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Feature: Free Software
Four alternative operating systems
By Tim Miller
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June 14, 2006 (8:00:00 AM)
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Linux distributions such as Ubuntu, SUSE, and Linspire are making headway in the desktop market, but if you want to try something really different, you can find other, less-well-known alternative operating systems. While these OSes may not be the most stable, or have the greatest hardware support, they offer some unique ideas.
SkyOS
Started in 1996 and still in beta, SkyOS is primarily developed by just one person, Robert Szeleney. This proprietary OS has a lot of good things going for it, such as symmetric multiprocessing support, an integrated media subsystem, and a journaled 64-bit file system that lets you recover a partition in the event of a crash. Application support is limited, but SkyOS offers Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird, AbiWord, Gaim, Nvu, and Pixel, among others. Installing application software is simple via the SkyOS Software Store; all it takes is a few clicks of the mouse.
SkyOS also offers real-time file content query searches with multiple keyword support, similar to Beagle in Linux or Spotlight in Mac OS X. Files and programs are indexed for easy access. Also included is support for system-wide mouse gestures, and a media player application that uses ffmpeg for multiple codec support, including Windows Media Video and MP3.
On the negative side, SkyOS hardware support is extremely limited (though by running SkyOS through VMware you can get the graphics card, sound, and networking support of your native OS). Only a handful of network cards and sound cards work, and only a few graphics cards allow for full 2-D acceleration.
If you have hardware that's supported, you can pay the project $30 to join the beta program. If, however, you prefer a stable operating system, wait until SkyOS releases its first official version.
Haiku
After Be Inc.'s assets were bought Palm in 2001, a group of BeOS fans created the OpenBeOS project to write an open source operating system (under the MIT license) that would be backward-compatible with BeOS 5. The project, now known as Haiku, has made some progress since it started. A lot of programs can run on the system, including Mozilla Firefox and SeaMonkey, as well as some games and other programs.
While Haiku offers short boot times and application load times, networking adapter support is very limited. Also, installing Haiku requires a BeOS or Zeta system installed, and an extra BeOS partition to move the Haiku files onto.
Syllable
Syllable, created in 2002 as a fork of the now-defunct AtheOS, is a GPL-licensed open source desktop OS. It has modest hardware requirements and boots quickly. Although the choice of application software is limited, there are Web browsers, email programs, games, and a media player. To install the majority of the software, you just move a binary file out of an archive. Syllable also includes a 64-bit file system, the AtheOS File System.
Syllable's hardware support can be lacking, and installing Syllable can be an adventure for some, as the installer is text-based and can be confusing. However, out of all the operating systems in this list, this is the most ready to be used as a secondary OS.
Visopsys
Visopsys, the Visual Operating System, is an open source OS licensed under the GPL and LGPL that was started in 1997. However, if you're thinking of running Visopsys as a desktop OS, you might think again, as this is more of a hobby OS developed primarily by Andy McLaughlin. Visopsys offers fewer applications and much more restricted hardware support than the others in this list.
While Visopsys may not be the best desktop OS, it has one great use. Partition Logic, a free, open source partition manager like Symantec's Partition Magic, uses Visopsys, and in fact was created by the same person. Partition Logic works just as well as Partition Magic, and makes for a great, free alternative.
So there you have four alternative operating systems in development. While they may not have the best hardware support out there, and may not be the easiest to install and use, their ideas and designs set them apart. In a world where Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X have control of public mindset of the operating system, it is nice that other OSes can make strides and try different things.
Started in 1996 and still in beta, SkyOS is primarily developed by just one person, Robert Szeleney. This proprietary OS has a lot of good things going for it, such as symmetric multiprocessing support, an integrated media subsystem, and a journaled 64-bit file system that lets you recover a partition in the event of a crash. Application support is limited, but SkyOS offers Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird, AbiWord, Gaim, Nvu, and Pixel, among others. Installing application software is simple via the SkyOS Software Store; all it takes is a few clicks of the mouse.
SkyOS also offers real-time file content query searches with multiple keyword support, similar to Beagle in Linux or Spotlight in Mac OS X. Files and programs are indexed for easy access. Also included is support for system-wide mouse gestures, and a media player application that uses ffmpeg for multiple codec support, including Windows Media Video and MP3.
On the negative side, SkyOS hardware support is extremely limited (though by running SkyOS through VMware you can get the graphics card, sound, and networking support of your native OS). Only a handful of network cards and sound cards work, and only a few graphics cards allow for full 2-D acceleration.
If you have hardware that's supported, you can pay the project $30 to join the beta program. If, however, you prefer a stable operating system, wait until SkyOS releases its first official version.
Haiku
After Be Inc.'s assets were bought Palm in 2001, a group of BeOS fans created the OpenBeOS project to write an open source operating system (under the MIT license) that would be backward-compatible with BeOS 5. The project, now known as Haiku, has made some progress since it started. A lot of programs can run on the system, including Mozilla Firefox and SeaMonkey, as well as some games and other programs.
While Haiku offers short boot times and application load times, networking adapter support is very limited. Also, installing Haiku requires a BeOS or Zeta system installed, and an extra BeOS partition to move the Haiku files onto.
Syllable
Syllable, created in 2002 as a fork of the now-defunct AtheOS, is a GPL-licensed open source desktop OS. It has modest hardware requirements and boots quickly. Although the choice of application software is limited, there are Web browsers, email programs, games, and a media player. To install the majority of the software, you just move a binary file out of an archive. Syllable also includes a 64-bit file system, the AtheOS File System.
Syllable's hardware support can be lacking, and installing Syllable can be an adventure for some, as the installer is text-based and can be confusing. However, out of all the operating systems in this list, this is the most ready to be used as a secondary OS.
Visopsys
Visopsys, the Visual Operating System, is an open source OS licensed under the GPL and LGPL that was started in 1997. However, if you're thinking of running Visopsys as a desktop OS, you might think again, as this is more of a hobby OS developed primarily by Andy McLaughlin. Visopsys offers fewer applications and much more restricted hardware support than the others in this list.
While Visopsys may not be the best desktop OS, it has one great use. Partition Logic, a free, open source partition manager like Symantec's Partition Magic, uses Visopsys, and in fact was created by the same person. Partition Logic works just as well as Partition Magic, and makes for a great, free alternative.
So there you have four alternative operating systems in development. While they may not have the best hardware support out there, and may not be the easiest to install and use, their ideas and designs set them apart. In a world where Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X have control of public mindset of the operating system, it is nice that other OSes can make strides and try different things.
Comments
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The whole point of the article was not to change what you are using now, but to say what else is out there besides Linux, Windows, and OSX.
What I said was, given some time, these OS's are becoming quite good and cool. It may not be the easiest thing to use right now, but they have a bright future.
What I said was, given some time, these OS's are becoming quite good and cool. It may not be the easiest thing to use right now, but they have a bright future.
It seems to me that many of these alternative OSs are attempts to "bring back" the Amiga's OS. Syllable clearly states this, and Haiku is based on BeOS which was the self-proclaimed successor to the Amiga.
In this vein I would like to mention AROS, the Amiga Research Operating System, available from <a href="http://www.aros.org/" title="aros.org">http://www.aros.org/</a aros.org> under the GPL. It aims at binary compatibility with AmigaOS3.1 on the m68k architecture, and on x86 it runs very quickly. At the moment it is not natively installable on x86, so I have had little experience with installing the few applications available. To run it on x86 there is a LiveCD which is mainly for demo purposes, and also a nested version which runs natively inside Linux.
Also on this topic, and since the mention of SkyOS shows that this is not a FLOSS only topic, there is obviously the official AmigaOS which is now (sort of) at version 4 and you can get info on it from <a href="http://os4.hyperion-entertainment.biz/" title="hyperion-e...inment.biz">http://os4.hyperion-entertainment.biz/</a hyperion-e...inment.biz> but note that it needs custom hardware to run (the availability of which is hit-and-miss)
Finally I couldn't mention AmigaOS without MorphOS or risk starting a flame war. MorphOS/Pegasos project was created before AmigaOS4/AmigaONE was available and (maybe accidentaly) created a split in the Amiga community. The split is between AmigaOS4 which promises more and has the "official Amiga" idea helping it, and the MorphOS which is similar, but has lower expectations and seems to meet them quite well. MorphOS (the most up-to-date site I can find on it is <a href="http://www.morphos-news.de/" title="morphos-news.de">http://www.morphos-news.de/</a morphos-news.de> ) requires custom hardware as well, but the Pegasos platform it runs on is in a relatively stable position (to me it seems the best supported PPC desktop system since Apple have left that market)
You may only be interested in AROS if you are an x86 user, but if you don't have any dependance on an x86 system (ie. you don't use Windows) then you may consider buying an alternative system as your next computer, considering that the AmigaONE (I think currently only available second hand) runs Debian quite well with a little patching, and the Pegasos is a respectable system with support for Linux, the BSDs, QNX, Haiku and others and is well worth a look (although their customer support may be a little lacking if Sabrina Online is anything to go by<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)
In this vein I would like to mention AROS, the Amiga Research Operating System, available from <a href="http://www.aros.org/" title="aros.org">http://www.aros.org/</a aros.org> under the GPL. It aims at binary compatibility with AmigaOS3.1 on the m68k architecture, and on x86 it runs very quickly. At the moment it is not natively installable on x86, so I have had little experience with installing the few applications available. To run it on x86 there is a LiveCD which is mainly for demo purposes, and also a nested version which runs natively inside Linux.
Also on this topic, and since the mention of SkyOS shows that this is not a FLOSS only topic, there is obviously the official AmigaOS which is now (sort of) at version 4 and you can get info on it from <a href="http://os4.hyperion-entertainment.biz/" title="hyperion-e...inment.biz">http://os4.hyperion-entertainment.biz/</a hyperion-e...inment.biz> but note that it needs custom hardware to run (the availability of which is hit-and-miss)
Finally I couldn't mention AmigaOS without MorphOS or risk starting a flame war. MorphOS/Pegasos project was created before AmigaOS4/AmigaONE was available and (maybe accidentaly) created a split in the Amiga community. The split is between AmigaOS4 which promises more and has the "official Amiga" idea helping it, and the MorphOS which is similar, but has lower expectations and seems to meet them quite well. MorphOS (the most up-to-date site I can find on it is <a href="http://www.morphos-news.de/" title="morphos-news.de">http://www.morphos-news.de/</a morphos-news.de> ) requires custom hardware as well, but the Pegasos platform it runs on is in a relatively stable position (to me it seems the best supported PPC desktop system since Apple have left that market)
You may only be interested in AROS if you are an x86 user, but if you don't have any dependance on an x86 system (ie. you don't use Windows) then you may consider buying an alternative system as your next computer, considering that the AmigaONE (I think currently only available second hand) runs Debian quite well with a little patching, and the Pegasos is a respectable system with support for Linux, the BSDs, QNX, Haiku and others and is well worth a look (although their customer support may be a little lacking if Sabrina Online is anything to go by<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)
I was going to put AROS in the article (It was in the email I sent to the editors when I sent in the idea), but I changed my mind. Mostly because, while there is a native boot, I have never really gotten it to work (only through Linux have I used it). When I can install it nativly, then I will check it out some more.
And I wish I could try MorphOS, or some of the other OS's out there that require the require some kind of hardware, but I don't want to pay those costs just to use an OS like that.
(and if you are wondering, yeah, I'm the guy that wrote the article, kinda hard to prove that on the Internet though, gotta have some trust, ha)
And I wish I could try MorphOS, or some of the other OS's out there that require the require some kind of hardware, but I don't want to pay those costs just to use an OS like that.
(and if you are wondering, yeah, I'm the guy that wrote the article, kinda hard to prove that on the Internet though, gotta have some trust, ha)
The BeOS was aimed at the MacOS not AmigaOSHaiku is based on BeOS which was the self-proclaimed successor to the Amiga.
Well, as a subscriber to Amiga Format I was constantly confronted with articles about the BeBox. In about 1995 Be Inc. definelty said something along the lines of "Now that Commodore is bust, Amiga users need to move to a new platform. The BeOS has the preemptive multitasking and multimedia performance that Amiga users expect, and it uses dual 66MHz PPC processors!" (bear in mind that the A4000 came with a single, CISC CPU clocked at 25MHz as standard). I would find one of the articles, but I wouldn't know where to start with a collection my size<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-) (By the way, I'm the guy who wrote the "A few more" comment)
ReactOS
<a href="http://www.reactos.org/xhtml/en/index.html" title="reactos.org">http://www.reactos.org/xhtml/en/index.html</a reactos.org>
I have never used it myself.
but it sounds like a cool idea
from the home page...
"ReactOS aims to achieve complete binary compatibility with both applications and device drivers meant for NT and XP operating systems, by using a similar architecture and providing a complete and equivalent public interface."
ie, Freedom Windows...:)
<a href="http://www.reactos.org/xhtml/en/index.html" title="reactos.org">http://www.reactos.org/xhtml/en/index.html</a reactos.org>
I have never used it myself.
but it sounds like a cool idea
from the home page...
"ReactOS aims to achieve complete binary compatibility with both applications and device drivers meant for NT and XP operating systems, by using a similar architecture and providing a complete and equivalent public interface."
ie, Freedom Windows...:)
It's a nice concept, though last time I took a crack at it I found it to be a lot easier to use Wine on Linux than to use ReactOS.
A unique approach based on the concept of using the four corners of the screen for menus for easy mouse access without misclicking.
<a href="http://www.symphonyos.com/" title="symphonyos.com">http://www.symphonyos.com/</a symphonyos.com>
<a href="http://www.symphonyos.com/" title="symphonyos.com">http://www.symphonyos.com/</a symphonyos.com>
That is actually a Linux distribution (based on Debian) while these previously mentioned ones are completely independant of Windows, Linux, MacOS or any BSD system, they are literally alternative OSs (don't take this the wrong way, SymphonyOS could be based on anything because it's simplicity takes away any need to understand/use the underlying system, but at the moment it is a Linux distro)
Ubuntu (maybe the whole of GNOME, I'm not sure) now puts the trash in the extreme lower right of the panel, the Applications menu at the extreme upper left, logout button top right and show desktop lower left. They have obviously been looking at Symphony, and I still prefer GNOME as Symphony's Mezzo desktop environment isn't mature enough for me yet (I installed it on my Ubuntu system but it was broken in parts, and the rest looked like crap [the button to reconfigure the appearence was broken as well]). The CD is easy to use, but doesn't offer me the power I have become used to. Each to his own, though<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)
Nice article, very enjoyable.
To add another "me too" post I would say take a look at MenuetOS at <a href="http://www.menuetos.net/" title="menuetos.net">http://www.menuetos.net/</a menuetos.net>. It's a fun little OS to play with.
Plan 9 (<a href="http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9/" title="bell-labs.com">http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9/</a bell-labs.com>) is interesting as well.
In addition to the Menuet you linked to, which is non-free and only works on 64 bit machines, there's a fork that's GPL and works on 32 bit machines, which might suit some people better. <a href="http://menuet.homelinux.net/Main_Page" title="homelinux.net">http://menuet.homelinux.net/Main_Page</a homelinux.net>.
I gave it a go a few months ago and found it ran like lightning but lacked some essential apps (eg. web browser) and was a bit prone to crashing. Fun though.
Given the speed of the thing I was thinking that a good standards-compliant web browser could turn this into a serious option for low end machines. If it coped with ajax then the brave new world of web applications we keep hearing about would open up.
Son of a gun. I hadn't noticed that MenuetOS went 64-bit only. The old 32-bit version was lightning fast and rock solid. Yes, it does lack some of what we now would term essential apps but if it did have an ajax capable browser...
I'll have to take a look at the GPL'ed version. Thanks for catching that.
I am very curious about Plan 9 and hope someday soon a steady user writes an article about it.
I ran it for a while back in '01 but haven't had the time or extra HW to play with it since then. It would be cool to see a semi-indepth review of it.
From the <a href="http://www.minix3.org/" title="minix3.org">minix homepage</a minix3.org>:
What Is MINIX 3?
MINIX 3 is a new open-source operating system designed to be highly reliable, flexible, and secure. It is based somewhat on previous versions of MINIX, but is fundamentally different in many key ways. MINIX 1 and 2 were intended as teaching tools; MINIX 3 adds the new goal of being usable as a serious system on resource-limited and embedded computers and for applications requiring high reliability
This new OS is extremely small, with the part that runs in kernel mode under 4000 lines of executable code. The parts that run in user mode are divided into small modules, well insulated from one another. For example, each device driver runs as a separate user-mode process so a bug in a driver (by far the biggest source of bugs in any operating system), cannot bring down the entire OS. In fact, most of the time when a driver crashes it is automatically replaced without requiring any user intervention, without requiring rebooting, and without affecting running programs. These features, the tiny amount of kernel code, and other aspects greatly enhance system reliability.
MINIX 3 is initially targeted at the following areas:
* Applications where very high reliability is required
* Single-chip, small-RAM, low-power, $100 laptops for Third-World children
* Embedded systems (e.g., cameras, DVD recorders, cell phones)
* Applications where the GPL is too restrictive (MINIX 3 uses a BSD-type license)
* Education (e.g., operating systems courses at universities)
What Is MINIX 3?
MINIX 3 is a new open-source operating system designed to be highly reliable, flexible, and secure. It is based somewhat on previous versions of MINIX, but is fundamentally different in many key ways. MINIX 1 and 2 were intended as teaching tools; MINIX 3 adds the new goal of being usable as a serious system on resource-limited and embedded computers and for applications requiring high reliability
This new OS is extremely small, with the part that runs in kernel mode under 4000 lines of executable code. The parts that run in user mode are divided into small modules, well insulated from one another. For example, each device driver runs as a separate user-mode process so a bug in a driver (by far the biggest source of bugs in any operating system), cannot bring down the entire OS. In fact, most of the time when a driver crashes it is automatically replaced without requiring any user intervention, without requiring rebooting, and without affecting running programs. These features, the tiny amount of kernel code, and other aspects greatly enhance system reliability.
MINIX 3 is initially targeted at the following areas:
* Applications where very high reliability is required
* Single-chip, small-RAM, low-power, $100 laptops for Third-World children
* Embedded systems (e.g., cameras, DVD recorders, cell phones)
* Applications where the GPL is too restrictive (MINIX 3 uses a BSD-type license)
* Education (e.g., operating systems courses at universities)
<a href="http://www.losethos.com/" title="losethos.com">http://www.losethos.com/</a losethos.com>
This is a new operating starting with a clean slate. It's radically different and if you're interested in fresh ideas check it out.
This is a new operating starting with a clean slate. It's radically different and if you're interested in fresh ideas check it out.
why bothering with those "toy-systems"? It is nice and it is about choice and so an, but you can tailor every Linux/BSD toward your wishes. So what? Because of "Ma I can do it too"? Okay it is their time, but do not lure beginners into those systems, they will "regret" it!
Hey dont forget about the venerable RiscOS, can be run using a VM (spacealien)
And why would I install one of these?
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on June 15, 2006 02:37 AMNot a real helpful article, sorry.
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