14 DAY TRIAL // If staying home for long becomes way too boring, how about running some ancient software on your Linux PC to get a taste of the software that we used to work with back in the ‘90s?
An Electron app released by developer Felix Rieseberg allows us to install Mac OS 8 on pretty much any Windows, Linux, or Mac computer, and the GitHub page of the project guarantees you’re going to get the full experience.
It’s a 1991 Macintosh Quadra that we’re talking about here, with the virtual machine emulating the OS running on a Motorola CPU, which is the one that Apple itself used on its computers before making the migration to PowerPC.
IE and Netscape pre-loaded
The app comes equipped with some of the apps that users loved the most nearly 30 years ago, including Internet Explorer and Netscape, although it goes without saying that neither would work to browse the web given the old technology that’s available in there. The dev even emphasizes that you wouldn’t be able to open Google, but they’re still a pretty neat way to see how long the world of browser has gone since the ‘90s.
“You'll find various games and demos preinstalled, thanks to an old MacWorld Demo CD from 1997. Namely, Oregon Trail, Duke Nukem 3D, Civilization II, Alley 19 Bowling, Damage Incorporated, and Dungeons & Dragons,” the dev explains.
“There are also various apps and trials preinstalled, including Photoshop 3, Premiere 4, Illustrator 5.5, StuffIt Expander, the Apple Web Page Construction Kit, and more.”
Of course, it goes without saying that this is nothing more than a fun project that allows you to get a taste of the early Mac builds, so it’s not supposed to by any means to “do anything serious with it,” as the dev himself explains.
You can find full details on the GitHub page linked above.