The FreeDOS Alpha 5 distribution was released 10 August 1996.
History
We don't have a complete history of the early FreeDOS releases. The 25+ years of DOS history page shows two dates for Alpha 5: 10/97 and 11/97. The page also explains that "The FreeDOS A5 released Nov '97 was the first modern FreeDOS distribution, and was a re-release of the FreeDOS Alpha5." So the date for Alpha 5 should be updated to either 10/97 or 11/97.
Looks like we had an official Alpha 5 release on Aug 10 1996 per this archived announcement.
See different archive of announcement which also says Aug 10 1996
An announcement archived elsewhere dated Jan 28 1996 suggests Alpha 5 will be released early 2/96. This was probably very optimistic; if other release docs show Aug 96, then that is probably correct.
Announcement
FreeDOS Alpha 5 release (August 10th, 1996) INTRODUCTION TO FreeDOS ------------------------------------------------------ INTRODUCTION ------------ You have in your possession, the product of the combined work of over 50 programmers and software developers from around the world, as well as the end result of literally thousands of hours of work designing, developing, coding, and testing of this software. It is now released to you free of charge, in the hope that it will, in some way assist you, no matter where your journeys will take you. With that said, on behalf of everyone who has contributed to the FreeDOS project, I would like to welcome you to the FreeDOS Alpha-5 release. If you haven't figured it out yet, FreeDOS is a Disk Operating System (OS), which is very similar to MS-DOS. In fact, Free-DOS has been designed to eventually be 100% compatible with all MS-DOS software. As of right now, however, FreeDOS has not reached that 100% mark, and is in fact still under Alpha Development. It would not do much good to release a software that was exactly the same is MS-DOS, so most of FreeDOS has been programmed to provide features and enhancements above and beyond those of MS-DOS. Further, FreeDOS will run on ANY IBM or COMPATIBLE x86 based processor. The best part about FreeDOS to most people is the fact that is 100% Free, you will never have to pay any registration software, or anything of the sort (although any contributions will be welcome). ALPHA TESTING ------------- FreeDOS is being released as an ALPHA release. The standard definition for a software to be given a classification of ALPHA is any software which is still under development, and of which the major known bugs HAVE NOT fully been worked out yet. If you are looking for a 100% bug free OS, then it may not be best for you to use FreeDOS at this time. During this testing period, we are asking that you help us out as best as you can be reporting bugs, and other problems that you see. Please refer to the ALPHA.DOC file for additional information, and instructions about this alpha test procedure.
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