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MotorOS: a Rust-first operating system for x64 VMs

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Re: MotorOS: a Rust-first operating system for x64 VMs

#121
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And thanks to the BSD license, the project is getting zero back from Sony, while those Playstation profits get a big higher thanks to less R&D costs spent on OS code. Same applies to clang/LLVM port to the Playstation, regarding everything that would expose console implementation details without an NDA.

It is probably for another product but there is at least one Sony email address, and a number email addresses from different corporate entities, on the FreeBSD contributors list. All 3 majors BSD OSes also list donators (can be financially or hardware). So saying corps that use BSD code never give anything back because of license is not true. And an awful lot don't do any more or even hide their use of gpl licensed c…

When, say, IBM contributed a lot of stuff into the Linux kernel in early 2000s, that stuff became immediately available to anyone. Whatever cool stuff Nintendo or Sony may introduce in their versions of BSD kernels, we don't even know, let alone seeing them contribute it back.

GPL works similarly to a patent pool: every participant sees that openly contributing to the pool is more profitable than being a renegade, as long as everyone else plays by the rules, too. MIT/BSD, while as open as possible, can easily promote a trade-secret type of environment, where any enhancements are never heard of, except under an NDA, and perish if their creators go under or lose interest.

Re: MotorOS: a Rust-first operating system for x64 VMs

#122
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you say wasm container, you mean something like wasmtime that provides a non-browser wasm runtime? https://github.com/bytecodealliance/wasmtime

Yeah, just that sort of thing. I mean, heck, can you put #!wasmtime at the top of a wasm file? Would such a file literally run right now (assuming #! is supported, and wasmtime doesn't hit any MotorOS Rust limitations)?

Serendipitously I see this article about WASM and how it has all these nice properties as a runtime abstraction: https://wingolog.org/archives/2024/01/08/missing-the-point-o...

Re: MotorOS: a Rust-first operating system for x64 VMs

#123
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Idk if it's "the Unix family". Clouds are running with SmartOS for example with containers running on bare metal and I've not heard of security issues with this model.

SmartOS is a fork of OpenSolaris right? Solaris used to have its share of public vulnerability discourse when it had more users, and it quieted down as the user base shrank and people stopped deploying it as a general purpouse server OS. In a slow moving niche OS I wouldn't put much weight on low volume of public security problem discourse especially in face of apparent architectural problems.

Yes it's a fork of OpenSolaris. Companies are running clouds with it, with containers of different clients running next to each other on bare metal (no VM to re-isolate). If it was so easy to exploit it would have been done already wouldn't it ?

Re: MotorOS: a Rust-first operating system for x64 VMs

#124
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unstable, undocumented, compiler-(version-)dependent ABIs are the reason Haiku for x86-32 still has to use GCC 2.95. I’m never not going to welcome a hobby OS, especially in an interesting language (still have fond memories of House). By all means, go for it. Just... it’s important to be aware of the prior art here.

Haiku was stuck on old GCC only because they wanted to support old BeOS binaries? But binary backwards/forwards compatibility is not requirement for many use-cases.

Haiku without the BeOS applications wouldn't have that much to show.

This is the way to go on platforms that favour shipping binaries instead of source code.

Outside Linux/BSD, stable ABI across OS versions is a concern, hence why Apple, Google and Microsoft platforms all offer ways to keep this going.

Re: MotorOS: a Rust-first operating system for x64 VMs

#125
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SmartOS is a fork of OpenSolaris right? Solaris used to have its share of public vulnerability discourse when it had more users, and it quieted down as the user base shrank and people stopped deploying it as a general purpouse server OS. In a slow moving niche OS I wouldn't put much weight on low volume of public security problem discourse especially in face of apparent architectural problems.

Yes it's a fork of OpenSolaris. Companies are running clouds with it, with containers of different clients running next to each other on bare metal (no VM to re-isolate). If it was so easy to exploit it would have been done already wouldn't it ?

No, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, that's a very central thing to understand when thinking about software vulnerabilities.
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