An introduction to the Haiku OS • Hacker News Board

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#11

Post by fingerprinter » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:11 AM UTC

Several things

1. I'm an OS junkie. I love installing, fiddling and learning new OSes. I installed BeOS and used it for about 2 years (no joke) back in the day. LOVED IT. I even had it replace my Slackware instance for about 6 months as my primary system.

2. I love seeing OSes still actively developed even if they aren't popular. I think it keeps driving ingenuity and pushes other people. But, I don't get why we have to have rewritten older systems...lets try to advance OSes.

3. The interface has to go. It was clunky back then and now it is downright horrendous compared to nearly any interface we have. Gnome might feel like 2004, but this feels like 1997.

4. The biggest problem with BeOS back in the day was lack of applications. I don't see this being fixed with Haiku unless they have translation layer.

EDIT - One thing I forgot to mention about BeOS back in the day. It booted in about 15 seconds. It was amazing. Right now the fastest I've seen is an Ubuntu box getting from start to internet in about 7 seconds w/ a SSD etc but for 1999/2000, it was amazing. Astonishing, really.

I would also add in this edit that I think the state of UI on current OSes is a bit disappointing. I think Ubuntu is trying w/ Unity and even that has a ways to go before I see any real innovation in interfaces. It feels like we've got a modality that worked 15 years ago and we've sort of massaged it, but haven't really innovated or pivoted on the concept too well.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#12

Post by dreyfiz » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:15 AM UTC

jcitme wrote: post #8

single user only os? i'm sorry, but there's no way that it can become popular with that limitation. security is too much at risk here, didn't we just manage to convince microsoft that computers shouldn't start as root all the time? also, seeing that it's geared towards multimedia, there's no way that any real multimedia company will adopt the software with no file permissions and user access to all root powers.

It's okay to make things that aren't intended to become popular or to take over their niche commercially. Haiku's makers loved BeOS and are just remaking it. It's very charming and human.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#13

Post by i80and » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:20 AM UTC

ihodes wrote: post #4

beoba wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, get some lens flare and transparent windows in there!

Or, you know, text smoothing. Antialiasing. Silly stuff like that ;)

Haiku... has font smoothing? In fact, they just recently activated hinting. Icons are anti-aliased too. I guess I'm unclear on what you're saying.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#14

Post by slantyyz » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:34 AM UTC

fingerprinter wrote: post #11

Several things 1. I'm an OS junkie. I love installing, fiddling and learning new OSes. I installed BeOS and used it for about 2 years (no joke) back in the day. LOVED IT. I even had it replace my Slackware instance for about 6 months as my primary system. 2. I love seeing OSes still actively developed even if they aren't popular. I think it keeps driving ingenuity and pushes other people. But, I don't get why we have…

I remember being able to play 4 qvga sized movies simultaneously on a Pentium (the first one) running BeOS with no hiccups. Impressive in those days.

Honestly, after all these years, I had major doubts that Haiku would ever be released. Glad to be wrong.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#15

Post by st3fan » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:35 AM UTC

My MacBook Air also boots in 10 seconds. But who cares .. I reboot it maybe once a month.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#16

Post by slantyyz » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:36 AM UTC

gry wrote: post #9

I used to run BeOS on a Umax c600x280 Mac clone (PowerMax, Umax, Motorola days). I loved it because the UI was responsive. There was no lag. It also introduced me to the command line. The previous year, I tried an mklinux install. I couldn't tell upside from down. I didn't know enough to "man" a command, let alone which commands to man. I'm sad Be never became OS X. I wonder what Haiku/Be would be today. Remember the…

Devil's advocate: If Be became OSX, we probably wouldn't have ever seen the iPod, iPhone or iPad.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#17

Post by mosburger » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:39 AM UTC

slantyyz wrote: post #16

gry wrote: post #9

I used to run BeOS on a Umax c600x280 Mac clone (PowerMax, Umax, Motorola days). I loved it because the UI was responsive. There was no lag. It also introduced me to the command line. The previous year, I tried an mklinux install. I couldn't tell upside from down. I didn't know enough to "man" a command, let alone which commands to man. I'm sad Be never became OS X. I wonder what Haiku/Be would be today. Remember the…

Devil's advocate: If Be became OSX, we probably wouldn't have ever seen the iPod, iPhone or iPad.

What makes you say that? I think BeOS / OSX could've been a fantastic embedded platform to build an iOS type device around.

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#18

Post by mambodog » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:39 AM UTC

I can't see what Haiku offers that modern OS X doesn't. Drag and Drop between applications? Got it. Combining soundcards to use in aggregate? Got it[1]. Object Oriented APIs? Had it since NeXTSTEP (and they're called 'Kits' as well).

The only thing that seemed mildly interesting to me was the routing of audio between apps, but this is mostly achieved these days using ReWire or Soundflower (admittedly not an ideal solution).

It seems like a fun hobby (I'm into OS nostalgia myself) but suggesting that it's going to have any effect on 'the world' is pretty silly.

[1]: http://www.apple.com/pro/techniques/aggregateaudio/

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#19

Post by tiles » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:43 AM UTC

mosburger wrote: post #17

slantyyz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Devil's advocate: If Be became OSX, we probably wouldn't have ever seen the iPod, iPhone or iPad.

What makes you say that? I think BeOS / OSX could've been a fantastic embedded platform to build an iOS type device around.

Steve Jobs wouldn't have been brought back to the company. (But that's not a commentary about the technology.)

Re: An introduction to the Haiku OS

#20

Post by tiles » Wed, Jan 05, 2011, 2:48 AM UTC

The reason that I'm excited about Haiku: a fledgling open-source OS that isn't based on the Linux kernel. It has been awesome to see Linux find its place on the desktop and mobile, yet, the homogeny is rather stifling and it's disappointing to see there's no alternative to maintaining UNIX's legacy (X11, filesystem layout, my personal dislikes). Haiku seems to have the potential to fill that void.