I know it is a huge task but out of pure boredom I've started working on my own operating system. Destined Entertainment Studios Operating System or DESOS for short. I've not worked out all the features but I may use it in the very, very distant future as my gaming OS. I've started capsulating everything and I've started working on the possible GUIs, sound, and graphics stuff (with the help of detailed information from web sites about the topics). Right now I'm running it off a floppy so that if I mess up it can be rebooted into Windows just by restarting the computer and removing the floppy. There aren't any features that are worth mentioning right now because I'm only doing test runs of DESOS.

It's all majorly buggy and faulty but yes I have those sort of working. That is why I've not released any demo of it. Maybe I'll get Matrix OS and see what they did with that to determine where I'll go with DESOS.

[edit]Feature wise of course.

I agree with Derezo. Besides, the last thing we need is yet another operating system.
Don't get me wrong. If you like playing around with it for fun, that's fine. If you intend to do anything serious with it, I would suggest you look into modifying an existing Linux distribution instead.

An OS for games is a little bit overkill, if you ask me.

Although, having a decent OS for desktop users (BESIDES windows and BESIDES some of those strange linux distriubtions that install junk that you really don't need... your installing a desktop; DO NOT INSTALL SERVER STUFF PLEASE!!!!).

It would be nice for a DECENT desktop distribution of linux to come out that operated very similarly to at least MacOS X, and windows would be preferable. It would be nice to get a linux-based OS that works like windows; doesn't complicate things, require you to launch shells to run programs, etc. Heck, have it so it doesn't even allow you to configure anything that requires root access unless you are logged in directly as root.

Linux is great; it is those computer idiots out there who don't program for linux/don't want to "waste time" on linux that are keeping it from spreading.

Yick. If every OS uses/is linux, every OS will have the same flaws as linux (<-please lets not go into that though). I don't think any OS should have a monopoly. It allows more variety.

I have a idea for an operating system that I may work on in the future. It's what I consider module based. Each module can be reset/shutdown/patched/etc without touching any other module (except submodules) and the ones required to install the driver (file i/o module, assuming it's not already in RAM).

So you could in theory reinstall almost the entire OS while it's running. And you could be playing quake during the process as well.

That's an OS architecture, known as microkernel. It provides only the four basic services (process management, memory management, low level i/o and IPC), and all other stuff is managed as daemons or servers.

GNU has been trying to get one of these for a long time, it's called The Hurd, but they haven't made much progress. That's why we have to stick with Linux.

And I built a MMORPG 50x the size of Morrowind in 34 minutes, 2 seconds yesterday. It looks better than Doom 3 & HL2 combined. I have no screenshots because my speakers don't work. Oh well!

Linux can do that. You can load and unload drivers on the fly and change the configuration without having to reboot like in Windows.
Kernel updates are about the only thing I think that really requires a restart.

Anyway, all I was saying is that if you want to build your own operating system, you can probably save yourself a lot of trouble by looking at an existing open source operating system. Linux is the obvious choice, but FreeBSD should do just as well. Even FreeDOS might be interesting.

If you're interested in tiny OSs, try Menuet - it's GPL, mostly written in assembler, has a couple of graphics demos, web server, media server, http client, mail client, text editor and compiler (it can build itself) all on one floppy.

For microkernels, check out L4 which works on MIPS, PowerPC, x86 and ARM processors. It claims to have addressed some of the performance issues that killed microkernels about 10 years ago (Chorus, Mach etc) but it is at the University Research stage.

I think it would be possible to make a focussed, mini OS for games that would go on a floppy. If you use GRUB, that will boot to protected mode, load an ELF binary with any associated data to memory, and give you a pointer to a VBE3.0 interface for graphics. You'd only need input and sound drivers.

Having said all that, for most people the effort:reward ratio for writing an OS would be too high - very difficult to debug, for a start, and, if you wanted modern hardware support, it would be a constant game of catch-up on the driver side.

I hope this won't delay DES's first games release, which I am really looking forward to.

Pete

DESOS is going nicely but it is being put on hold for now so I can work more on my present project(s).

So you are porting MingW? Minimalist GNU for Windows? What kind of a bootloader do you have? How are you handling kernel memory allocation? How about program execution? Multitasking? TCP/IP stack? How are you accessing/polling external devices and their states & features?

To be truthful, I don't think DESOS exists. DESOS is 100% certified bogus. I am not convinced by words alone.

Which are...? A superhyperfantastic game, which you can't post screenshots of because it's raining outside? A superhyperfantastic AI which emulates the brain completely and acts exactly as a human being would - but you have nothing to show because the letter C comes right after letter B?

It's your intellectual property unless you actually signed it away at some point. Of course you do need the group's permission.

Inphernic I want to answer those question and I would if I was team leader but Kyle is the one that makes of the rules for our college project. He has decided that we can tell the name of the OS but nothing else otherwise we get kicked off the team and that would make m fail for the semester:(. I'll talk to him and see if he will let me at least post the answers here and then I'll answer all questions and post as many screenshots as you can stand;D.

The researching is trying to make it the best OS that college students can make. The thing I hate is that Kyle and the others think it will be possible to continue this after our course is done and want to then try to make DESOS support Windows programs, Linux programs, and Mac Programs???. If I can't talk some sense into them I may drop from the team and answer all your questions just to p*ss them off>:(.