OSDev.org

Hello everyone,

I'm new here and just wanted to say the hello's, etc. I have a few questions I'd like to ask, just to feel out the territory.

1. What is everyone working on?
2. What are the first things that I should look
into when starting my adventure into OS design?
And, where can I find good resources?
3. Is everyone here using Assembly+C/C++ or are
there some crazy folk here trying to use a
different language to develop their system?
If so, which ones (languages and people ?
4. Is there an OSDev FAQ that has archived
explanations of questions I am likely to ask
along the way, but everyone is tired of
answering?
5. One of the most interesting projects I have run
across, while researching OS design is the
TUNES project. It seems very similar to the
kind of OS I would like to use/develop. What
do you all think about it, being more
experienced than I? Is such a thing possible?
Is there a reason that more people aren't
working on developing a system similar to this?

Thanks all,
Kurt

>1. What is everyone working on?

Operating Systems, dude
I can't speak for everyone else, but I was
working on "PolyOS" a while back... I lost the
majority of the source in an "unexpected" HD
format, so I'm currently on hiatus... rethinking
the process, and maybe I'll restart.

>2. What are the first things that I should look
> into when starting my adventure into OS design?
> And, where can I find good resources?

Books, dude. Books! No matter how many resources
I find on the internet, I still reference my
pmode books. They're indespensible.

Protected Mode Systems Architechture is a GREAT
book. Heavy on details, but still easy to read.
I forget who writes it, tho. I can find out.

Other than that, though... just general asm,
C/C++ and pmode knowledge is good. Later on,
some GUI or CLI knowledge will do some good

>3. Is everyone here using Assembly+C/C++ or are
> there some crazy folk here trying to use a
> different language to develop their system?
> If so, which ones (languages and people ?

Well, now that my OS is, essentially, scrapped, I'm
thinking about writting it in a different language.
I'm very tempted to do some research of languages
and perhaps write my own OO language... something
that I could encorporate into the OS design itself.
Something similar to C (so the learning curve is
next to 'nill) but with object oriented extensions
(without the crappyness of C++ Something
that's easy to connect with ASM as well (no name
mangling!) We'll see...

>4. Is there an OSDev FAQ that has archived
> explanations of questions I am likely to ask
> along the way, but everyone is tired of
> answering?

I think there is... at least I recall somewhere
seeing one. I don't know if it's still
available, tho. Check out the Links from this page.
Lots of good info.

>5. One of the most interesting projects I have run
> across, while researching OS design is the
> TUNES project. It seems very similar to the
> kind of OS I would like to use/develop. What
> do you all think about it, being more
> experienced than I? Is such a thing possible?
> Is there a reason that more people aren't
> working on developing a system similar to this?

As long as you've got a good knowledge of asm and
pmode, you can write a good OS.

Don't know much about Tunes, specific... I've heard
it mentioned a lot, but never actually tried it.

J.Weeks

>On 2001-10-17 11:02:38, J. Weeks wrote:
>>1. What is everyone working on?
>
>Operating Systems, dude
>I can't speak for everyone else, but I was
>working on "PolyOS" a while back... I lost the
>majority of the source in an "unexpected" HD
>format, so I'm currently on hiatus... rethinking
>the process, and maybe I'll restart.

That's horrible. Searching up PolyOS, I found
lots of links to your bootloader, but no page for
the whole project. Which makes sense, because
you wouldn't have lost your whole project if you
had code out on the net. What was the idea behind
PolyOS?

>
>>2. What are the first things that I should look
>> into when starting my adventure into OS design?
>> And, where can I find good resources?
>
>Books, dude. Books! No matter how many resources
>I find on the internet, I still reference my
>pmode books. They're indespensible.
>
>Protected Mode Systems Architechture is a GREAT
>book. Heavy on details, but still easy to read.
>I forget who writes it, tho. I can find out.
>
>Other than that, though... just general asm,
>C/C++ and pmode knowledge is good. Later on,
>some GUI or CLI knowledge will do some good
>

Cool.

>>3. Is everyone here using Assembly+C/C++ or are
>> there some crazy folk here trying to use a
>> different language to develop their system?
>> If so, which ones (languages and people ?
>
>Well, now that my OS is, essentially, scrapped, I'm
>thinking about writting it in a different language.
>I'm very tempted to do some research of languages
>and perhaps write my own OO language... something
>that I could encorporate into the OS design itself.
>Something similar to C (so the learning curve is
>next to 'nill) but with object oriented extensions
>(without the crappyness of C++ Something
>that's easy to connect with ASM as well (no name
>mangling!) We'll see...
>

Sounds very interesting to me, since I can read C,
but have no understanding at all of languages like
LISP and Standard ML, which both have language
features that I think would ease the creation of
next gen operating systems. The few code
fragments of those languages that I've seen look
like complete gibberish to me. They make me feel
like I need to take a computer science theory
course or something.

>>4. Is there an OSDev FAQ that has archived
>> explanations of questions I am likely to ask
>> along the way, but everyone is tired of
>> answering?
>
>I think there is... at least I recall somewhere
>seeing one. I don't know if it's still
>available, tho. Check out the Links from this page.
>Lots of good info.
>
>>5. One of the most interesting projects I have run
>> across, while researching OS design is the
>> TUNES project. It seems very similar to the
>> kind of OS I would like to use/develop. What
>> do you all think about it, being more
>> experienced than I? Is such a thing possible?
>> Is there a reason that more people aren't
>> working on developing a system similar to this?
>
>As long as you've got a good knowledge of asm and
>pmode, you can write a good OS.
>
>Don't know much about Tunes, specific... I've heard
>it mentioned a lot, but never actually tried it.
>

Cool, looks like I'll have to start learning ASM then. Luckily, I have an Intel 386 processor manual laying around.

Thanks for the quick reply and the info.

Kurt



>J.Weeks

>On 2001-10-17 01:21:56, clone304 wrote:
>
>1. What is everyone working on?

World domination...MUHAHAHAHAHA!

>2. What are the first things that I should look
> into when starting my adventure into OS design?

Well, I can suggest some things you should NOT
look into if you're just starting out:
1. Writing your own bootloader
2. Re-compiling GNU C or binutils
3. Creating your own filesystem
4. Creating your own programming language
5. Creating your own executable file format

> And, where can I find good resources?

http://www.execpc.com/~geezer/osd
http://www.execpc.com/~geezer/os

>3. Is everyone here using Assembly+C/C++ or are
> there some crazy folk here trying to use a
> different language to develop their system?
> If so, which ones (languages and people ?

There's a guy trying to use Ada:
http://willowplan.tripod.com/sorcerer/main.html

>4. Is there an OSDev FAQ that has archived
> explanations of questions I am likely to ask
> along the way, but everyone is tired of
> answering?

http://www.mega-tokyo.com/os/os-faq.html

>That's horrible. Searching up PolyOS, I found
>lots of links to your bootloader, but no page for
>the whole project. Which makes sense, because
>you wouldn't have lost your whole project if you
>had code out on the net.

Indeed The worse thing is that the boot loader
up on the net is so old and crappy I did have a
multi-section boot loader that read my file system
to get the kernel... gone

But, what can you do? Like I said, it could be a
good thing, if I can manage to write my own
OO language and rewrite it.

>What was the idea behind PolyOS?

Same as a lot of OS's, I think, but more to the
extreme. Totally modular/object-oriented. Everything
becomes an object. Every file, button, device, etc.

Objects are controlled by a language (there is where
my new language idea comes in) that's interpreted
at the kernel level. For instance, to run a program:

programs.calculator.run();

is piped into the cli and the calculator runs.

Once it's running, all the programs objects are
accessable (unless they're private, of course) which
leads cool little things like this:

running.calculator.face.add(new Button("Npr", &Math.Npr()));

Which could, theoretically, add a new function to the
calculator at run time.

In essence, everything can be changed through
changes in the object, using the language.

Also, all programs would be distributed as
collections of objects, not one executable. This
way you can update individual parts of the program
when new parts exist, or you can use individual
parts in your program (for exactly, you could use
the HTML widget from Netscape without needed the
source code for it... just copy the widget into
your projects directory).

Well... enough promoting...

>Sounds very interesting to me, since I can read C,
>but have no understanding at all of languages like
>LISP and Standard ML, which both have language
>features that I think would ease the creation of
>next gen operating systems. The few code
>fragments of those languages that I've seen look
>like complete gibberish to me. They make me feel
>like I need to take a computer science theory
>course or something.

Yeah, the first time I looked at Objective C, I
thought, "This is supposed to look like C?"

After taking a database class and looking back
at it again I realized where all the + - stuff
comes from. Now I wanna implement that syntax
into my language

>Cool, looks like I'll have to start learning ASM then.

Yeah, there really isn't much of a way around it.

>Luckily, I have an Intel 386 processor manual
>laying around.

Excellent reference, if you can make sense of it

>Thanks for the quick reply and the info.

No prob. Good luck with your projects, dude.

j.weeks

>On 2001-10-17 21:51:31, Chris Giese wrote:
>>On 2001-10-17 01:21:56, clone304 wrote:
>>
>>1. What is everyone working on?
>
>World domination...MUHAHAHAHAHA!

HEY!!! That's what I'm working on!

Actual I'm final starting to write new code for this
site. Someday soon, everything will be pretty and work
like it should

-Chase

>On 2001-10-17 22:52:37, J. Weeks wrote:

>>What was the idea behind PolyOS?
>
>Same as a lot of OS's, I think, but more to the
>extreme. Totally modular/object-oriented. Everything
>becomes an object. Every file, button, device, etc.
>
>Objects are controlled by a language (there is where
>my new language idea comes in) that's interpreted
>at the kernel level. For instance, to run a program:
>
>programs.calculator.run();
>
>is piped into the cli and the calculator runs.
>
>Once it's running, all the programs objects are
>accessable (unless they're private, of course) which
>leads cool little things like this:
>
>running.calculator.face.add(new Button("Npr", &Math.Npr()));
>
>Which could, theoretically, add a new function to the
>calculator at run time.
>
>In essence, everything can be changed through
>changes in the object, using the language.
>
>Also, all programs would be distributed as
>collections of objects, not one executable. This
>way you can update individual parts of the program
>when new parts exist, or you can use individual
>parts in your program (for exactly, you could use
>the HTML widget from Netscape without needed the
>source code for it... just copy the widget into
>your projects directory).
>
>Well... enough promoting...
>

That sounds really similar to the type of thing I'd like to do and the ideas behind the TUNES
project. You might find some of his writings to
be interesting, http://tunes.org

I think the BRIX project is also doing something
similar. It's cool to see that so many people
are thinking along similar lines.

Lates,

Kurt

>On 2001-10-18 14:49:41, Chase wrote:
>>On 2001-10-17 21:51:31, Chris Giese wrote:
>>>On 2001-10-17 01:21:56, clone304 wrote:
>>>
>>>1. What is everyone working on?
>>
>>World domination...MUHAHAHAHAHA!
>
>HEY!!! That's what I'm working on!

Hey you guys, I was here first!

>That sounds really similar to the type of thing I'd like to do and the ideas behind the TUNES
>project. You might find some of his writings to
>be interesting, http://tunes.org

Sweet! Thanks dude. There're definitly some
funky ideas there.

>I think the BRIX project is also doing something
>similar. It's cool to see that so many people
>are thinking along similar lines.

Yeah, I remember reading about BRIX a while back
but I can't find it on the web anymore.

j.weeks

>On 2001-10-19 13:23:54, J. Weeks wrote:
>>That sounds really similar to the type of thing I'd like to do and the ideas behind the TUNES
>>project. You might find some of his writings to
>>be interesting, http://tunes.org
>
>Sweet! Thanks dude. There're definitly some
>funky ideas there.
>
>>I think the BRIX project is also doing something
>>similar. It's cool to see that so many people
>>are thinking along similar lines.
>
>Yeah, I remember reading about BRIX a while back
>but I can't find it on the web anymore.
>
>j.weeks

You can find it here:

http://qzx.com/brix/

Kurt