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DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

dustinbrett.com

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Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#71

Post by c22 »

mofosyne wrote: post #6

I do wonder what it would be like if we have a linux distro, where you can work seamlessly between a desktop PC and a laptop or a random cafe, because the desktop is essentally a web browser like this example. Of course you could just say IPKVM or VNC, but I would say it's a bit different if you can run most of the logic client side (via webassembly etc...). So this would require the app to be rewritten to have a cle…

20 years ago I was using SunRays which were neat because you could tie a desktop session to a physical smart card and have it instantly pop up on any terminal you stuck the card into.

If I recall at some point there was even a SunRay laptop with wifi, but I never got a chance to use one 'cause we just didn't need it.

Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#74

Post by byteflip »

accrual wrote: post #3

This is an insanely nice Windows UI clone. Not only is the site nicely done, but I enjoyed reading the author's posts regarding their current life and future aspirations. The whole bundle of code + UI + content hits home. I hope the author becomes the senior software engineer they desire to be - they deserve it.

This gave me a good chuckle. Obviously titles mean different things at different places but my god my accomplishments as a "Senior Software Engineer" title pales in comparison to what Dustin has built here. Kudos to him and it inspires me to shoot for more.

Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#75

Post by nottorp »

vbezhenar wrote: post #36

I'm really thinking that's the feature. Compile Linux kernel to wasm. So it can run inside a browser with a very nice performance. Write FS drivers to enable seamless caching and remote data storage, so you can shutdown your system on PC and boot from laptop. Or even some kind of hibernate mode, so you can just continue from where you left off. Write graphics drivers using WebGPU and other technologies, enabling very…

Don't forget to run the os running the browser in a hypervisor... or maybe 2-3 nested VMs.

Or wait. Perhaps we could run a VM inside the OS in the browser...

Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#76

Post by j-a-a-p »

l33tman wrote: post #68
wolletd wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm looking forward to the day when I can run a browser in my browser.

Creepy analogy available here with our universe-as-a-simulation

100 years before our simulation developed The Browser, Hegel wrote book about it. IIRC he predicted the World would end once the Geist would become self aware. Do we know better and tell it is just a stack overflow of recursive browser instances?

Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#78

Post by rollcat »

vbezhenar wrote: post #36

I'm really thinking that's the feature. Compile Linux kernel to wasm. So it can run inside a browser with a very nice performance. Write FS drivers to enable seamless caching and remote data storage, so you can shutdown your system on PC and boot from laptop. Or even some kind of hibernate mode, so you can just continue from where you left off. Write graphics drivers using WebGPU and other technologies, enabling very…

What's the trade-off? I'm giving up performance and simplicity (well, what's left of it in a kernel as complex as Linux), for what exactly? To run the same apps I can already run natively? Which apps exactly - TUI apps that can already run over an SSH connection? Electron apps that already run in a browser? Are there any native apps that are worth the effort? Emacs, GIMP, Audacity, Blender, or DaVinci are all cross-platform. Or do you have an idea for an app that would be better off targeting Linux rather than the web, but won't suffer from the performance loss?

Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#79

Post by rollcat »

jitl wrote: post #12
mofosyne wrote: post #6

I do wonder what it would be like if we have a linux distro, where you can work seamlessly between a desktop PC and a laptop or a random cafe, because the desktop is essentally a web browser like this example. Of course you could just say IPKVM or VNC, but I would say it's a bit different if you can run most of the logic client side (via webassembly etc...). So this would require the app to be rewritten to have a cle…

Sandstorm really had this kind of feeling. Not that it presented as a desktop environment visually - but it offered a much more integrated “computer” of documents versus silod web site apps where you need to open each site to see the files in the app. https://sandstorm.io/ On the other side of things, you can just run an SSH + X11 server for remoting; and have fairly good integration between windows controlled by a r…

I'm a big fan of the idea behind Sandstorm.

There's (theoretically) nothing standing in the way of making self-hosting of serverside apps as easy and painless as installing mobile apps, except someone has to do the infrastructure/integration work to make that UX come true. Docker got us 80% of the way there, but maintaining a complex setup can still be painful even for seasoned sysops (and we'd rather not take our work home more often than we already do). Sandstorm added another 80% and I wish it could take off like mobile did.

Re: DaedalOS – Desktop environment in the browser

#80

Post by d3w4s9 »

These things pop up here every once in a while. And they have existed since at least early 2000s, but I have never ever seen this kind of thing getting any more traction than "oh this looks cool", or seen or known anyone (software engineer or not) in real life that uses it. Not at all excited about this.
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