The Verge is reporting:
Microsoft is releasing the source code for its original Windows File Manager from nearly 28 years ago. While it's a relic from the past, you can still compile the source code Microsoft has released and run the app on Windows 10 today.
The source code is available on GitHub, and is maintained by Microsoft veteran Craig Wittenberg under the MIT license. Wittenberg copied the File Manager code from Windows NT 4 back in 2007, and has been maintaining it before open sourcing it recently. It's a testament to the backward compatibility of Windows itself, especially that this was originally included in Windows more than 20 years ago.
A port of Microsoft's File Manger made its first appearance in OS/2 1.1 and then became the primary file manager in Windows 3.0.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by linuxrocks123 on Tuesday April 10 2018, @04:25PM (2 children)
The version online supports long file names, along with several other useful features not in the original version (like include subdirs in directory file search).
It looks to me like this is some Microsoft guy who's been maintaining File Manager all these years for his own personal use, and, now, due to cultural changes at MS, was finally able to get permission to open source it.
It's pretty impressive someone's gone to this much trouble. I doubt I'll do much with the code myself, but there's no accounting for taste.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 10 2018, @08:46PM (1 child)
What killed me about Windoze was the way they allowed not-DOS-compatible characters in filenames--but when you tried to do a file search that included one of those, the damned thing would bomb.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Touché) by aristarchus on Tuesday April 10 2018, @09:17PM
Another case of Micro$oft being case insensitive. If you cannot grok the glyph, you should not grep the tree.