I have a question, /g/.
Almost every major OS out today is based on a kernel older than many of its current developers, and has decades of legacy bloat so that businesses who use it don't completely lose compatibility.
But... Why?
Why must the inner machinations of the most important invention in human history since the wheel be so difficult to comprehend that even the people who work on it don't completely understand it, if at all? Why does everything have to have such significant overhead? Why can't an OS be designed from the ground up to be as straightforward as possible?
Is an OS of this caliber even possible? Something so simple that even an IT guy could come up with a low-level solution to a problem? Something that doesn't really require much work from the end user because the base of it all has been refined extensively and simplified to the greatest degree possible?
I'd answer this, but I'm just a shitty little normie who's dissatisfied with everything available.
Discuss...
Simple, fast, pick one.
>>53757402
Is it really that simple? I would think requiring the processor to... Well, process less, would lead to better performance. Less lines of code should therefore equal a faster solution.
Unless I'm missing something?
The requirements are too complex.
A text-based OS would be able to do what you say.
A graphical one that needs to be both modern and 30 years old, not so much.
Imagine rewriting C64's BASIC every release, not so bad.
Imagine rewriting the 15GB Windows. Very bad.
>>53757543
Fast:
2 x 4 = 8
Simple:
2 + 2 + 2 + 2 = 8
>>53757640
Okay, I can see where you're going. Small things can be a little harder to read. (Though in this case 2x4 is also the simple one for anyone in IT...)
What would alleviate that? Clear documentation?
>>53757595
I'm not entirely sure you got me. I'm basically asking if it's possible to just make a new kernel and OS designed around being straightforward and simple to work with. No legacy, no cross platform stuff, no attempts to work with industry standard stuff. It just werks all on its own.
It'd probably be incredibly specialized, and I don't see it being popular, but can it be done? I'm just a normie, all I really need is internet browsing and the basic office stuff. Being able to run it all on what's essentially a potato would be pretty cool, and it could be an interesting experiment in my mind.
>>53757543
You're missing safety, security, and compatibility. Memory protection, SMP, networking, and multiuser are SO HARD to get right that it was easier to scrap every home computer OS from the 80s and 90s and replace them with API (and ABI via emulation) compatible replacements based on OSes from refrigerator sized minicomputers from the 1980s: Unix for Mac, VMS for Windows. Every other platform from back then had already died off for lack of ability to use the internet properly. Modern Amiga-ish operating systems (AmigaOS4, MorphOS, AROS) are literally the only OS family not descended from Unix or VMS to EVER get a modern web browser, for example, and they're unstable as fuck compared to Linux or Windows.
>>53757864
>I'm not entirely sure you got me. I'm basically asking if it's possible to just make a new kernel and OS designed around being straightforward and simple to work with. No legacy, no cross platform stuff, no attempts to work with industry standard stuff. It just werks all on its own.
>It'd probably be incredibly specialized, and I don't see it being popular, but can it be done?
Yep. http://www.redox-os.org/
>>53757864
>all I really need is internet browsing and the basic office stuff
Web browsers are probably the single biggest contributor to OS complexity, and unless you want to write all that shit from scratch you'll end up using a bunch of cross platform C libraries and whoops there goes your safety. You wind up with a full-weight OS or a metric fuckton of security holes once you add a modern web browser into the equation. You have no fucking clue what a "simple" OS really is or what its limitations are.
Protip: this is the exact reason Plan 9 was abandoned by its creators.
>>53757039
CHROME OS NIGGHAH
>>53760072
linux kernel
>>53757039
>so that businesses who use it don't completely lose compatibility
The finance department usually has domain over IT even though they often consider Excel to be a "database".
>>53759319
Huh. I legit did not know that. How intriguing...
Thanks for the input /g/uys. I think I'll stick to some slightly more basic stuff than OS dev... Especially when I'm not really even planning to be a CS major. (inb4 normiereefuckoff)
Well, that, and also the fact that apparently I've been beaten to that game. >>53759274
>>53760168
Aaaand now we come to something I wish I didn't know. IT handled by finances... Almost as dumb as laying off logistics as a part manufacturer. Management decisions are fucking stupid...
>>53760614
>Aaaand now we come to something I wish I didn't know. IT handled by finances... Almost as dumb as laying off logistics as a part manufacturer. Management decisions are fucking stupid...
Yup, and this is why so many MSPs have popped up. IT professionals got sick of Finance bullshit.
>>53757039
Because having to learn a new, unproven platform and find re-purchase software (if it exists at all) every five years for the sake of some trivial performance boost or a little less headache for niche use cases isn't worth it. Speed and efficiency aren't everything in personal computing, what ultimately matters is it gets the job done in a manner that doesn't make you pull your hair out, and for the most part, this is true, especially in the modern era where hardware is so fast that a little legacy bloat in your operating system is of little consequence.
>Why can't an OS be designed from the ground up to be as straightforward as possible?
Take a look at the '80s and '90s, it's been done many times in both hardware and software, but starting with a clean slate for a personal computer is a guaranteed recipe for failure.
