OS with modem support!!!

[charthick]

hi!!!

i was a newbie for OSD( 6 months b4) and am still a newbie ;D. i am in my final year of my graduation and i have decided to do an os as my final year project.

My idea is to run the os(32 bit) from a floppy, and using it i have to connect it to the net and then run some functions which resides in the web as a webservice using SOAP. i can understand that i have to detect the modem for that and will have to write a driver for that. and then write my networking layers.
i implemented a bootloader and i was able to boot my hello world kernel.

i wud like to develop a microkernel rather than a monolithic kernel. which one will be the best option?

wat approach shud i give for memory mangement? i guess i need not give much emphasis for that coz my kernel is functionally limited.
but i am wondering where i'll get some material or documentation on the modem driver development. and i am clueless on how to approach this for a primitive kernel like mine.

It'll be really helpful if u guys can gimme some advice on how to approch this project.

Regards,
R Karthick

[Curufir]

One place for a little inspiration might be the GRUB source.

I know it doesn't sound promising, but GRUB can boot from a network and in essence is a teeny tiny kernel in itself at startup.

[Tim]

Serial modems are pretty easy to interface to, as is the RS-232 serial interface itself. Once you're able to send and receive bytes at the serial port (the simplest serial routines are maybe 10 lines of code), all you need to do is send ATDT<phone number> to the serial port, and wait for a CONNECT message back.

Now, interpreting what the remote modem sends you is another matter. PPP, IP and TCP add much more complexity to it.

[charthick]

Thnx a lot tim and curufir for your answers.

how abt usb modems. is it hard to write a driver for them?
and also can you give me some tips on wat shud b my approach towards memory management and the architecture. like shud it b a micro or monlithic kernel.

i am findin these things a bit hard to grasp. i'll really appreciate if u guys can help me out of this.

[Tim]

Any USB device is at least 10 times harder to progrtam than the corresponding conventional device.

More accurately, it's not the device that's hard to program, but the USB in general. USB moves most of the intelligence away from the device (making it possible to mass-produce devices simply) and into the OS.