How do I find out?

Mac

You can find out what version of MacOS is running by selecting About this Mac from the "Apple Menu" in the upper left hand corner of the screen when you are in the "Finder" (in other words, no applications are active - a little computer icon should appear in the upper right hand corner).

If the machine has hung or is otherwise non-functional, then you can determine the OS version by looking at the system disks, if they are available to you, or the packaging of some of your software that you successfully run on a regular basis, for it m ay say "System 6.x or greater" - thus giving us a clue.

PC

If your interaction with the computer is limited to keystroke commands, then the OS is probably a version of DOS, or, possibly Linux. If it is DOS, you can verify this and obtain the DOS version number by typing vers at your prompt. If that f ails, then see below for Unix instructions.

If the user interface is graphical (you use a mouse and generally point and click), then it is either a type of Windows, OS2, or flavor of Xwindows. However, if the machine in question is functional, it should tell you the OS and version when it boots up and the OS launches.

If the machine has hung or is otherwise non-functional, then you can determine the OS version by looking at the system disks, if they are available to you, or the packaging of some of your software that you successfully run on a regular basis, for it m ay say "Windows 95 required" - thus giving us a clue.

Unix

You can type /bin/uname -a at any Unix-flavor prompt (eg. fractal-user 10%) to determine the flavor and version.

Last modifed: Friday, 16-Jun-2006 09:38:54 EDT