Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows (often simply called Windows) is an operating system developed by Microsoft. It has been the most-used operating system on desktop PCs for decades.
Early versions of Windows were based on MS-DOS, and ran the MS-DOS builds of NetHack. There have been separate builds of NetHack for Windows proper since at least NetHack 3.1.1, with support for tiles beginning in NetHack 3.2.0: since that version, Windows builds have offered two binaries—NetHack.exe for the standard TTY mode application, and NetHackW.exe for the tiled version. Since NetHack 3.6.3, the Windows version of NetHack has also offered the curses interface.
The most current official binary for NetHack is available here on the DevTeam's website, with binaries for previous applicable versions available through the site index—from NetHack 3.6.3 onwards, the DevTeam has been maintaining an official "NetHack 3.6" app on the Windows Store as well.
Windows 8.1 and earlier
The NetHackW.exe binary of NetHack 5.0.0 is confirmed to run on Windows 8.1, Windows 7 and Windows Vista. It does not run on Windows XP or earlier.
The NetHack.exe binary runs on Windows Vista, 7 and 8.1, but it produces ANSI escape sequences that the older terminal program does not understand. Cmder runs on these versions and it understands the escape sequences, but the result works correctly on Windows 8.1 only. On 7 and Vista, menus show some glitches and IBMgraphics does not work correctly.
This commit fixes the glitches, and NetHack.exe will then run on Windows Vista through 8.1, provided it is run under Cmder.
Windows 95, 98 and Me
Windows 95, 98 and Me are internally quite different from modern versions of Windows. They are in fact the last released versions of MS-DOS combined with a graphical shell.
NetHack 3.4.3 runs on these versions. NetHack 3.6.0 and 3.6.1 are untested. NetHack 3.6.2 uses a cryptographic API to seed the random number generator, and this API is not present on these versions of Windows. This version through 3.6.7 could possibly be built without that API.
NetHack 5.0.0 uses additional APIs not present on these versions of Windows.
The MS-DOS version runs natively, with full support for VESA BIOS Extensions. It will run full screen unless text mode is selected (OPTIONS=video:text, which is the default).
