: دوس m
• Icelandic: diskstýrikerfi n

Noun

DOS (plural DOSes)

1. (military) Initialism of date of service.
2. (military) Initialism of date of separation.
3. (computing, Internet) Initialism of denial of service.

   Alternative form: DoS

4. (sciences) Initialism of density of states.
5. (education) Initialism of director of studies.

Further reading

• DOS on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• disk operating system on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• MS-DOS on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• United States Department of State on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• density of states on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• DSO, OD's, ODS, OSD, SDO, SOD, SoD, dso, ods, sod