Written in Rust. Hmm.
SerenityOS is written in C++.
I'd love some kind of meta-language that is easy to read and write, easy to maintain - but fast. C, C++, Rust etc... are not that easy to read, write and maintain.
CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
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Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#42Written in Rust. Hmm. SerenityOS is written in C++. I'd love some kind of meta-language that is easy to read and write, easy to maintain - but fast. C, C++, Rust etc... are not that easy to read, write and maintain.
fast necessitates manual control -> more semantics for low level control) that need to be expressible, ie: more complex
easy to understand, maintain -> computer does more work for you to "figure things out" in a way that simply can't be optimal under al conditions.
TLDR: what you're asking for isn't really possible without some form of AGI
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#43I love seeing projects in this space! Non-big-corp OSSes have been limited to Linux etc; would love to explore the space more and have non-Linux, non-MS/Apple options. For example, Linux has these at the core which I don't find to be a good match for my uses: - Multi-user and server-oriented permissions system. - Incompatible ABIs - File-based everything; leads to scattered state that gets messy over time. - Package…
BSD exists
Also Open Solaris
Minix
etc...
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
It would be easy to tell for anyone seriously after you: If I kidnap you and make you log into your computer, and you log into the decoy state, it'd be obvious to see that the last time you visited any website etc. was over a month ago and so on.
For sure you'd have to use it from time to time.
Something I thought about long ago was that it would be better/easier to divide user accounts into "personas": different sets of public-facing IDs, settings etc.
This could be done at every level: the operating system, the browser, websites..
So if you don't care about the website knowing it's the same person, instead of having multiple user accounts on HN, Reddit, you could log into a single account, then choose from a set of different usernames each with their own post history, karma, etc.
If you want to have different usernames on each website, switch the browser persona.
At the OS level, people could have different "decoy" personas if they're at risk of state/partner spying or wrench-based decryption, and so on.
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
The sad part is that there are too many ideas of old systems lost in a world that 30 years later seems too focused on putting Linux distributions everywhere.
Yeah the more you read up on computing history from barely even 40 years ago, it seems that most of the things that we take for granted today became so more through politics (and in the case of Microsoft, bullying) than merit.
Regarding Microsoft, this was before even the "Browser Wars" they'd send suited people to the offices of Japanese PC manufacturers and threaten to revoke their Windows licenses if they even OFFERED customers the CHOICE of an alternative operating system!!
This and other dirt is on any YouTube video about the history/demise of alternative computing platforms/OSes.
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#46Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or, write a login script to touch files at random.
That won't mask your online interaction history etc. Maybe an LLM agent posting crap at random? lol
Could also be a "cross-over", so your real account could mount certain parts of other file systems as an overlay. So if you could have a browser that would be the same across two environments. That way the throwaway account could be seen as real, but it wouldn't show things you don't want to be compromised.
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#48This is probably a better introduction it seems, than specifically the kernel of the OS: https://github.com/charlotte-os/.github/blob/main/profile/RE... > URIs as namespace paths allowing access to system resources both locally and on the network without mounting or unmounting anything This is such an attractive idea, and I'm gonna give it a try just because I want something with this idea to succeed. Seems the proje…
In theory, wouldn't it be possible for the Linux kernel to also provide a URI "auto mount" extension too?
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#49So, what's modern about it? "novel systems like Plan 9" is quite funny because Plan 9 is 30 years old.
The sad part is that there are too many ideas of old systems lost in a world that 30 years later seems too focused on putting Linux distributions everywhere.
Indeed. I am reminded of what Alan Kay has repeatedly referred to as a “pop culture” of computing that has become widespread in technical communities since the 1980s, when the spread of technology grew faster than educational efforts. One result is there are many inventions and innovations from the research community that never got adopted by major players. The corollary to “perfect is the enemy of the good” is good-enough solutions have amazingly long lifetimes in the marketplace.
There are many great ideas in operating systems, programming languages, and other systems that have been developed in the fast 30 years, but these ideas need to work with existing infrastructure due to costs, network effects, and other important factors.
What is interesting is how some of these features do get picked up by the mainstream computing ecosystem. Rust is one of the biggest breakthroughs in systems programming in decades, bringing together research in linear types and memory safety in a form that has resonated with a lot of systems programmers who tend to resist typical languages from the PL community. Some ideas from Plan 9, such as 9P, have made their way into contemporary systems. Features that were once the domain of Lisp have made their ways into contemporary programming languages, such as anonymous functions.
I think it would be cool if there were some book or blog that taught “alternate universe computing”: the ideas of research systems during the past few decades that didn’t become dominant but have very important lessons that people working on today’s systems can apply. A lot of what I know about research systems comes from graduate school, working in research environments, and reading sites like Hacker News. It would be cool if this information were more widely disseminated.
Re: CharlotteOS – An Experimental Modern Operating System
#50I’m very happy I’m seeing more open source kernels being released.
More options (and thus) competition is very healthy.