It’s an app, not a system-integrated[1] screensaver?
> Installation
> Drag FakeDOS.app into /Applications.
> Double-click to launch. It installs itself as a menu-bar icon.
> Click the menu-bar icon to configure or start manually.
> After the configured idle time (default: 5 min), FakeDOS takes over fullscreen.
> Type EXIT to return to your real desktop.
> Cmd + , opens six pages of pure control: idle time, warp speed, the ghost writer, sound and more. The PC speaker can be silenced. Your co-workers cannot.
Yup. OP wants you to download a sketchy closed source screensaver from an obnoxiously vibecoded website that looks identical to the scourge of phishing pages currently going after random open source projects in a fully automated way.
Way back I hacked together a VB6 application (don't remember what it did) but after a while it popped up a new window that faked a DOS prompt formatting the c drive. Then I send it to my best bud on April 1st with a message "Hey, check out this new program I made!" :-)
Things not on my bingo card: Watching Hacker News denizens download, install, and run vibecoded Mac apps from sketchy vibecoded websites with TLS issues.
Except dos isn't the PC experience. It was back in the 90s when you'd edit your config.sys and autoexec.bat to shift your himem settings so you could run a given game with your soundblaster
That world doesn't exist any more, whether you're on a mac, linux, or any other OS.
This is cool - but…
It’s an app, not a system-integrated[1] screensaver?
> Installation
> Drag FakeDOS.app into /Applications.
> Double-click to launch. It installs itself as a menu-bar icon.
> Click the menu-bar icon to configure or start manually.
> After the configured idle time (default: 5 min), FakeDOS takes over fullscreen.
> Type EXIT to return to your real desktop.
> Cmd + , opens six pages of pure control: idle time, warp speed, the ghost writer, sound and more. The PC speaker can be silenced. Your co-workers cannot.
[1]: ScreenSaver.framework: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/screensaver
If they had made it as a website, anybody could use it.
I'm surprised that the LLM that was used to vibecode this didn't point it out
Maybe I'm blind, but is this closed source?
Yup. OP wants you to download a sketchy closed source screensaver from an obnoxiously vibecoded website that looks identical to the scourge of phishing pages currently going after random open source projects in a fully automated way.
Things aren't always what they seem. Sometimes it's just for fun.
Finally some comment that actually makes sense here! :)
What exactly is this? Site doesn't work for me (ERR_SSL_PROTOCOL_ERROR). Gathering from the other comments, some screensaver that shows a DOS prompt?
> "Gathering from the other comments, some screensaver that shows a DOS prompt?"
Kinda worse. Some Mac application that acts as a screensaver and shows a DOS-prompt when idle...
Either way, I like the idea of getting people to install and configure fun apps which then know exactly when a PC is not in use.
Could be a useful swarm of devices...
Reminds me of the 'BSOD' module from Xscreensaver.
Video: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIqbMCfR3r0>
Still my screensaver of choice after two decades. Even after it's tricked me into a forced reboot two or three times...
https://man.archlinux.org/man/extra/xscreensaver/decayscreen...
Decay Screen for X11. Written by David Wald, Vivek Khera, Jamie Zawinski, and Vince Levey; 1993.
Way back I hacked together a VB6 application (don't remember what it did) but after a while it popped up a new window that faked a DOS prompt formatting the c drive. Then I send it to my best bud on April 1st with a message "Hey, check out this new program I made!" :-)
gives me SSL_ERROR_INTERNAL_ERROR_ALERT on Firefox
same on Chrome, maybe it's real DOS
Doesn't work for me either.
DOS has been DoS'd
The quantum fireball was a nice touch.
I was site visitor 0001101 (hit return).
I will get back until counter reaches 01000110 01010010 01001101 01000001 01010100 00100000 01000011 00111010
I think you mean 01000110 01001111 01010010 01001101 01000001 01010100 00100000 01000011 00111010
Things not on my bingo card: Watching Hacker News denizens download, install, and run vibecoded Mac apps from sketchy vibecoded websites with TLS issues.
There is also something about this being Mac-only that feels really dumb or really fitting, I can't quite put my finger on it.
The delicious irony is that it's written for a platform that never ran MS-DOS.
It's time to vibedesign a new bingo card!
Anyone else append something like this to AUTOEXEC.BAT as a kid at school? We were a right bunch of bastards.
I think a lot about my poor teachers and this Calvin quote comes to mind.https://imgur.com/a/eX4UKLk
This would be more trustworthy (and portable) as a website (Would have maybe also needed less tokens to produce)
Instead it's a somewhat sketchy app that by design happens to know exactly when my PC is not in use...
You couldn’t run a format command when within the disk you were trying to format. You’d need to (for example) cd A: and then format c:.
Deltree, on the other hand…
There was a secret option at one point 'FORMAT C: /AUTOTEST'
The favourite of naughty kids in computer shops with Windows 95
Yup.
I'll stick with 86Box and DOSBox and try not to run FORMAT C: without backups.
32768MB of ram?
Yeah, that’s wrong.
Thanks for the hint, and very old bug from the beginning, forgotten in space and time....
Fixed!
FP4 vs FP8 strikes again…
Ah. Again[0].
0. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROQSw6jqJO8
It amusing how Mac users yearn for the PC experience. They know they're missing out on something great, but they can't or won't leave their cult.
Except dos isn't the PC experience. It was back in the 90s when you'd edit your config.sys and autoexec.bat to shift your himem settings so you could run a given game with your soundblaster
That world doesn't exist any more, whether you're on a mac, linux, or any other OS.