Making an Operating System

Post Reply New Topic

I'm making an operating system, here is the general idea

hybrid kernel (process manager, memory manager, and security manager are in kernel, no need for them to be user space process, but most drivers/servers are in user-space).
support for intel 64/x86_64 (I have a core i7, and I want to use the 64 bit features)
support for ia32 (not a primary goal though)
paging VM (required for the x86 64 chips)
file system supporting unix-like-features
my own bootloader/sector, not GRUB's
Multiprogramming and support for multiple cores
SSD RAID and hard disk drivers
support for devices with 64 megs of ram or more
some unix functions, and allow some unix-like functioning, however I figure I won't be able to get true POSIX-compliance for a while
Non-GUI for at least until 2.0
Kick arse name like "Cube" (Creators Unified Base Environment?)

Anyways, I was wondering what you all think, and what low level/higher level features you like in OS's. Andrew Tanenbaum said that he didn't like the idea of the PM/MM/SM being in kernel space, but I have slightly different goals than him (I would like this OS to be fairly efficient while not sacrificing security)

Last edited by MDM on 19 Aug 2010, 10:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Open source this, I'm learning assembly at the moment, it may make for interesting reading.

I plan on going open source after version 1 (I want to be able to tell future universities/colleges that version 1 was all me). According to my schedule (which is quite probably inaccurate) I should reach version 1 in a year.

Cool! Are you going to make a live version of you OS? How big will it be?

Not sure by what you mean as a 'Live' version. I doubt version 1.0's binary will be larger than a couple megs.

Spread the word

buy a mac.



just kidding

I actually will be deving on my iMac, although at least for a while I won't be doing on-hardware tests. Instead I will be using a vm for quite a while.

You have pretty good ideas. The truth is drivers are often the problem with the OS as they take up much of the code. Monolithic is pretty good as it allows more processing power if well written, but with the millions of lines of code it's hard to manage especially if your the only person currently working on the project.

I would suggest putting more processes in User Land for Stability not too much though. Then the system could really slow down.

Yeah, I plan on keeping most stuff that can either be provided by third parties, stuff that isn't used often, stuff that is slow, and stuff that is unstable in user-space. Things like process managers and memory managers that are used constantly are going to remain in system. I'm also tempted to put file-system in user-land, because of how often it is used. However since most of what it does is just wait on disk drivers, however it fits my criteria of a user space process. If I keep file system in user space though, I definitely need to have some form of server to check on it and make sure it hasn't crashed. Yet it seems a little optimistic to believe that I would have a reincarnation server by version 1.0.

What I mean by that is to be able to run the OS from a USB stick or CD without installing it. Most Linux distros come with that feature.

good luck to you man!

The only hurdle that may be there in a on-disk run would be the file system. In theory though, everything could quite possibly work fine on a CD/USB-stick. If it doesn't though, it won't be a high priority to make work (at least for a while.).

Thank you, Krzysz00.

Hope it's a success!

Thank you, Stonecold.

Just got some new equipment yesterday and will begin programming tonight.

What goal are you trying to fulfill by making an OS?