Nextor 2.0 Alpha 1

Konamiman has released the first version of his new development: Nextor, an enhanced version of MSX-DOS 2. The features that Nextor adds to MSX-DOS include:

• Native support for the FAT16 file system. No need to install any patch. Also, booting from a FAT16 device is possible.
• New, enhanced and fully documented device driver system. No need to reverse-engineer the MSX-DOS kernel ROM in order to figure out how to embed a custom device driver within the kernel. The steps needed to integrate a custom driver within the kernel ROM are fully documented. Also, Nextor drivers have extra extensibility points (for BASIC "CALL" commands or extended BIOS, for instance).
• Device and partition to drive mapping management. When using the device driver system designed for Nextor, it is the operating system itself who manages the logical drive to physical storage device mapping, including the partition selection. Nextor drivers simply enumerate the available devices and provide access to the raw device sectors.
• Built-in device partitioning tool. The tool is invoked by simply executing CALL FDISK from the BASIC prompt, and allows to partition any device controlled by a Nextor driver.
• Embedded MSX-DOS 1 kernel. Nextor can boot in MSX-DOS 1 mode, which is especially useful for computers with no mapped RAM. Partitions of size up to 16MB can be used in MSX-DOS 1 mode.

Nextor is currently in Alpha state, so it may have bugs and not all the planned features are implemented yet; also, only an experimental driver for the Sunrise IDE interface is available at this time. However, it's worth giving it a try, even by just using an MSX emulator.

Relevant link: Konamiman's MSX page