Search Results for: visopsys

Visopsys 0.92 released

Andy McLaughlin 2023-09-22 OS News No Comments

It’s been a while, but Visopsys has had a new release, 0.92, with all the details in the changelog. There is a longer-term project to bring the operating system into the modern era, with things like 64-bit support, UEFI booting, and so on. In the meantime, this maintenance release features stability and usability improvements, bug fixes, and multitasker portability changes designed to further unshackle it from the x86 processor architecture. Visopsys has been in development since 1997, and one of its unique features is a focus on a partitioning tool built atop Visopsys, Partition Logic, to make partitioning changes without booting into any other operating system.

Visopsys 0.9 released

Submitted by andymc 2020-04-20 OS News 6 Comments

Visopsys is a hobby OS for x86-compatible PCs, started in 1997. Version 0.9 was released this morning, and there’s a change log. The summary: This major release offers a subtly updated look, enhanced networking capabilities and associated programs, Unicode support, a software packaging/download/install/uninstall infrastructure with an online ‘store’, a user space window shell, VMware mouse integration, HTTP, XML, and HTML libraries, some C++ and POSIX threads (pthreads) support, ‘pipes’ for interprocess communication, and additional hashing algorithms. Visopsys has a long history on OSNews – the oldest mention being from 2005. It’s been in relatively steady development ever since.

Visopsys 0.8.3 released

Thom Holwerda 2018-10-02 OS News 2 Comments

It's been a long time since we last covered Visopys - one of the few remaining hobby operating systems still in development - so how about an update? The last version we covered was 0.8 way back in September 2016, but the most recent release is 0.8.3 from August of this year.

This maintenance version features user experience enhancements and reliability improvements, and a more capable Archive Manager program. Bug fixes cover a number of GUI flaws and memory leaks, and some of the low-level network infrastructure code has been refined.

And just in case you forgot all about this operating system:

Visopsys is an alternative operating system for PC compatible computers. In development since 1997, this system is small, fast, and open source. It features a simple but functional graphical interface, pre-emptive multitasking, and virtual memory. Though it attempts to be compatible in a number of ways, Visopsys is not a clone of any other operating system.

It's available from the project's download page.

Visopsys 0.8 released

Guest post by andymc 2016-09-19 OS News 3 Comments

It's taken a while, but Visopsys 0.8 has been released. The GUI appearance has been updated, the infamous icons have all been replaced, and touch support has been added. There are a few new utilities, and in addition to all of the usual under-the-bonnet improvements, they've added OHCI (USB 1) support, completing the set of USB host controller drivers. There's a full changelog is and new screenshots.

Visopsys 0.75 Released

Submitted by andymc 2014-10-29 OS News 4 Comments

Visopsys is an alternative OS for PC-compatibles. Version 0.75 is the third update this year, and is particularly focused on hardware, adding USB 3.0 (XHCI) and APIC interrupt controller support, as well as improved USB 2.0 and hub support. Downloads are available from here, and details are available in the change log

Visopsys 0.74 released

Submitted by andymc 2014-07-07 OS News 1 Comment

Visopsys has seen a new release.

This maintenance release features enhanced internationalization support with Spanish and German translations, per-user settings, and extensive stability and performance improvements, most notably to the kernel memory, user input, disk I/O, and GUI subsystems.

More details can be found in the changelog.

New website for Visopsys

Submitted by andymc 2014-01-20 OS News 33 Comments

We report regularly about Visopsys - one of the few hobby operating systems that survived where virtually all the others (SkyOS, Syllable, etc.) died out. They've got a new website, which seems like a nice occasion to give it some attention again.

The bulk of Visopsys is a fully multitasking, 100% protected mode, virtual-memory, massively-monolithic-style kernel. Added to this is a bare-bones C library and a minimal suite of applications - together comprising a small but reasonably functional operating system which can operate natively in either graphical or text modes. Though it's been in continuous development for a number of years, realistically the target audience remains limited to operating system enthusiasts, students, and assorted other sensation seekers.

Visopsys 0.72 released

Submitted by andymc 2013-08-27 OS News 28 Comments

A new release of Visopsys.

This release consists of hardware support updates and bugfixes, with particular focus on USB. Support for USB 2 controllers and devices has been added.

More details in the changelog.

Visopsys: one man’s vision to build an operating system

Submitted by Andy McLaughlin 2012-09-17 OS News 46 Comments

"Visopsys (VISual OPerating SYStem) is an alternative operating system for PC-compatible computers, developed almost exclusively by one person, Andy McLaughlin, since its inception in 1997. Andy is a 30-something programmer from Canada, who, via Boston and San Jose ended up in London, UK, where he spends much of his spare time developing Visopsys. We had the great fortune to catch up with Andy via email and ask him questions about Visopsys, why he started the project in the first place, and where is it going in the future."

Visopsys 0.71 Released

Guest post by N.P. Brandt 2011-10-28 OS News 4 Comments

Version 0.71 of Visopsys has been unleashed into the wild. "The bulk of this release consists of general bug fixes, and improvements to hardware detection and device drivers, with particular focus on USB. New features include the ability to boot from a USB device (a new USB image is available for download) and the ability to power down the system."

Visopsys 0.7 Released

Submitted by brynet 2011-02-20 OS News 41 Comments

The 0.7 version of the Visopsys desktop operating system has been released. "More than four years in the making, this is a major new release offering an updated look and a number of new features, including JPEG image support, image resizing, 64-bit disk support, UDF (DVD) filesystem support, and GPT partition table support, as well as lots of new icons, wallpaper images, and file browsing functionality. New administrative applications and functionality have been added, and the ATA/IDE driver has been enhanced, including the ability to better support backwards-compatible SATA controllers. FPU context saving has been improved, and a number of tweaks and bug fixes are also included."

Visopsys’ Partition Logic in PC World’s Top 100

Submitted by andymc 2008-06-08 OS News 10 Comments

The partitioning 'live' CD known as Partition Logic, which is a specially-configured version of the alternative operating system Visopsys, has been chosen as one of PC World magazine's "The 100 Best Products of 2008". Okay, so it's only at number 96, but it's still an honour.

Visopsys 0.7 Preview Released

Submitted by andymc 2008-02-05 OS News 2 Comments

A preview of the 0.7 release of Visopsys is now available from the preview page. The page is light on details of the new technical features such as JPEG, 64-bit disk, UDF, and GPT support but provides screenshots and a breakdown of the updated look of Visopsys. As always you can try the OS from the 'live' CD image (and yes, after 10 years of development, there's still a basic version that fits on a floppy).

Visopsys 0.69 Released

Submitted by andymc 2007-09-24 OS News 3 Comments

Visopsys version 0.69 was released today. Four months in the making, this is a maintenance release comprising the final round of tweaks and bug fixes to the 0.6x series of Visopsys, featuring lots of work on the USB subsystem including support for USB mice/keyboards and hubs, tuning of the FAT filesystem driver, usability fixes for various user programs, and loads of OS kernel and C library improvements and bug fixes. As always you can demo Visopsys as a live CD or run a scaled-down version from a floppy disk. Change log is here, and downloads are here.

Visopsys 0.68 Released

Submitted by andymc 2007-05-10 OS News 6 Comments

The 0.68 release of the Visopsys OS went live today. It's a maintenance release with the usual array of tweaks and bug fixes, plus a focus on disk I/O performance; the software disk caching was re-written, and lookahead/write caching were added to the IDE driver. Another new feature is secure deletion (shredding) of files, partitions, and disks. Change log here and downloads here.

Visopsys 0.67 Released

Submitted by andymc 2007-04-03 OS News 11 Comments

Version 0.67 of Visopsys was released today, with all the usual bug fixes and tweaks plus two focus areas of improvement: the IDE/ATA disk driver has been 'modernized' with PCI, DMA, and 48-bit addressing support, resulting in a raw I/O performance increase of up to 700%; additionally the Disk Manager (Partition Logic) has been re-engineered and modularized to support the later addition of new disk label types, as well as improved support for MS-DOS logical partitions (moving, creating out-of-order, etc.). Downloads are here, and the change log is here.

Visopsys 0.66 Released

Submitted by poundsmack 2007-02-01 OS News 4 Comments

Today marks a new release of the Visopsys operating system, version 0.66. "This is a maintenance release, featuring the ability to resize Windows Vista partitions, more reliable loading on various systems, better exception handling, color text in graphics mode, improvements to the C library, and a number of bugfixes." The changelog has all the details.

Visopsys 0.65 Released

Submitted by andymc 2006-12-18 OS News 6 Comments

Version 0.65 of the Visopsys operating system was released today. A lot of work has been done on the USB subsystem and underlying UHCI driver - though it's still not 'there' yet it has been re-enabled for the time being. New features were added to the Disk Manager (a.k.a. Partition Logic) including partition copy/paste (same disk or disk-to-disk). And finally, as with the last few releases there's been a focus on improving the GUI code. You can demo Visopsys on a floppy or live CD. Downloads and change log.

Visopsys 0.64 Released

Submitted by andymc 2006-10-25 OS News 2 Comments

After a couple of months of serious work, Visopsys 0.64 has been released. There are only a handful of new, user-visible features (including right-click context menus and 32-bit .bmp/.ico support). The real focus of this release has been stability, quality, and debugging, plus large scale GUI re-engineering. In addition, graphics mode now works under Bochs 2.3 (as well as Qemu and VmWare). Downloads here and changelog here.

Visopsys 0.63 Released

Submitted by andymc 2006-08-15 OS News 5 Comments

Version 0.63 of Visopsys was released today. It's a maintenance release with bugfixes and loads of small tweaks throughout the system, but also a few new little features, including the ability to format and resize Linux swap partitions, more reliable OS loading, better CPU detection, and a simple text editor. Detailed change log and downloads.

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