Here I present to you my thoughts on the 7th beta version of SkyOS, followed by an interview with Robert Szeleney, SkyOS’ creator and lead developer and a few screenshots.
Introduction
You could say that I am a fan of SkyOS. Not only the OS itself, but also the whole community around it, the relaxed no-pressure development model and the way the developers listen to the community. I have been active in the SkyOS community since the days of version 3; I can remember the discussions I and some others had with Kelly Rush (now SkyOS ‘Business Manager’, so you could guess who won the discussion) about the GUI. For some reason after the GUI-contest had begun, I dropped out of it all. I still followed SkyOS’ progress, but from the sideline; it wasn’t until January 2004 that I re-joined the SkyOS.org forums. And after that, it again took me months before I joined the beta-team.
Now, I am moderator on SkyOS.org, beta-tester, moderator on an independent SkyOS forum (the eXpert Zone) and rusted stuck in the community, together with other long-time community members. Why am I telling you all this not-so-very-interesting information? Well, because I want to make something clear.
You might think that because of all this, my judgment about SkyOS has lost its objectivity. Well, I can assure you for 100%: it hasn’t. I am no milder towards SkyOS than towards any other operating system. Simply because of one thing: I have the strong conviction that all operating systems suck. So whether it be Windows, Linux, BeOS or SkyOS, they all work on my nerves. That is why I can still be objective about SkyOS itself. My judgment about the community, on the other hand, is completely biased. I think we have the best community there is on the internet. We in the SkyOS community are all friendly, open-minded, quite lovable, and fluffy.
Anyway, some of you might think: why are you telling about how you are part of the community and all, while you could’ve also just ignored that and give us the overview/interview? Well, I wanted you all to know this, because else someone else would’ve said it in the comments section, drastically reducing my credibility, and therefore also reducing the credibility of this overview. This would (or could) hurt SkyOS. This may sound overdone to you, but remember that OSNews gets about 200.000 page views per day. By the way, did I mention we have a very friendly community?
Viewing It All Over
Much has changed since beta 6 was released. Multi-user support has been added, BASH has been ported (at the community’s request), a new widget design was implemented, and more.
Installing SkyOS is actually pretty easy. The install routine is not more complicated than any other, and if you have no problems installing Windows, or any desktop-oriented Linux distribution, you will have no problem installing SkyOS. During install it’s all basic stuff; language selection, keyboard layout, license, partitioning, and so on.
But the install isn’t all bliss. What’s mostly troublesome, at least for me, is the fact that USB is partially de-activated. Kind of annoying for someone who uses both a USB trackball ánd keyboard. But by actually disabling USB support (by booting into safemode), I could get my trackball to work. Not my keyboard though, that’s off limits, still. How is this possible? Well, the USB system is working perfectly, but the USB drivers are disabled. Therefore, SkyOS does recognize my equipment; it just doesn’t have the drivers to operate them. So by disabling USB support, SkyOS turns to my BIOS’ USB to ps/2 conversion in order to operate my trackball (thank you Robert, for the explanation).
This may seem annoying, and trust me, it is; but it’s not really a problem. As you will read in the interview after this preview, beta 9 will be the USB beta. Then, my trackball and keyboard are supposed to work out-of-the-box. We’ll see.
SkyOS, as of yet, does not install a bootloader. So in order to boot into my SkyOS install, I will have to use the CD. And that’s a problem. Not because I will have to boot off of CD (that’s actually great, I hate bootloaders, see here for details), but because there is no way to boot an already installled system in safe mode, from CD. So, every time I will have to start up the install program, enter my beta team name and serial, before I can choose the option ‘boot an already installed system’ from within the setup program. Now that’s annoying. There are guides as how to install the GRUB form the SkyOS CD onto your MBR, but I haven’t tried it yet. But, seeing other people already succeeded at doing so, I presume it works.
During boot-up I encountered another small improvement: the new boot screen. Not something that’ll get your panties in a twist, but still noticable. After that, the first encounter with multiuser: ‘Choose you username and login!’ Wow, that looks pretty sexy, since it was also my first encounter with the new widget set in high res (it was also featured in the install routine, but that was low-res). Of course some of you may say: ‘Who cares about the GUI!’. Well, I do, for instance (and this is my article, after all), and many others with me. We cannot all be as good and clean and pretty as PhotonUI, but still, SkyOS does a nice job. Hats off to the people who designed it. Marvellous, really. After the ‘Login succesful’ message, the desktop of course appears. Not much new to see, except for that icon that says ‘BASH’. With BASH being ported now, together with the improvements which made the system more POSIX-compatible, porting and using *nix applications should be easier. Seeing the huge amounts of software for *nix, this is great news.
After messing around with the OS for a while, it dawned on me that beta 7 was considerably faster and more responsive than the previous betas. After asking Robert about this on the forum, he replied that he was happy that everyone noticed the speed improvements; he had been working on system optimization. A lot more can be done, he added. To my knowledge, speed improvements are always good. And knowing that more is to come really pleases me. A UI cannot be responsive enough.
After Viewing It All Over
Using SkyOS is, well, boring. Why? Well, there isn’t much to do as of yet. Since I stopped playing games when I was like two years old, I only use my computers for email, surfing, university, music, playing with operating systems and of course writing articles for OSNews.com. And, to put it bluntly, I cannot do that as of yet with SkyOS. Since networking is disabled, I cannot connect to the internet. Again, in the interview there is more on this, the next beta will (finally!) be the networking beta. I can’t wait for that one, because, from then on, SkyOS will really be viable for me.
Beta 7 is, though, a huge improvement over beta 6. It’s faster, has more functionality, and looks prettier. The multiuser support is great for those of us who share their PC with others (I don’t, actually), and the matching security and rights management system is truly amazing; even someone who perfectly fits in the ‘But-I-thought-that-that-was-my-coffee-cup-holder’-anecdote can understand it.
The real problem with SkyOS is (still?) the lack of basic applications. Even though we’re already as far as the 7th beta, there’s still no email-client, no IM-client and no up-to-date browser. There is a lot of talk in the community, but (pardon my bluntness) no results. Robert is doing a wonderful job; when he says something will be implemented, it’s implemented before you can press the refresh button on your browser. That’s real nice, but we cannot expect Robert to do all the work. What SkyOS needs, is more developpers. Since beta 8 will feature a nicer development environment, I’m pretty confident it’ll all turn out to be okay after all. Another problem is the lack of drivers. Again, SkyOS needs external support; Robert cannot do all the work himself.
So, what is my overal judgement on SkyOS at this point? Well, system and kernelwise everything seems to be pretty mature, maybe even more mature than you thought. SkyOS is damn stable, the crashes you do encounter are mostly from applications, not from the OS itself.
So, SkyOS’ real weakness at this point is its lack of applications and drivers. This is no real shame, as skyOS is a new OS, and most people don’t even know about it. So, I think this lack is not really a problem that will be around for too long. When SkyOS gets more exposure, more people will be attracted to it.
On the other hand, we should not forget that SkyOS is still in beta phase, and therefore any predictions on how the final version will be are irrelevant. SkyOS has a very solid base, stable, mature, and comparable to other kernels. What really needs extra attention are the basic applications everyone needs in an OS. Once that’s achieved, I see no reason why SkyOS cannot gain a solid userbase. And if not, they still have us: the friendly and fluffy community.
Interview With Robert Szeleney, Lead Developer Of SkyOS
Thom: I’ll start with a question that has been on my mind for a while. What are your favorite operating systems (system-wise and/or GUI-wise), and why?
Robert: My favorite OS? Hmm, well, in general, I’m using Windows all the day at work and at home. I like how it is performing, and what you can do with it. I never really worked with Linux for more than a few hours, so I can’t really make a judgment about it either way. Nevertheless, everything I need to do can be done with Windows, so I would say, yes, Windows is my favorite OS. Aside from SkyOS, of course.
GUI-wise, I’m not sure. I’ve never tried MacOS X, although I have seen many pictures and videos of it. It looks really nice, but as long as haven’t tried it, I can’t really compare it.
Is SkyOS also inspired by these OS’s, and if yes, to what extent?
I’m sure that a few techniques from Windows made it into SkyOS; as I said above, I’m sitting in front of a Windows machine the entire day. From the BeOS side, I got really excited about their filesystem. As soon as I discovered the OpenBFS, I ported it over to SkyOS, making it the primary SkyOS filesystem.
As far as MacOS X is concerned, you always are inspired by their GUI. I can’t think of any benefits from Linux techniques that have made it into SkyOS, but as I said above, I almost have used it very little.
Another thing that popped into my mind (seeing you seem to, well, code like hell): were you ever contacted by a major software company, in the lines of Microsoft, Red Hat, IBM etc.?
Yes, I have been contacted in the past by a few companies, but I’d prefer not to name them.
Naturally. Currently, the much-awaited version 5.0 of SkyOS is in beta-phase. It seems that you decided on disabling certain aspects of the system per beta in order to better focus on the enabled parts. Could you explain this in more detail?
I think that the less system parts there are to test, the more intensive they are tested. Additionally, whenever there are critical bugs, it is much easier to fix them if there are not too many possible error “sources”. By disabling the networking, which will be enabled in beta 8, we (myself and the developers in the beta community) can fully concentrate on network stuff.
Furthermore, bug fixing is more efficient when errors are reported for similar system parts. For example, you don’t have to fix a driver one hour, the next some GUI issues, then the shell, etc. You can fully concentrate on networking. The same will be done for USB in beta 9.
Recently a new bug-reporting tool has been implemented into the SkyOS website. Is the SkyOS project already picking the fruits of this tool?
Definitely. I think in no beta version prior to beta 7 have there been so many bugfixes. More than 120 bugs have been fixed. Additionally, people make much more detailed bug reports when there is a bug reporting system, and I think that people are simply “more motivated” if they can report bugs in a nice database, instead of just sending an email or making a forum post.
SkyOS’ internet-browser, SkyKruzer, is based on the khtml-engine. Have you ever thought of using Mozilla’s gecko-engine instead? If so, why did you choose khtml?
I ported khtml because at the time, it was much easier to port than a full suite like Mozilla/Firefox. Many kernel features and GUI features were missing, so khtml was the only option to get a good rendering engine. However, SkyOS now has all the requirements to port really great browsers like Firefox and Opera. We really hope that these companies consider porting their software. We would be glad to make the first one to port their browser the “official” browser that is included with SkyOS.
Which other browser resembles SkyKruzer the most?
I really can’t think of one. It’s quite a simple browser; it doesn’t really resemble any one-other browser in particular.
Well, sounds like Net+ to me :). So far, there is no email-application available for SkyOS, but this does seem like a vital application to me. Is one on the to-do list? And, to double that question, what about an IM-client?
Both applications are on the to-do list and will be available for SkyOS 5.0.
Will there be means of updating SkyOS through the Internet, as in Windows Update?
Yes, absolutely. I’m not sure if this feature will make it into 5.0 final, but it is definitely something that will be included somewhere down the line.
What other native applications are on the to-do list?
Currently in progress are a Contact Manager, Paint application, and a few minor applications coded by the SkyOS community. We are also in talks with a few 3rd party developers to see if they would be interested in making their software available on SkyOS.
And now, I’d like to move on to some issues being brought up on forums on the net. Let’s start with the touchiest subject: the licensing-issue. You already made very, very clear to everyone that no
a lot of people are convinced that you’ve stolen code. Could you, once and for all, sum up the non-SkyOS-native programs/parts/modules/drivers/etc. that have been ported to SkyOS?
Well, I won’t get my hopes up about it being once and for all. At any rate, here is the list of every non-SkyOS native piece of code we use:
libraries: freetype, atk, expat, ffmpeg, fribidi, glade, glib, gtk, khtml, libart, libdvdcss, libungif, libiconv, libjpeg, libpng, sdl, libxml, mad, mesa, pango, pop, regex, termcap, zlib
apps: abiword, apache, bash, bin86, binutils, bochs, coreutils, d2x, dosfstools, dotgnu, dxf2gl, e2fsprogs, ftp, gcc, gdb, gimp, grub, hp, httpd, inetutils, less, links, lynx, make, mpg123, ott, perl, quake, quake2, samba, telnetd, vlc, wabavm, xine, zsnes.
kernel modules: SkyFS port of OpenBFS.
All of these are either GPL, LGPL, BSD, or MIT licensed.
I hope this finally settles the issue, but I agree with you, it probably won’t. You already revealed that there will be some-sort of Live-CD available, for free, so that people can test SkyOS before buying it. Also, this live-CD will be limited in one way or another. Have you decided yet on what features will be removed/disabled/limited etc.?
Obviously you will not be able to install SkyOS to a hard drive with the LiveCD. The LiveCD will also be limited in what applications are offered. Some of the larger applications will be missing (such as Quake I/II, possibly the GTK apps, etc.). This is more to save people the time of downloading, as these apps make up about 2/3rds of the space on the SkyOS download.
The point of the LiveCD is to give people a taste of what SkyOS is; what the environment is like, what it is capable of. It’s just a sampling, something to let people decide if SkyOS is something that they would like to pursue further.
How are you planning to distribute SkyOS v5.0 final? Kelly (SkyOS’ Business Manager) revealed in the SkyOS forum that “we intend to make SkyOS available to businesses who would like to offer it as the default operating system on their computers.”
Source.
Could you be a bit more specific?
We are investigating a number of options. We do want to make SkyOS available to smaller businesses at a substantially discounted price. Any licensed businesses that would be interested in this are welcome to contact us ([email protected]) to find out more.
As far as end-users are concerned, sales will initially be conducted via our website (which will see a major overhaul in the coming months). Sales will be similar to what we have set up now, with the notable exception that we are going to do our best to allow users to purchase with credit cards as well.
If you have been following the SkyOS forums or polls, you will have noticed that we are trying to gauge the interest from our users in purchasing computers with SkyOS pre-installed on them. These computers would be around $600 (specs available here), and sales would be handled via the website. We are still undecided if we will be pursuing this option. It depends if there is enough interest to warrant the amount of work this would bring.
In the future we of course would like to see SkyOS on retail shelves, and will be pursuing this option as soon as it becomes viable. We also would like to see some of the major computer manufacturers offer SkyOS as an option, but that of course is looking into the future quite a bit.
And now, the inevitable question: When will SkyOS v5.0 Final be released? I know you cannot give an exact date, but maybe you could say something like ‘this summer’ or ‘this fall’…
Like always, we do not want to tie ourselves down to a date of release. We have been having some really great success with our beta testers, so we would like to work with them to make things as flawless as possible. So we can’t really give a date, but we certainly are closer to the finish line than we are to the starting line.
Well, at least I tried.Now, do you have ány idea on where SkyOS will be going after v5.0?
It’s still a bit early to be thinking about that. We really hope to have hardware 3D support for nVidia and Ati cards, but this will depend largely on them. We have contacted both companies to attempt to get this support for 5.0, but they were not willing to work with us.
Lots of other things. More drivers, more applications, wireless support… All of these things will become more apparent as time goes on.
The following questions have nothing to do with SkyOS, I just wanted to ask them out of curiosity.
What’s your view on the current state of the OS market? Will we ever see a serious decline in Microsoft’s dominance? Which OS poses the greatest threat to Microsoft?
I think the only way to play in a league like Microsoft plays in is to have a very easy to use, very user friendly desktop operating system, which allows the user to run almost any possible software and gives good support to them by the company behind the operating system. I don’t think that currently there is an operating system which has these criteria.
However, no company has ever been able to maintain complete dominance forever, so looking at historical precedence, one should assume that the market will begin to open up more. I don’t think anyone really poses a threat to Microsoft. Microsoft will always be around, sort of like IBM. A better question might be ‘Which OS do you think can find marketable success on the desktop?’ I don’t know the answer. Linux? SkyOS? There could easily be a number of successful desktop operating systems. Just because one finds success does not mean others cannot.
We have already seen quite a few builds of Longhorn, Microsoft’s next-generation OS. What do you think, thus far, of Longhorn?
I’m not really following the development of Longhorn in any great detail. From what I have seen and heard, it could bring a few nice features to developers and users. It mostly depends on how well they are integrated. But I think it’s too early to give a judgment on this yet.
The only ‘problem’ (at least for the other operating systems out there) I see is that Microsoft will get yet another head start in the field of developing if their new features are taken up positively by developers.
How do you feel about Apple’s recent ‘focus shift’ (it might be a small one, but it’s a shift all right) from the Macintosh/Mac OS X to the iPod/iTunes?
Apple has certainly found a lot of success with the iPod. I think that it would be bad business for them not to think seriously about what options are available to them with it.
I don’t think we will see Apple move out of the computer business though. There are just too many people that see the Mac almost as a religion. And all the more power to Apple for being able to derive for themselves such a dedicated user base.
Another interesting project I’d like to know your view on: Sun Microsystems’ ‘Project Looking Glass.’ What do you think of it?
It’s definitely an interesting project. I don’t know the usefulness of it in the real world, but kudos to them for trying something new. It’s better to try it and find out it doesn’t work than to never try it at all.
Well, this is the end of this interview, of course I would like to thank Robert for answering these questions. This interview/article was just to give you an idea where SkyOS’ development stands as of now. Just remember that you can ask any question (especially more technical questions) either on the SkyOS.org forum, or on the SkyOS irc channel (irc.freenode.com, #skyos).
Note: All screenshots were taken by Alex Forester.
About the author:
Thom Holwerda is a regular visitor on OSNews.com and has contributed more than once. His first computer experience dates back to 1991 (a 286 entered the household). Over the years he has played around with several computers, but it wasn’t until 2001 that he really started to experiment OS-wise with computers. His favorite operating systems are Windows Server 2003, Mandrake Linux and BeOS. He also has an affinity for the QNX Neutrino RTOS. He is also contributing to the SkyOS project, being responsible for the Dutch translation, moderating the SkyOS.org forum and the eXpert Zone (independent SkyOS forum). He will also be helping OSNews.com when it comes to moderation.
If you would like to see your thoughts or experiences with technology published, please consider writing an article for OSNews.
Excellent review and also a nice interview. Although I like Syllable more, SkyOS is getting really usable as it seems.
>Will there be means of updating SkyOS through the Internet, >as in Windows Update?
>Yes, absolutely. I’m not sure if this feature will make it >into 5.0 final, but it is definitely something that will be >included somewhere down the line.
Given the last piece of news on the Skyos website(18/07/2004)
http://www2.skyos.org/
this nice feature has just been added…
^_^
Lakedemon
Robert seems to be a very good programmer, and from the interview he showed to be a reasonable, level-minded guy, which is great (it’s easy for someone so skilled to start having illusions of grandiosity too soon)
It is _great_ to have more and more options out there.
I am looking forward to boot their LiveCD. I gotta confess that I don’t like much the looks of it (especially that variable-width taskbar) but hey, I remember how Linux used to look a few years ago and how it looks now, so that’s a minor detail.
Good luck Robert et al, and congratulations for the nice interview, Thom.
For someone claiming to be objective, you’re a tad too bubbly about the whole thing, and are quick to deflect any shortcomings off of SkyOS and the developer, Robert (see: driver support, USB, networking, etc).
Next time, write a “final draft” and cull out all the weird, “its bad, but its really not SkyOS’ fault….” Gives you a bit more cred, bruh’.
I’m only pointing it out cuz its kinda ironic, the way you startled the whole article, my man. And irony is my thing, because, you know, I didn’t get breakfast this morning, so no iron in my lungs, y’know?
I was surprised to see that Robert has tried so few operating systems, especially those ones SkyOS is often compared to.
Another interesting question would have been:
“In two or three years of time, when we can expect SkyOS 5 and Haiku R1, what will SkyOS have to offer that Haiku doesn’t have, especially in media aspects?”
And please guys, don’t perceive the statement above as a flame or a means to make SkyOS look bad, it’s just a question which seems really interesting to me.
years of time
seems i’m a little tired…
>Another interesting question would have been:
>”In two or three years of time, when we can expect SkyOS 5 >and Haiku R1, what will SkyOS have to offer that Haiku >doesn’t have, especially in media aspects?”
Well….
if you consider how fast Robert is implementing features…
you might indeed be in for a bit of a surprise in 3 years….
Nice article. I can’t wait to get my hands on 5.0 final. Robert has been the most incredible developer I’ve ever had the pleasure of speaking too. Hands down.
skyos 4.0 had USB and networking but for all the betas so far these components / frameworks have been disabled so that the core can be updated first.
good interview, im suprised Robert hasnt used too many oses, i was more suprised that he hasnt used Linux alot, considering alot of the ported apps are from *nix systems.
…that’s real nice, but we cannot expect Robert to do all the work. What SkyOS needs, is more developpers.
I guess there is a windows sdk or something, but do developers get free betas, and a final if they contribute something? So does Robert expect people to buy a SkyOS beta, develop for it, and then give their application away for free?
No. Exceptions have been made for dev’s, somem free versions have been distributed to them.
…because they were criticizing Thom Holverda’s english grammar/spelling.
Please do remember that the people posting articles here aren’t necessarily english native speaker. So, they sometimes spell wrongly or make up funny sentences.
BTW, Thom is dutch…And…I’m french…
^_^;
you can sell ur applications if u like, if its what you want to do, in the end u decide if its GPL, BSD, MIT, commercial, etc
Is there a live iso available for download for free? I realize that the actual OS costs money, but I’m certainly not going to buy something that I can’t try for free first. I’ve been poking around the website and it looks like there may be one available, but I can’t find it.
Is there a live iso available for download for free? I realize that the actual OS costs money, but I’m certainly not going to buy something that I can’t try for free first. I’ve been poking around the website and it looks like there may be one available, but I can’t find it.
Yeah there will. Did you miss that in the article? A whole paragraph was dedicated to that subject.
SkyOs 5.0 hasnt reached Final yet a Live ISO will be available once skyOS 5.0 final is released
SkyOS was free untill Version 4.9 (you can still freely download those versions, there are still direct links on for them on some websites….Besides, I saw a few of them posted in the SkyOS forum).
When SkyOS 5 will be released, it won’t be free BUT there shall be a free live cd.
In other words, The live iso isn’t available yet because you have to wait for SkyOS V5 release to get it.
how you’ve worded that is slightly wrong you’ve said it as if the ISO isnt free, the LiveCD ISO is free the full Os isnt
SkyOS is looking very good. I do wish Robert would fix the drop shadow irregularity at the top-right hand corner of every window though.
i enjoyed reading the article, and we at the SkyOS forums had been waiting for it for quite some time now…glad to see it went live. I was surprised that Robert hadn’t tried other OSen as well, but i guess it’s better that way, as he can create features on his own, without worrying about what others are doing. I successfully ran SkyOS in QEMU (can’t install to HD for some reason) and I was very happy with the speed and performance, even though I was running an emulated OS. Very nice…I could only imagine the speed when it runs native. I think once the next two betas come out (networking and usb), then SkyOS will really be something I (and others) can really start playing with. As Thom mentioned, networking is a huge part of an OS nowadays, and it will help bring SkyOS to the forefront. I don’t doubt Robert or his OS’ capabilities and potential for the future.
SkyOS is looking very good. I do wish Robert would fix the drop shadow irregularity at the top-right hand corner of every window though.
Already done
Expect a whole upgrade on the shadows, I got a secret mockup in my inbox that no one has seen yet 
hey, folks!
not a really technical or at least very SkyOS specific question here:
i l o v e the wallpaper from the second screenshot on the second page! the one with the grass, the dew and this awesome green…has anybody any idea where to get this in decent resolution?
thx. in advance!
hagbard
I guess there is a windows sdk or something, but do developers get free betas, and a final if they contribute something? So does Robert expect people to buy a SkyOS beta, develop for it, and then give their application away for free?
We do give serious developers access to the SkyOS betas. We are careful with who we give access to because if we let any “developer” have access to the betas, then every single person would suddenly become a “developer”, and that wouldn’t be fair to our paying beta testers.
But yes, if someone is truly interested in creating software for SkyOS, we will give them access to the betas usually.
As far as what developers do after their software is created, that is entirely up to them. We would be glad to include their software with the default install of SkyOS, but if they would prefer to make their software available for download somewhere else, or even make their software available commercially, that is just fine as well. We’re just glad to have more applications available for SkyOS, no matter what the distribution model.
If i’m not mistaken, this is a redhat wallpaper (or looks very similar to one of them). i think all of those wallpapers are in the desktop-backgrounds-extras rpm (or something like that).
I really do admire your work and think you are doing a very good job. The harder parts like networking, multi-user, security, daemons, drivers etc are yet to come but i think you will do fine.
I also do think that as long as SkyOS is not Free or can do something other OS’s can not, it will not stand a chance on the desktop regarding Windows, Linux or MacOSX. There is really no need to go buy yet another OS that can do less than the above. Please open it!
i have to agree with bas, that you’ll have rough times if you want to sell your OS and don’t have functions other OS’ do. What i’d recommand to you is getting devs with porting mono/dotGNU for instance…i don’t like M$ but if they have the developers mono/dotGNU are good ways to show them new land…
what will be much harder is like you said getting the hardware-makers to give specs…there’s always opensource but you’d be required to open your source if you’d use that (GPL)
anyway, good luck with the project
The desktops are from iStockphoto (the poor mans stock photo site) from some other design work I’ve done..
dew: http://www.istockphoto.com/file_closeup.php?id=000000125595
hall: http://www.istockphoto.com/file_closeup.php?id=000000162024
i have to agree with bas, that you’ll have rough times if you want to sell your OS and don’t have functions other OS’ do. What i’d recommand to you is getting devs with porting mono/dotGNU for instance…i don’t like M$ but if they have the developers mono/dotGNU are good ways to show them new land…
what will be much harder is like you said getting the hardware-makers to give specs…there’s always opensource but you’d be required to open your source if you’d use that (GPL)
anyway, good luck with the project
Port OGRE! http://www.ogre3d.org.
Why? All he has to do is port the Mono’s Tao media library and he can run http://axiomengine.sf.net automagically.
Much less work!
In the interview, Robert writes:
“We really hope to have hardware 3D support for nVidia and Ati cards … We have contacted both companies to attempt to get this support for 5.0, but they were not willing to work with us.”
Robert’s an astoundingly talented coder and SkyOS is looking better and better with each beta, so I don’t mean to cause offence at all, but all this hope seems very naive. I mean, I would be surprised if anyone at nVidia and ATI even spent longer than five seconds reading the email.
Let’s get things in perspective: how many full-time SkyOS users are there? How many people rely on it day-to-day as their primary OS? Considering it’s in a massive state of flux and some major subsystems such as networking are disabled at present, it’s extremely unlikely to be more than 50. Perhaps not even 10. There’s just no way whatsoever that large companies will be willing to develop drivers.
I mean, look at Linux. It has around 30 million users (IBM estimates) and ATI and nVidia still don’t fully support it; it’s mainly good-will towards the community. Why anyone would expect the big multi-million-dollar GFX chip vendors to pay attention to an unknown, hobbyist less-than-100 user OS is beyond me. Similarly:
“[i]We do want to make SkyOS available to smaller businesses at a substantially discounted price.[i]”
This really is wishful thinking too, at least in the next three or four so years. SkyOS is very new (OK, it’s been in development for a while but a lot has been rewritten in 5.0), it has absolutely no mainstream coverage, has hardly any apps and no mature QA and support options. Why would small businesses use it over fully-supported OSes like Linux or Windows?
Don’t get me wrong, I think SkyOS is an amazing hobbyist OS with a great deal of potential. But when you’ve got merely a handful of active users and no wide publicity whatsoever, expecting big companies to port drivers and businesses to switch over is just… well, worryingly optimistic at best. It just ain’t gonna happen.
As said, Linux has 30 million users and still has problems with drivers and the market’s momentum. (SkyOS may be slightly easier to use, but Linux has wider hardware and app support, which are far more important to most people.) If 30 million users still have trouble with the market, an OS with less than 100 full-time users isn’t even going to register on the graph. It’s, what, 0.00000000000000001% of the computer market.
I really hope SkyOS succeeds, and if 5.0 works well I’ll probably buy it (I’d love a fast, stable and light OS on my laptop). But I’m just trying to be realistic — the tiny community is going to be very disappointed when, this time next year, there are only a few thousand users at best. Everyone on the forums seems to believe that SkyOS will become massive so quickly, but it takes time. Just look at the computer market, both hardware, OSes and apps, and you’ll see what I mean — it’ll take 5 to 10 years before SkyOS could even start to be a significant player in the market.
Whoops, sorry — forgot to close that italics tag. Shame there’s no way to edit posts…
Every argument you presented against SkyOS could have been said about Linux 5 years ago.
We’re aware of the challenges that lay ahead. We are simply trying to move things along one step at a time. So nVidia and ATI didn’t support us. Oh well. Yes, it is very disappointing that they control 95% of the market and make no way for new OS developers to support their hardware. That said, it is the reality of the situation, and we will deal with it until such time that it is not the case anymore.
>Every argument you presented against SkyOS could have been
>said about Linux 5 years ago.
No Linux had a much higher userbase in 1999, Corel made already software like CorelDraW! PhotoPaint etc for it, 3D labs already had ported their drivers so did Diamond for their FireGL cards. There was a LOT of 3rd party software and hardware drivers for Linux back in 1999. Hence Titanic was renderd on Linux back in 1997. You cannot compare it in any way….sorry.
But you gotta give’em credit – for a closed source operating system trying to break in where the the Big Three pretty much have the entire landscape to themselves, they’re aiming pretty high. You gotta have some kind of drive or goal if you’re gonna compete, no matter how successfully – why not aim for the biggest goal available?
I’ll admit that there is very little wiggle run for something that is closed source *and* that costs money, but, you know, in a couple (5, 7) years they might make enough inroads to have about 1% or 2% of the market. That sounds like little to you and me, but if it really is a one-man show I’m sure that’s more than enough money coming in to set him up for a long, long time in the future.
It is like indie game developers: they don’t get all the fame or glory of the bigg’uns, but they make enough money to make an, uh, “comfortable” living, while doing what they love. Just because they can’t conquer much of the market doesn’t mean it isn’t fun and! profitable.
but in 1999, linux hadn’t begun to appeal to the desktop user yet, it was still very much a “geek” Os i admit i use linux, Windows, SkyOS, MenuetOS, but in 1999 in my opinion Linux was still a “geek” Os and was still aimed soley at the network admin / geek user. where as skyos si going for the desktop rather than server market
“Every argument you presented against SkyOS could have been said about Linux 5 years ago.”
Er, well… no they couldn’t. Not in the slightest, and not sure where you’re getting your history from Kelly! Five years ago Linux had several million users, rather than 50 or so. It had the backing of various multi-million-dollar companies. It had dedicated newsstand magazines. It had thousands of applications, both commercial and open source. It had support contracts available from those companies mentioned.
SkyOS doesn’t have any of those at present, and is nowhere near to getting any of them. Linux in 1999 was orders of magnitude bigger than SkyOS is now; in reality, SkyOS is closer to Linux in 1993.
“Yes, it is very disappointing that they control 95% of the market and make no way for new OS developers to support their hardware.”
But why should they? SkyOS is set to be a great little hobbyist OS, but why would multi-million-dollar global companies even consider an OS with 0.000000000001% of the market? It’s like saying they should also support MenuetOS, Haiku, Syllable, Visopsys, NewOS et al.
Hey, full 3D card support would be great to have, but these companies exist to make money. They have infinitely bigger fish to fry. Perhaps if SkyOS had 5 million users it’d be worth discussing, but expecting ATI and nVidia to devote time to an OS that’s far less-used than MS-DOS, RISC OS or even Atari GEM is pointless!
>but, you know, in a couple (5, 7) years they might make
>enough inroads to have about 1% or 2% of the market. That
>sounds like little to you and me
That is about the same as Apple or Linux has at this moment, i think you overshoot yourself by these numbers…
>Just because they can’t conquer much of the market doesn’t
>mean it isn’t fun and! profitable.
Nobody said anything about fun but i doubt about the profits seeing the speed in wich SkyOS is evolving and the fact Robert is alomst the only developer i guess he has not other work or income. Does he??
“…for a closed source operating system trying to break in where the the Big Three pretty much have the entire landscape to themselves…”
Big three? Lets not kid ourselves, there is only one OS that is big. You say:
“…they might make enough inroads to have about 1% or 2% of the market…”
But that is exactly the level of success that Linux has reached in 10 years, and Mac has currently fallen to.
Sorry to call you out individually, but I don’t like it when people pretend that there are three major players in the desktop world right now. Mac has had a lot of success for media developers, Linux has found a place on the servers, but as far as the desktop goes, there is only one contender right now.
>No Linux had a much higher userbase in 1999, Corel made >already software like CorelDraW! PhotoPaint etc for it, 3D >labs already had ported their drivers so did Diamond for >their FireGL cards. There was a LOT of 3rd party software >and hardware drivers for Linux back in 1999. Hence Titanic >was renderd on Linux back in 1997. You cannot compare it in >any way….sorry.
True. Yet Linux started (well nearly…) from scratch too.
So I guess that we could find a year where the state of Linux was the same as the state of today’s SkyOS.
Yet…I switched briefly to Linux in 1999 (Suse 6.2)… used it for some months and work…then switched back to windows…
Though articles about “forsake windows and switch to linux” are plenty in the news lately, I don’t see a lot of joe-user doing so….
Besides, Linux has been around for quite a time now but most Game developpers still don’t support the Linux platform, don’t they ?
My point is :
don’t be so quick to forsake SkyO’s hope to become one day a successfull commercial OS as Linux is STILL struggling to get a significant market share in the desktop’s niche.
Let’s remember too that the Open source applications have greatly improved these last years and they can be ported to SkyOS. 5 years ago, Linux didn’t have applications that good.
The problem is that the desktop market is much harder to get than the server market. For the desktop you have to support every shitty little piece of hardware gadget, make everything foolproof for computer illiterate users, and sign some deals with computer distributors.
I wish the SkyOS team the best of luck, but they should really be realistic and realize that they will not be a major, or even minor player in any reasonable amount of time. Yes it seems that a lot of progress has been made, and it has, but getting a basic OS going is not really the hard part.
Even Linux, with thousands of times more developer resources is not yet ready for the desktop for most people. And that’s after years and years of work by all those thousands of developers.
Linux grew so fast because everyone could get a copy for free and muck around with it. If Linus would have charged money and kept the source for himself and a couple core developers, Linux would probably be about as popular as Minix right now.
It’s easy to think that “hey, SkyOS looks really nice, better than linux even, it must be pretty close to ready”, when in fact it is nowhere near.
The most important point however, is that new OS’s MUST have interesting new features. A clean design is NOT a feature, the only reason it is clean and manageable now is because it is small. Maybe I’m missing something but I don’t really see anything particularly revolutionary about SkyOS that would make anyone want to switch, even a hobbyist.
>but I don’t like it when people pretend that there are three
>major players in the desktop world right now.
I think its like:
Windows: 90%
Linux: 5%
Mac: 4%
others: 1% (bsd/amiga/sun/qnx)
So the biggest three of this moment are: Windows , Linux and Mac. I think he was trying to point that out.
“That is about the same as Apple or Linux has at this moment, i think you overshoot yourself by these numbers…”
Whoa, I don’t think so. ;p You need to brush up a bit: last I checked, Windows only had about 90-93% of the market (some fancy smacy-ass fortune 500 report geared at the guys with pointy hair), which leaves anywhere from 10 to 8 percent for everyone else. Its not inconvicable that hobbyist software that attain at least ~1% of that to call its own – computer users grow, and there will never be a set rate of computer users until people stop reproducing. All he needs to do is land some prebundled gig somewhere off in a third-world country that wants an easy-to-use operating system and, bang, he’s there. Not very big, but still.
“Sorry to call you out individually, but I don’t like it when people pretend that there are three major players in the desktop world right now.”
Wah? I dun’ get your argument – how does Windows being the biggest of them have anything to do with their relevance as being the three biggest platforms available? They are the big three precisely because of their relation, not to one another, but to other operating systems. It doesn’t have to be a 33/33/33 share for them to be considered the biggest competitors out there. ;p Proporationality within the the big three doesn’t have anything to do with it.
“Maybe I’m missing something but I don’t really see anything particularly revolutionary about SkyOS that would make anyone want to switch, even a hobbyist.”
You’re probably right there. Switch? Probably not, but dual boot.. I’ll tell you why I’m looking forward to it. Somebody mentioned security..what could be more secure than this? No cracker is going to bother to learn how to break into it unless it gets big. No worm writer/malware designer will take the time to design something just for SkyOS. Even with the *Nixes you have root exploits and such, but not with this. At least for awhile, you can surf the Net with total piece of mind.
>Let’s remember too that the Open source applications have
>greatly improved these last years and they can be ported to
>SkyOS. 5 years ago, Linux didn’t have applications that good.
That is the point i always make torwards SkyOS, if you believe SkyOS has to be closed etc. Why use other peoples software that was created with free and open in mind? besides that why use SkyOS to run OOS if you can run it on Mac, Linux or Windows? What is extra value?
>Besides, Linux has been around for quite a time now but
>most Game developpers still don’t support the Linux
>platform, don’t they ?
Oh? I play Unrreal 2004 / RTCW / Americas Army / NWN / Tribes and the Simms nativly on Linux. Lots of game servers run on Linux too. Linux has the attention of the gaming industry trust me on that.
Mmmm, I agree with Kelly.
The desktop market is owned by Windows, no matter how you twist and turn it. Linux and Mac might be the number 2 and 3, but if they (together) only acount for 5% or so, then they are insignificant, “irrelevant” (Star Trek fan here
), so to speak.
On the desktop, you compete with Windows. Period.
>but if they (together) only acount for 5% or so, then they
>are insignificant, “irrelevant” (Star Trek fan here
), so
> to speak.
So your are doing the same as ATI and Nvidia, ignore.
That really helps. Why, if you ignore that fact that 5% is a lot of users, do you think ATI or Nvidia is going to make drivers for an OS that has not even got 0,0000000000000001% ?
“My point is: don’t be so quick to forsake SkyO’s hope to become one day a successfull commercial OS as Linux is STILL struggling to get a significant market share in the desktop’s niche.”
That is true, but it also strengthens the argument. Linux is fairly well-known, has around 30 million users, several newsstand magazines, large companies supporting it, wide hardware support and thousands of commercial and open source apps. And like you say, it’s still struggling to get a comfortable desktop market share.
So SkyOS, which doesn’t have any of the above (millions of users, big companies, magazines, proper support) is going to have an even harder time. A user-friendly and slick GUI is only going to have a negligible effect.
I think Leo made a really good point:
“It’s easy to think that “hey, SkyOS looks really nice, better than linux even, it must be pretty close to ready”, when in fact it is nowhere near.”
That seems to be what’s generating the hype on here and the SkyOS forums. Many of the regulars haven’t even used it! They assume because it looks so smooth (WindUI is great) that it must be as mature and versatile as Windows and Linux.
Again, I’m not knocking SkyOS at all — it’s making superb progress and I could well end up buying 5.0. But if we’re not realistic we’re only going to disappoint ourselves and others. SkyOS is a cool little hobbyist OS, but it’s going to take 5-10 years before it becomes even a minor player in the OS arena. History has shown that.
Uhm, I never said I’m expecting any Ati/nVidia drivers soon, did I? Please point to where I said that.
The point is: people think Linux and Mac are serious players in the desktop market. Wake up: they aren’t.
Yes, a lot of the good Linux apps could be ported to SkyOS, perhaps even with very little trouble, but why?
Even if I can run Mozilla, OpenOffice, KMail, <insert favourite application here> on SkyOS, what benefit would this give me? I already run them on Linux or Windows without the bugs introduced by porting.
Looking at the feature list on the skyos website, it looks very good, but nothing revolutionary or even anything that is lacking in some form or another on Linux or Windows. If SkyOS was released now with 100% support for all major applications and drivers, it would make waves. Unfortunately, in 5 years, features like OpenGL rendering of windows, 64 bit file systems with queries, and fancy GUI effects, will be old hat.
Although I probably sound like an asshole saying this, I’m really not trying to put down your work, but realistically, it will not be more than a hobby OS.
For those who haven’t looked at SkyOS web site, I just checked it out yesterday, new shadow effect has been implemented. Looks much more realistic then before.
http://66.90.81.8/skyos.org/images/shadow.png
It’s going to be even better, judging by the screenshot I got from one of SkyOS’ graphis desginers
Thom Holwerda, isn’t the SkyOS Software Store equivilent to Windows Update?
The make software installation easier for users, the SkyOS Software Store has been implemented and will be available with SkyOS 5.0-beta8.
Using the SkyOS software store you can download software for SkyOS and keep the system up-to-date very easily and fast. All available software and updates for SkyOS can be downloaded with the SkyOS software store. As soon as you start the SkyOS software store, the application connects to the software repository and looks for new and updated software. With just a few mouse clicks the selected software will be downloaded and installed on your system.
The interview was conducted a few weeks ago, therefore that hasn’t been taken into account. Also, remember that there’s a delay of +/- a week between article submission and going live.
It’s going to be even better, judging by the screenshot I got from one of SkyOS’ graphis desginers
Looking forward to it
“The point is: people think Linux and Mac are serious players in the desktop market. Wake up: they aren’t.”
Wake up? You’re making the age-old mistake of confusing market-share percentage with volume. This is basic economics; think about it. Say there are 500 million computers in the world (I don’t know the exact figure), and Apple has 3% market share.
That’s 15 million Apple computers, so if you’re interested in writing software and you consider MacOS as a target platform, you’ve got millions of potential buyers. That makes it a serious player. Or Thom, are you going to tell Adobe and co. to “wake up” when they’re making lots of money selling MacOS software?
If Microsoft was utterly dominant in a world of only 500 computers, you’d perhaps have a point. But that’s not the case. You can still be a major player even with a tiny percentage when the volumes are gigantic.
(BTW, the figures above probably aren’t accurate, but you get the idea.)
>Uhm, I never said I’m expecting any Ati/nVidia drivers soon,
>did I? Please point to where I said that.
I was trying to point that if you as a user / beta-tester and translator, of an alternative OS that is trying to get a userbase is naming other Os’s that have 5% of market share “irrelevant”, do not many good for your own community because in a sense you are saying its logic of ATI and Nvidia to ignore SkyOS. This is not want you want and is completly the oposite of what SkyOS needs.
The interview was conducted a few weeks ago, therefore that hasn’t been taken into account. Also, remember that there’s a delay of +/- a week between article submission and going live.
I wasn’t aware of that. Thanks! I am looking forward to the final version.
The point is: people think Linux and Mac are serious players in the desktop market. Wake up: they aren’t.
You’re absolutely right. Linux (and the Mac to a lesser extent), is not a major player in the desktop market, in fact its barely a minor player.
However, it is a viable competitor in that there is a significant minority of computer users that believe Linux or Mac are as good or better than Windows.
And anyway, what does the standing of Linux and Mac have to do with SkyOS?
skyos definitely looks like its shaping up, im definitly going to keep track of its progress after reading this review
“SkyOS is damn stable, the crashes you do encounter are mostly from applications”.
Why let applications crash the whole os?
more choices are always good. you should be able to pick an operating system that feels right for you, instead of being forced to pick one. and SkyOS sure is purty!
good luck on 0.5 final
I don’t a shift from apple. I see them focusing on what they have always focused on making money. They have released a early build of developers so I don’t see a shift from the mac/MacOSX to ipod/itunes
So it won’t be a free OS?
Well too bad … I won’t consider to buy it just because the screenshots look great.
Oh, and btw will it work with nforce2 mobo?nvnet?nvaudio?Geforce4?
It’s obvious without many very big parts of Open Source SkyOS would never of got where it is (khtml, abiword, gimp, bash, gcc – and more).
SkyOS is obviously wanting and needing more opensource – I’m sure the IM will be at least some of GAIM or similar, and to be honest I wouldn’t be suprised if someone ported GTK right across.
All I’m saying is surely that if you profit out of open source, you should give some back?
To add to that I can’t see a reason why SkyOS couldn’t be opensourced, and then charge people for a ‘support contract’ or ‘software install’. This would get many more users and therefore hopefully bring more revenue in.
>But yes, if someone is truly interested in creating software for SkyOS, we will give them access to the betas usually.
Ah, really ?
Sometime ago I asked for information (and only information: I did not ask to access Beta stuff,…) about development on SkyOS through mail and I received no answer *at all*.
>To add to that I can’t see a reason why SkyOS couldn’t be opensourced, and then charge people for a ‘support contract’ or ‘software install’. This would get many more users and therefore hopefully bring more revenue in.
The source is being kept close to keep control of it, prevent forking etc. It might limit the user base to people that are prepared to pay for it but it greately improves compatability issues if you have a single base OS. Linux is a fantastic OS in some respects, but its fragmentation is one of its major dissadvantages, especially when it comes to getting commercial developers intreasted.
“The source is being kept close to keep control of it, prevent forking etc. It might limit the user base to people that are prepared to pay for it but it greately improves compatability issues if you have a single base OS. Linux is a fantastic OS in some respects, but its fragmentation is one of its major dissadvantages, especially when it comes to getting commercial developers intreasted.”
show me the kernel forks,perl,python,apache forks etc before you pass this shit around
So its not exactly true, per the forking, but as to fragmentation, its exactly on the money. You run linux, but your really run RedHat or Suse or slackware etc.
The lack of cohesion between distros is a problem.
linux is just a kernel. there must be hundreds of distros, quite a few window managers including kde and gnome, file systems, etc etc. That’s real fragmentation
You don’t need the kernel forks, perl, python, apache forks. You’ve already got the Redhat, Debian, Mandrake, Suse, Slackware, Gentoo, etc.. forks. Those are the OSs you use. A kernel is not an operating system. That’s what he means by fragmentation. There are definite benefits to closed-source whether you want to admit it or not. I don’t think you understand the benefits of a good, small team that has control over an entire system. Linux distros are packages of code that much of which they don’t have control or any influence over. This can be a serious headache. It’s still a major pain for proprietary software companies to target linux. First they have to deal with various library dependencies, do they use gtk+ or qt or roll their own like Slickedit, deal with how the file system is laid out, etc…
The small team of SkyOS developers and management could probably make a moderate living off of it even if it doesn’t get huge. I think their biggest problem is that they’re not going to be able to get 3d drivers from ATI and Nvidia. this will be more important in the future as harnessing the power of the GPU to offload some processing from the CPU becomes more prominent on the desktop. I wonder if it would be technically possible to use an approach like Ndiswrapper to maybe use linux binary drivers. I guess you’d have to some reverse-engineering, but it might be technically possible.
> What i’d recommand to you is getting devs with porting mono/dotGNU for instance.
I thought SkyOS shipped with dotgnu already ?…
I don’t think count on winforms on SkyOS anytime soon (but I managed to run winforms on a PlayStation2 though)
Dotgnu’s winforms even kicks MS’s winforms in terms of good looks *drool* http://maciek.mil-sim.net/xbox.jpg …
SWT has proved that platform Look & Feel rocks, dotgnu is following that for their light weight toolkit ? (seems strange).
>Yes, a lot of the good Linux apps could be ported to SkyOS, >perhaps even with very little trouble, but why?
>Even if I can run Mozilla, OpenOffice, KMail,
Open source applications are NOT Linux apps.
From the beginning, Open source software was meant to help people create and populate new Oses.
Your argument backfire : why should I run linux when I could run all the open source applications of linux on my windows box along with a lot more proprietary ones ?
Take note that this isn’t relevant for SkyOS as I’m sure that the SkyOS team’s goal is not so grand as to conquer desktop space but at first to earn enough money to make a living and…
1 coder for the os, a small team for developing apps don’t need that much money to live nicely :
For each 1000 of users…you can have Robert
living from SkyOS for a year
Of course, the software team can sell their better apps too….
@Bas. Yes, there are a few games natively written for Linux (thx id software…) and some more work through Wine.
But, most new games are still released only on the windows platform. Linux caught a bit of attention of the games developper. No more than that at this point.
dude u are doing a very very good job & u r OS really rocks if only I had money & time to help it i would have done it surely. (i know this os is cheap but i am a student & i have some diff priorities)
also on other note pls pls don’t make your os part of OSS. it will get bloated , focusless & completly inapproprate for home users.
bloated : just look at Linuxon default install you get 2+ windows manager, several browsers,office suiteS etc. user may get confused by it. WTF just look how many flavours of Linux there are
focusless : look at mozilla, they were saying mozilla suite will be discontinued & they will focus entirely on FF & Thunderbird but now we are almost near to v1.0 of FF & still they are developing Mozilla, this means both projects get split attention
inaapropriate for home users : look at linux
Yer missing some things…
bloated:
Plenty of Linux distro’s that come with 1 WM, 1 browser, etc (not the major distros tho, I agree)… and with those ‘bloated’ distro’s it’s still not like you have to use them all anyways, at least you can choose which one fits you best, you’re not tied to something specific that is maybe ‘almost but not quite’ (nothing is perfect for everybody). I prefer having a choice I guess
focusless:
Don’t generalize please, there’s more than enuf of that already
Don’t use one example to dis dozens & dozens of focused OSS projects (checked Freshmeat lately?). Some projects are focused, other’s are not, both in OSS and in closed source software.
inappropriate for home users:
The same could be said for SkyOS, it hasn’t proven itself in any shape or form in the home user area. So for all I know it might be even more inappropriate as it is currently.
Robert is indeed doing a great job on SkyOS and I will definitely try out the live-CD, I personally don’t agree with his politics tho and I believe they will ultimately hinder the adoption of SkyOS. But I wish him & SkyOS all the best ofcourse. SkyOS deserves a chance for sure.
What it doesn’t deserve tho is people spreading FUD (and neither does any other OS
).
community
By Sikosis (IP: 61.88.23.—) – Posted on 2004-07-21 01:01:03
“We in the SkyOS community are all friendly, open-minded, quite lovable, and fluffy.”
Don’t worry – the linux loving losers will come along and ruin it
haha, that was great. very true to
This’ll probably get deleted though, because I’m ‘offending’ linux users! *gasp*
Robert’s an astoundingly talented coder and SkyOS is looking better and better with each beta, so I don’t mean to cause offence at all, but all this hope seems very naive. I mean, I would be surprised if anyone at nVidia and ATI even spent longer than five seconds reading the email.
I think you’re underestimating Robert’s intelligence a bit. Of course that he expected NVidia and ATI to shrug his request, I can bet he was not surprised that NVidia didn’t gave him an answer (if they answered at all), but the fact is, if you have a project, you should at least try. If nothing else, at least it slowly increases the awareness of his OS.
If one acts like “oh my project is so small, I won’t even dare to leave under my rock”, hey, your project will be small forever. Gotta have some enterpreneur spirit. So before Robert get a “yes” he will get a few thousand “no’s”, but that’s how it goes for everyone.
As someone very appropriatedly said, maybe Robert and the other SkyOS guys won’t be the next Linus or Gates, but hey, he could make more money than me and you out of this on niche markets, AND have fun AND have a sense of accomplishment.
aditya: Look at Syllable. They’re open source yet they are not bloated, have focus and are certainly not innapropriate for home use. They are a direct competitor to SkyOS and they’re further ahead. So your argument is crap. Why do you think everything Open Source must be Linux anyway?
have you tried Syllable? the download is particularly hard to find as the download section lacks order, and syllable isnt as easy to use as SkyOS, SkyOS’s installer is considerably better than Syllable’s:
1) SkyOS’s installer is a straight forward, methodical installer
2) Syllable presents you with a Terminal window to begin the installation, how many home / desktop users are going to like that?
also yeah they maybe ahead of skyOS in some areas but not all. remember AtheOS (now syllable) was created by one man aswell, but was started yrs before skyOS appeared so its bound to be a head in some areas
“…They are a direct competitor to SkyOS and they’re further ahead…”
I’m sorry, but that simply isn’t true.
“Don’t worry – the linux loving losers will come along and ruin it
”
You mean as opposed to Windows loving losers or Mac loving losers?
But you won’t see any ‘beos loving losers’ mucking thier forums up
Oh? I guess you’re biased so you have to say that, but lets be honest.
Syllable has more drivers than SkyOS. Far more drivers. It’s GUI isn’t as shiny but it’s just as complete as SkyOS. The filesystems are almost identical, but Syllable and AtheOS had AFS first. Networking has always worked in Syllable and AtheOS. They have better USB support (I think. Does SkyOS have OHCI, UHCI and EHCI drivers?) Syllable has its own “media framework” which can play and encode audio and video. Syllable has better and newer development tools. It probably has better SMP support (Probably. I have never heard of anyone using SkyOS on an SMP box). In the interview Robert can’t think of any browser that is like SkyCruzer, yet Syllable and AtheOS have had ABrowse for ages. Syllable has an email client and Jabber client, both native applications. Have you seen the new desktop they’ve been working on for the next version? Syllable is Open Source and love it or hate it, a lot of people like.
Installing Syllable does suck, but they don’t care at the moment because it isn’t finished. I like SkyOS, but what does it do that Syllable doesn’t already do and do it cheaper? I really do want to know.
1. Complete true multiuser support;
2. A very faine-grained and easy-to-use rights management system. No OS that I can think of has it this advanced and easy to use (note the ‘and’);
3. DifFS;
4. Online update and software installation. Any developper can create their own software repositories which can then be added to the “SkyOS Software Store” (name isn’t definitive, we’re discussing a more appropriate name;
5. Internationalization support is unbelievable. Language changing on the fly, and even people like me can translate SkyOS to Dutch. It’s really like editing a .txt file.
I’m sure others can add the more technical stuff to this list.
“In two or three years of time, when we can expect SkyOS 5 and Haiku R1, what will SkyOS have to offer that Haiku doesn’t have, especially in media aspects?”
One thing SkyOS will have that Haiku R1 won’t, is multi-user support.
“SkyOS is damn stable, the crashes you do encounter are mostly from applications”.
Why let applications crash the whole os?
I think he meant: the crashes you do encounter are mostly applications crashing, not the OS.
If the OS crashes due to applications, then the OS is not stable. But the author claims it is stable, so it’s only the applications that crash.
Okay, some more differences between syllable and SkyOS:
1. Drivers:
The drivers written for Syllable are mostly exact copies of Linux ones. A list:
network: 3c509, 3c59x, eepro100, pcnet32, rtl8139, tulip, via.(all linux drivers, 1:1 copy).
sound: es1371, es1380, i810, trident, via (all from linux).
USB: All Linux.
Conclusion: how can you use old drivers and put them in a new OS? That’s like putting a new case around your 486 and then say it’s all new and improved and better than someone who just bought a brand new PC.
2. Apps
Syllable:
Word processor? No. (SkyOS: AbiWord)
Image program? No. (SkyOS: The GIMP)
Mature email app? Spam filter? Spell checking? No. (SkyOS: Sylpheed)
…
3. Others
Syllable
Auto-update of all aspects of the OS? No. (SkyOS: yes)
True multi-user? No. (SkyOS: yes, as said in my previous post)
A GUI with modern features like Alpha support, shadows, non-rectangular windows, theme/skin able? No. (SkyOS: all this: yes)
OS installation program? No. (SkyOS: yes)
…
Now you again.
One more thing:
SkyOS makes heavy use of file attributes like BeOS does/did. You can “mark/highlight” files and folder, add sticky notes to files, …..
And the GUI and the overall system is damn fast.
the problem with going on with another os’s drivers is that you don’t create it from scrach which means those bugs get repeasted in your os which could make u r os unstable
ps: i saw screen shots of syllable & my first impression was that its gui was a straight rip off of MacOS9, anyways this debate is like Pepsi vs Coke no real decision, well lets leave it here & lets move on we will continue this may be next time a syllable or skyOS article releases
The drivers written for Syllable are mostly exact copies of Linux ones.
So? I think you’ll find that means that they work. Who cares if the code came from Linux, as long as it works?
Conclusion: how can you use old drivers and put them in a new OS? That’s like putting a new case around your 486 and then say it’s all new and improved and better than someone who just bought a brand new PC.
Now you’re just talking crap. Do you know how drivers work? A driver is a lump of code that fiddles with a bunch of hardware registers. It doesn’t make any difference if it is a BSD driver, a Windows driver or a Linux driver, they all have to fiddle with the same hardware registers in the same way. Syllable and Linux have totally different ways of managing drivers anyway, so your argument is just wrong.
While we’re here, Syllable has much better driver management than SkyOS. It detects all your hardware automatically.
Syllable:
Word processor? No. (SkyOS: AbiWord)
Image program? No. (SkyOS: The GIMP)
Mature email app? Spam filter? Spell checking? No. (SkyOS: Sylpheed)
All GTK applications, which anyone can run on Linux better and cheaper. Not really a compeling reason to run SkyOS.
Oh and “how can you use old applications and put them in a new OS? That’s like putting a new case around your 486 and then say it’s all new and improved and better than someone who just bought a brand new PC.”
Uh huh.
Auto-update of all aspects of the OS? No. (SkyOS: yes)
True multi-user? No. (SkyOS: yes, as said in my previous post)
Fair enough, but Auto-update is patented. Multi-user support is true, and SkyOS does support Access Control Lists. Until Syllable completes their security system anyway.
A GUI with modern features like Alpha support, shadows, non-rectangular windows, theme/skin able? No. (SkyOS: all this: yes)
Shows how much you know about Syllable. Alpha support? Uh, yes, Syllable always has done. Shadows? Big deal. Non-rectangular windows? Yes again. Themes and skins? No, but Windows can be changed. Like I said, the Syllable GUI isn’t as flashy but it is just as complete.
OS installation program? No. (SkyOS: yes)
Like I said, the Syllable guys don’t care at the moment. I understand SkyOS can’t install the bootloader during installation either by the way, so Syllable and SkyOS share the same problem.
SkyOS makes heavy use of file attributes like BeOS does/did.
So does Syllable.
the problem with going on with another os’s drivers is that you don’t create it from scrach which means those bugs get repeasted in your os which could make u r os unstable
Instead of writing your own drivers from scratch with a whole bunch of their very own, unique set of bugs that could make your OS unstable? Except your drivers won’t support half the stuff the other drivers did.
So the 3 of you have managed to argue for better multi user support, more applications (Even if they are GTK+ applications), and DiffFS. You havn’t argued against anything I said earlier. So apart from those three things, Syllable is ahead of SkyOS in everything else.
Its obvious you are quite new to SkyOS, because a great deal of your post is not very accurate.
“While we’re here, Syllable has much better driver management than SkyOS. It detects all your hardware automatically.”
Yes, nice. SkyOS does this as well.
“All GTK applications, which anyone can run on Linux better and cheaper. Not really a compeling reason to run SkyOS.”
Weren’t you discussing Syllable at one point?
“Fair enough, but Auto-update is patented. Multi-user support is true, and SkyOS does support Access Control Lists. Until Syllable completes their security system anyway.”
Please don’t bring nonsense into the discussion. Auto-update is not patented. Had that silly article not been posted two days ago, what would you have responded with? And when Syllable has Multi-user support and a security system implemented, then you can talk. Right now, we’re talking about what these OS’s HAVE, not what they might have in the distant future.
“Like I said, the Syllable GUI isn’t as flashy but it is just as complete.”
Again, we’re discussing what these OS’s have, not what they might have later. You said that Syllable was further along right now, remember?
“I understand SkyOS can’t install the bootloader during installation either by the way, so Syllable and SkyOS share the same problem.”
For another month or so, yes. Grub installation planned for beta 8.
“So the 3 of you have managed to argue for…”
And you’ve managed to argue a number of things that Syllable currently does not have, but might have in the future. And that is fine, we’re glad that they plan to support this. But if you are arguing about the current state of completeness, you can’t use things that might be implemented in the distant unknown future as evidence.
Both systems are nice and have strong points. Arguing who is better is silly, much like the majority of your argument.
I hope this is the end of this discussion.
Its obvious you are quite new to SkyOS, because a great deal of your post is not very accurate.
It’s become obvious that a lot of people here are new to Syllable, because a lot of the stuff in their posts is inacurate, too.
Stiil I’ll ask you to please stop taking my quotes out of context. That was a reply to various posts which listed things like GTK+ applications as an “advantage” that SkyOS had. I don’t believe GTK+ applications are an advantage at all, which is what that quote is talking about.
Auto-update is not patented.
Teleshuttle Technologies, LLC would disagree with you. If this had been posted two or three days ago we wouldn’t be talking about auto-update anyway, because SkyOS only got auto-update in the last few days!
And when Syllable has Multi-user support and a security system implemented, then you can talk. Right now, we’re talking about what these OS’s HAVE, not what they might have in the distant future.
Fair enough; I already conceeded that multi-user support is one thing SkyOS has that Syllable does not. Although I’ll point out that Syllable does support multiple users; it just doesn’t enforce any security.
You said that Syllable was further along right now, remember?
Yes and I stand by that. I’ll re-iterate my earlier post because not a single person in this thread has refuted any of the points in it (Apart from the silly argument “The drivers are from Linux so, uh, they don’t count!”):
“Syllable has more drivers than SkyOS. Far more drivers. It’s GUI isn’t as shiny but it’s just as complete as SkyOS. The filesystems are almost identical, but Syllable and AtheOS had AFS first. Networking has always worked in Syllable and AtheOS. They have better USB support (I think. Does SkyOS have OHCI, UHCI and EHCI drivers?) Syllable has its own “media framework” which can play and encode audio and video. Syllable has better and newer development tools. It probably has better SMP support (Probably. I have never heard of anyone using SkyOS on an SMP box). In the interview Robert can’t think of any browser that is like SkyCruzer, yet Syllable and AtheOS have had ABrowse for ages. Syllable has an email client and Jabber client, both native applications. Have you seen the new desktop they’ve been working on for the next version? Syllable is Open Source and love it or hate it, a lot of people like.”
My point is that on the majority of features, SkyOS and Syllable are equal (GUI, kernel, filesystem). On a few points, SkyOS is better (Multi user support, a few GTK+ applications) but Syllable is better in more areas (Everything I list above). So [Stuff Syllable is better at ] > [Stuff SkyOS is better at] == [Syllable is better in more areas]. I’d say that puts Syllable “ahead”.
technically SkyOS doesnt hav auto-update afaik, skyOS’s update feature has to be run by the user, and as such is not Automatic making the patent no concern of SkyOS as the update has to be executed by the user and is not automatic in the truest sense of the term
Alright, everyone gather your mud buckets and put them in a pile. The sling is over.
“While we’re here, Syllable has much better driver management than SkyOS. It detects all your hardware automatically.”
Yes, nice. SkyOS does this as well.
Really? Then why do I have to configure SkyOS to use the radeon driver? Shouldn’t it do that automatically?
Adam
by that do you mean there is no auto detection and we’re lying? or are you talking about turning opengl/framebuffer acceleration on.. because that’s off by default.. it’s not supposed to turn on automatically..
or… explain, i dont get you
Unless I’m mistaken (and I may be), doesn’t SkyOS automatically use the vesa driver? I remember having to go in and manually select the Radeon driver. Perhaps that’s been fixed and I wasn’t aware.
“Really? Then why do I have to configure SkyOS to use the radeon driver? Shouldn’t it do that automatically?”
Did you have to install a driver in order to have SkyOS detect your Radeon, or did SkyOS detect your Radeon, and you simply had to choose it? I’m going to guess that SkyOS saw you had a Radeon, and it was sitting in the list of video drivers for you to choose from (along with VESA), and all you had to do was select it.
If that is correct, it sounds to me like SkyOS auto-detected your Radeon, and started you off with the most compatible video mode just in case, and gave you a very easy way to switch to the correct driver.
“I don’t believe GTK+ applications are an advantage at all, which is what that quote is talking about.”
Following that path of logic, you could pretty much discount any advantage we list as something that you don’t consider an advantage. Personally, I think you’d be hard pressed to find people that think more applications is not an advantage.
“…because SkyOS only got auto-update in the last few days!”
You have a habit of just discounting what people say, don’t you? SkyOS has an update system. Syllable does not. It doesn’t matter when SkyOS implemented the update system, the fact of the matter is, SkyOS has it, Syllable does not. Advantage: SkyOS. And, as Youlle pointed out correctly, it is not an AUTO-update system, rather a manual one where users select what they would like to update. So even if that nonsensical patent does hold up (which it won’t), it does not make a difference with what SkyOS uses.
“Fair enough; I already conceeded that multi-user support is one thing SkyOS has that Syllable does not. Although I’ll point out that Syllable does support multiple users; it just doesn’t enforce any security.”
So I guess this would be yet another advantage that SkyOS has, irregardless of your caveat at the end.
“My point is that on the majority of features, SkyOS and Syllable are equal (GUI, kernel, filesystem). On a few points, SkyOS is better (Multi user support, a few GTK+ applications) but Syllable is better in more areas (Everything I list above). So [Stuff Syllable is better at ] > [Stuff SkyOS is better at] == [Syllable is better in more areas]. I’d say that puts Syllable “ahead”.”
The GUI is not equal. Not only is SkyOS’s UI more advanced and attractive, the system supporting the GUI (SkyGI) is more powerful.
SkyOS not only has a 64-bit filesystem with attributes, it uses those attributes quite frequently. I don’t know that Syllable does that.
Everything you listed above has been countered. The only thing that Syllable has more of is drivers that have been 1:1 lifted from Linux. You can go ahead and make the claim that Syllable is “ahead”, but you haven’t backed it up sufficiently. Declaring yourself right without providing sufficient supporting evidence (which you have not done, despite what you may think) does not make it so. A number of advantages that SkyOS has have been listed, and for each one you’ve either said that that isn’t important to you so therefore its not an advantage (GTK), or that Syllable will in the future have that feature, so they are equal (GUI, multi-user security).
Not only is SkyOS’s UI more advanced and attractive, the system supporting the GUI (SkyGI) is more powerful.
Please back up your claim that SkyGI is “more advanced” and “more powerful” than Syllable. Can you? I don’t believe you can, because the two are equal apart from the way they look. Syllable has all sorts of utility classes and framework that SkyOS does not, like StreamableIO, which make it more advanced.
SkyOS not only has a 64-bit filesystem with attributes, it uses those attributes quite frequently. I don’t know that Syllable does that.
It does.
You have a habit of just discounting what people say, don’t you?
You have a habit of flaming people for no good reason instead of sticking to the discussion.
Everything you listed above has been countered.
SkyOS has equally complete and up to date development tools? Does networking work yet in current SkyOS releases? Does SkyOS support OHCI, UHCI and EHCI USB controllers? Does the SMP support scale as well as it does in Syllable? Does SkyOS have any medium scale native applications? Does it have it’s own Email client or Jabber client? Is the SkyOS media system anywehre near as good as the one in Syllable? You or anyone else have not countered any of them.
The only thing that Syllable has more of is drivers that have been 1:1 lifted from Linux.
I’ll ask again. So what if they came from Linux? Robert has used XFree code and BSD licensed code for the drivers in SkyOS, so can I discount all the drivers in SkyOS as well? Of course not. So arguing about drivers is a losing proposition for you because both SkyOS and Syllable use drivers ported from other OS’s, and Syllable has more of them, which makes it more useful to more people.