Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

visopsys.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 151 posts

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#81

Post by II2II »

bombcar wrote: post #51
sorbusherra wrote: post #9

Amazing! I find it extremely fascinating that somebody is able to create entire operating system. Not a easy task!

It’s not easy, but it’s more approachable than many realize. Much of modern operating systems are the hordes and hordes of drivers; the fundamentals aren’t terribly complicated; just lots of detail.

It would also depend upon what you are trying to accomplish. You have simple filesystems and complex filesystems. You have simple video drivers, and you have complex video drivers. Simplicity gets the job done, but complexity may offer better reliability or performance or features.

Then there is the question of what one means by an operating system. While I'm sure that most people would agree that much of the software shipped with Windows, Mac OS, or the typical Linux distribution isn't part of an operating system proper, few would agree upon where the boundary lies.

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#82

Post by [deleted] »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #68
hollerith wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>if your needs are basic (kids, elderly, . . .) Most kids and most elderly need to run a mainstream browser from time to time, and this Visopsys will almost certainly never be able to run a mainstream browser.

Then we need to change what is meant by "mainstream browser".

[deleted]

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#83

Post by anthk »

pjmlp wrote: post #66
anthk wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CP/M was far more simpler.

OP didn't mentioned complexity, nor any kind of comparison.

Nice then. OTOH, CP/M 2.2 has been open sourced, but I think there are no libre assemblers for it.

Cross-assemblers, there's one: http://john.ccac.rwth-aachen.de:8000/as/ but it's tedious to build under OpenBSD.

As for software, the ZMachine and V3 games don't count as 'libre examples'.

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#84

Post by II2II »

anthk wrote: post #60
pjmlp wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CP/M was also created by one person.

CP/M was far more simpler.

In all probability, yes. I'm not sure how much easier it would be to develop though. Back then, most (if not all) of the operating system was developed in assembly language while there was far more to consider when it came down to performance and memory usage (which is often in conflict with each other). CP/M was also notorious for running on hardware that was incompatible with each other, relying upon the BIOS to smooth out those irregularities. While that may simplify the development in some respects, such as the hardware vendor developing hardware drivers, it complicates development in other respects, since CP/M development could not make assumptions about the underlying hardware.

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#88

Post by pkphilip »

wowczarek wrote: post #20
grepfru_it wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

take a look at AtheOS it's successor SyllableOS. created by a single developer, another single developer took it over (syllable) and it shortly became an open source project before it went defunct again. But it made impressive gains in the 3 years of initial development. i miss those days of everyone and their mom creating an OS for giggles

Don't forget SkyOS. And there's plenty more, with SerenityOS being one of the latest notable examples. Those days never ended. Also ekhem ekhem TempleOS, as single developer as you can get.

SkyOS ? I actually paid to be on the Beta program and then suddenly out of the blue the developer pulled the plug on the project completely. Not sure what happened but there were rumours that the code may have "borrowed" from other operating systems but I am not sure.

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#89

Post by 7thaccount »

visopsys wrote: post #45

I took an OS in college in 2006 and the big project that my prof required us to do was to make modification of visopsys. The software was primitive at that time but still had UI interface. I emailed the author to ask some questions in my project. The author had connection with my prof and informed my prof about this. My prof told me that I was not allowed to ask the author regarding this project. So I had to figured…

I can't tell if OP just really enjoyed the experience or if he is the actual author of the OS.

Re: Visopsys: OS maintained by a single developer since 1997

#90

Post by graemep »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #68
hollerith wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>if your needs are basic (kids, elderly, . . .) Most kids and most elderly need to run a mainstream browser from time to time, and this Visopsys will almost certainly never be able to run a mainstream browser.

Then we need to change what is meant by "mainstream browser".

I would love to see that happen, but its not going to.

It is the people with basic needs who need to stick to the mainstream stuff because they can get support and it does what they expect. People need bank and other complex websites to work. They want to watch online video. Kids will need educational apps.

Also do not make assumptions about elderly people. Not long ago I met a woman (guess in her 70s?) who used to write embedded software for nuclear reactors. I have known many people or similar or greater age who need quite complex stuff.

Its the geeks who can manage with the non-mainstream stuff.

Post reply on HN