Niche Operating Systems 405
Eugenia writes: "So, you think that BeOS or AtheOS are niche Operating Systems? Well, you haven't seen anything yet. OSNews provides a list and short description of the most active and most promising Operating Systems written by individuals or small teams just for the fun of it or because they have a dream of how the perfect OS should be (is there such a thing though?). Some of them, like SkyOS for example, are even quite far down the line in terms of usability and advancements."
yeah like Vx-works is niche (Score:3, Insightful)
ones that the general public uses ?
(ever thought about the O/S in a mobile phone)
or even yourt Set Top Box pluged into your TV
just because it doesnt screem the version and who made it does not make it less of a O/S
regards
john jones
p.s. oh and linux need to sort out threading I found out today (-;
Different types of niche operating systems (Score:5, Insightful)
- "Toy" systems that are written by a few hackers "just because they can". Those are typically written in (x86) assembler and even eary versions can produce a nice looking GUI. (Note that "toy" systems can very rigid and functional, despite their name.)
- "Research" systems that are written by researchers to prove a point. The rarely have a GUI (unless the research involve real-time graphics as for Nemesis [sourceforge.net]).
Both kinds are extremely hard to install, only run on a very carefully selected set of hardware, and don't really gain much appreciation other than from a very small group of followers. Followers from both groups often look down on eachother.Lately, the operating systems research has come to a slowdown, but the operating system hackers (that produce the "toy" systems) are gaining more and more momentum. The latter can most likely be contributed to the success of Linux. Can the former be explained by that operating systems now is a fully explored area?
Re:The more OS's the Better. (Score:3, Insightful)
_Everyone_ can make a choice. His personal choice is Windows, but he's saying that he wants lots of options available so each person has more to choose from.
learning from the past (Score:2, Insightful)
>>and nobody seems willing to even consider the
>>lessons learned in the past.
Except maybe Apple, who rewrote their entire OS based on Unix for its proven stability, ability to play nice with others, etc etc...
Re:How about OS's that should be brought back? (Score:3, Insightful)
A rather obvious answer to that would be AmigaOS.
Re:The more OS's the Better. (Score:2, Insightful)
It only is that way when some platform specific, propreitary method becomes the de facto standard. That's the whole reason for the IETF [ietf.org] standards process.
Standards should enhance choice by providing inter-operability for certain components while allowing customization of others. As the best and biggest example, TCP/IP is highly standardized and yet you can choose from a bewildering variety of stacks for different operating systems.
Thank you Linux/BSD/etc (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:learning from the past (Score:3, Insightful)
Unix is not the end all be all of OSes. Reimplementing it means that EXACTLY the mistakes of the past will be made, as opposed to a random assortment of mistakes and successes -- including new ones -- by trying something different
Re:Different types of niche operating systems (Score:1, Insightful)
This is correct as far as driver development and portable applications are concerned. A lot of useful stuff (compiler, C library, shell, GNOME etc.) can also be directly credited to the GNU project.
However, I believe that one main reason we see a new wave of OS development is large scale Internet and PC availability. It's far easier to both create a meaningful OS and tell the world about it today than it was, say, 10 years ago, when Linux got started. SourceForge etc. also contribute to this, as do weblogs which make people aware of cool new projects.
Re:How about OS's that should be brought back? (Score:3, Insightful)
- Amiga: pre-emptive multitasking, no virtual memory or memory protection.
- Mac: cooperative multitasking, no virtual memory or memory protection (prior to OS X, anyway)
What the Amiga did have that is noticably missing in current OSs is a simplicity of design (though to be fair, Amiga OS only had to run on a relatively small variety of hardware, and wasn't trying to fit into every niche in sight (embedded, desktop, server, wireless, etc).The real strenght of the Amiga was that it was targeted to a fairly specific group of graphics artists, gamers, and hackers. It's really too bad the Amiga never had the corporate support it deserved -- with the right backing, it could have been great...
Re:beOS is NOT a niche operating system. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:beOS is NOT a niche operating system. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why is it... (Score:2, Insightful)
For the fun of doing it.
Its like baking a cake. You can go out to the store and buy one, or you can bake one yourself. Its pleasure to eat something you made with your own hands.
Re:"Toy" OS systems (Score:2, Insightful)
(If the BSD lawsuit was settled a year earlier, or if OS/2 had shipped for the i386 instead of the i286, Linux probably would have stayed a toy.)
The problem is that you don't get that sort of market opportunity every day. It was just a historical circumstance that there was this huge demand for a cheap Unix and vendors that were not willing to provide one.
Re:The more OS's the Better. (Score:2, Insightful)
As anyone who works on systems from day to day knows... as much as I don't like it, each system has strengths and weaknesses.
Linux is a fantastic system for serving web content and doing databases and back end systems stuff
Microsoft, like it or not, has made a desktop and whether by fair play or not, taught most of the world to use it.
Macintosh has incredible strengths in the graphic design world. They have found a way to get the desktop out of the way of creativity.
BSD has great strengths in virtual host setups (down to splitting the processor / memory usage).
Each OS has a strength, the key to a good system is using the *best* tool for a given job and not buying into one system that does it all.
I love Linux and am an advocate for open source. I run Linux machines, but I also run Windows Machines because there are tasks that are easier on each. Both OS's have a place.
Just as there are many styles of education and learning, so too are there different ways of approaching the problem of the desktop. By having choices, we are enabled to choose what works best for our style. Otherwise, you folks running Themes wouldn't bother changing the defaults.
Nitch OS's have a place too... and thank's to the devoted masses who keep their missions alive, we all benefit from them, even if other companies lay off their work force or swallow them whole.
Because of visionaries discovering a great way to do something the collective pool benifits.
I still don't understand (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: linux need to sort out threading (Score:2, Insightful)
Right. And you should poll the hardware for events, rather than relying on interrupts. That would simplify designs marvelously.
<smartass> Actually in the embedded world sometimes polled is better because it's cheaper than making sure that the external interrupt sources are rate-limited or otherwise "clean". We just came across this in one of our designs. Interrupts were peachy-keen until it left the lab.</smartass>