this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2024
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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RedoxOS! There's been solid progress too, beyond just having a functional microkernel, they have many of the userspace tools/their version of coreutils, even a desktop environment already mostly implemented!
My understanding is that it shouldn't be too bad to port some other things over as well. The main issue I had was just the lack of drivers, especially since it's still tricky even on Linux, and the microkernel architecture (though more secure) also means there's no way to reuse any of those from Linux
They are actually looking into using the Linux Kernel for modular drivers in a really interesting way.
Same with Ironclad kernel and OS written in Ada Programing language. Nice to see these systems development
Gives me vibes of a second iteration of the OS writing boom. Though this time, the kernel mostly.
I think this overall is a better idea. I'm going to say this because, I thought I'd look into rust today. So I installed it, setup vscode to work with it etc. And it's all up and running. I thought I would port over a "fairly simple" C# project I wrote recently as a bit of a test.
While I've generally had success (albeit with 30+ tabs open to solve questions I had about how to do certain things, and only making it about 20% into the task) I'm going to say that it's different enough from C, C++ and C# (all of which I can work with) that I really don't think it is fair to expect C developers that have day jobs and work on the kernel in their spare time to learn this. It's fundamentally different in my opinion.
Now, I don't condone any bad attitude and pushing away of rust developers from the project. But there's no way they're going to want to do anything to help which involves learning a new language. It's just not going to happen.
Likewise, C is not a language most new developers are learning. So, I feel like over time there won't be so much of an influx of new kernel developers and any Rust based kernel could find itself with more contributors over time and taking over as the de-facto kernel.
In terms of Redox (not looked into it yet). So long as there's a different team working on the userspace tools. I would say the main task should be getting a solid kernel with drivers for most popular hardware etc in place. The existing GNU tools will do until there's a kernel that is able to compete with the C one. But that's just my opinion.