Most of you will know that the underlying core set of components of Mac OS X and the iPhone operating system are released under the Apple Public Source License, an FSF-approved open source license. Few of you, however, will have actually used Darwin in any other form than Mac OS X or the iPhone OS. Despite numerous projects attempting so, Darwin has never gained any significant traction apart from Apple's own interest. The PureDarwin project tries to rise from the ashes of the OpenDarwin project, and has just released a Christmas developer preview.
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Member since:2006-03-26
Exactly. Tons of OS projects jump up like this every day it seems. None of them seem to offer any more than what is already out there. No-one does anything creative with the GUI, or tries to improve that at all. Everyone just seems to be content with: Take a linux/darwin,bsd kernel, slap some existing packages in it to make it usable, slap KDE/Gnome/Enlightenment/or what have you on top of that, then claim you just created an OS.
I would love to see a project like this though that runs off of openstep gui, and uses objective c/gnustep for their main api. I think that would set it apart better. That combined with an appearance overhaul on openstep.
Edited 2008-12-26 13:30 UTC
Member since:2005-06-29
I guess you guys should read up on what Darwin has to offer. Most importantly, it differs a GREAT deal from Linux, BSD, and Solaris in that it uses a diferent kernel type, closer to that of Windows NT than that of the aforementioned.
It also has something called I/O kit, an object-oriented device driver kit that is very, very different from that othe roperating systems have to offer.
Those are just two I knew from the top of my head.
Sometimes, you need to dig a little deeper before you see the real differences. Sometimes, they just don't show up in the GUI. Sometimes, you need a little more technical knowledge.
Edited 2008-12-26 13:31 UTC
Member since:2005-11-10
http://etoileos.com/etoile/
Member since:2005-11-21
What I would like to know is, really, what does Darwin has to offer that other Unix and Unix-like systems don't?... for example, I see on the release page that pureDarwin has ZFS, DTrace and X11 working... so, why not use OpenSolaris or FreeBSD?
Very true, especially seeing as how this is designed to be Macintosh only.
Everyone knows I'm an advocate of OS X and Macs, but to use this only on a Mac seems a mystery.
Member since:2008-02-05
Member since:2005-12-13
I must say I agree.
Open Solaris would even be a better way for one to run ZFS anyway.
What I'd like to see though was for some of the core Darwin components like Open Directory and DirectoryServices to be ported to some open source OS like Open Solaris for use as a complete Mac OS X Server replacement along with Mac OS X clients. This would also make the use of Apple's open source CalendarServer much easier, as it ties itself quite tightly towards the Apple Open directory API structure.
The rest of it, Apple might as well keep to itself, if you ask me!
Member since:
2008-04-30
Well... If you take GNUstep/etoile you can make a nice MacOSX replacement out of Linux, other BSDs and OpenSolaris too...
What I would like to know is, really, what does Darwin has to offer that other Unix and Unix-like systems don't?... for example, I see on the release page that pureDarwin has ZFS, DTrace and X11 working... so, why not use OpenSolaris or FreeBSD?