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There's been a lot of talk lately about how Microsoft might be ready to send over the "Released to Manufacturing" (RTM) build of Windows 11 24H2 to PC makers to have them installed on upcoming desktops and notebooks. 32 years ago this week, a major Windows OS update hit that RTM milestone. It was Windows 3.1, and it turned out to be not only a successful release on its own but it paved the way for the even bigger success of Windows 95 over three years later. Microsoft had launched Windows 3.0 two years previously, and it turned out to be a big success. The previous versions of Windows were not huge financial successes, as many people thought they were still behind the user interface efforts of Apple's Macintosh OS. However, Windows 3.0 was different, and even Time magazine said back in June 1990 that "Microsoft seems to have got it right this time." It ended up selling 10 million copies in its first two years, according to Extreme Tech. The development of Windows 3.1 was handled under the code name Janus at Microsoft. Some of the new additions and improvements that were included compared to Windows 3.0 included support for the popular TrueType scalable font standard. Multimedia was also a major focus of Windows 3.1, which included support for Windows Media Player and screensavers with the boxed version of the OS. SVGA color support was also included, which meant that it could support more advanced PC monitors that used SVGA. Let's not forget Minesweeper. It debuted as a free game in Windows 3.1 and became a major time sink at work and home. You can check out our article on Minesweeper for a more detailed look at its origins as part of the OS. The release of Windows 3.1 was considered a major success, with three million box copies sold in its first three months on sale. Well over a year later, in November 1993, Microsoft released Windows 3.11. It was a minor release that fixed some bugs and included no major new features. However, it is still being used to help run parts of the German ICE railroad network, as we mentioned in a news story just a couple of months ago. In the end, Windows 3.1 was the end of the first era of Windows at Microsoft. It had reached a point where its user interface was familiar to most people who used PCs in the workplace as well as at home. The second era of Windows was still to come, as Microsoft would handle a complete overhaul of the UI and add many more features for the launch of Windows 95 in August 1995. Source

Having ported Doom to every device with the slightest bit of computing power (from smartwatches to digital cameras, scanners, calculators, and even pregnancy tests), enthusiasts are shifting their attention to ChatGPT to allow accessing the service using outdated and unsupported operating systems and software. The recently released JavaGPT for Windows XP is an excellent example of such work. Still, despite being unsupported for almost a decade, Windows XP remains considered a relatively modern OS with a decent for its age market share. How about something more ancient? Here is an app that lets you use ChatGPT on PCs running Windows 3.1, an operating system released over 30 years ago. WinGPT is a third-party app written in C using standard a Windows API from its era, and the standard set of controls. The only non-native UI element is the status bar, which the developer had to implement manually. Despite having a native status bar in Windows 3.1, Microsoft did not make it available to developers, so the WinGPT creator had to use custom code from 1997 to achieve the needed result. What is more impressive is that the program connects to the OpenAI API server natively using TLS 1.3, an encryption standard released in 2018. This removes the need for a proxy machine with a modern operating system to establish and maintain communication. You can learn more about implementing TLS 1.3 in a 16-bit OS here. As one may expect, WinGPT has some notable restraints. For example, due to limited memory support, WinGPT receives brief responses that do not consider the conversation context. You can download WinGPT from the dialup.net website (try not to have a nostalgic shock when visiting it). The app will work on any 16 or 32-bit Windows version beyond 3.11 with an implementation of Winsock. Also, you need to enter your OpenAI API key to get WinGPT operating. Learn more about the process of making WinGPT here. Source