Submitted by “Bluebottle is a powerful operating system developed in the Programming Languages and Runtime Systems Research Group, based on the Active Object System (Aos) kernel. The Aos kernel provides a compact runtime environment for the Active Oberon language, which supports active objects (threads) directly, and enables the construction of efficient active object-based systems that directly run on the hardware.” You can read the changelog for the latest changes, and be sure to check the screenshot of the window manager.
… as always when computer scientists code user interfaces and have no clue about usability and interfac design.
who cares about another language or operating system?
OSNews.com.
Not “WhoCaresAboutAnotherOSNews.com”.
I think it is great. The more OS’s out there for us to choose from the better.
who cares about another language or operating system?
I do. Most of our readers do. If you aren’t interested in new operating systems… Than why are you here commenting?
“who cares about another language or operating system?“
This is OSnews, I care!
OSnews, thanks for letting us know about this OS.
“who cares about another language or operating system?”
I can tell you why you should care:
The operating systems that are coded by computer scientists [working in a university environment with no commercial forces pushing them] don’t have the restraints imposed on them that operating systems coded in a commercial environment do: TCO, ROI, usability issues [read: most users know very little about computers], compliance with established interface design norms etc.
The direct consequence of this is that the afore-mentioned computer scientists are free to invent, change, try out, research, play, be structured or not, adapt, not adapt and a heap of other activities that are hard to implement when you are being governed by someone whose interest is not in the “best” product, but the most selling product.
And, just so you understand this, most of the inventions that drive the interfaces you think are “usable” were driven by the research of scientists, including the 3-button mouse, WIMP, 3D-graphics, vector imaging, Display Postscript, anti-aliasing, color theory and the mathematical/historical basis of the art and design disciplines.
So, I think the answer to your question is:
“Anybody with a broader view of the world than yours.”
Edited 2005-11-28 12:06
I agree with You, that OS Bluebottle GUI has relative usability for now. But!
,
OS Bluebottle is really revolutionary OS, among miscellaneous in the UI area also. In Bluebottle there are firstly and mostly enhanced was apply some Jef Raskin principles of “The Humane Interface”. Personally I did not agree with Jef in many parts, but some ideas, that already work in OS Bluebottle GUI, is only start to planning to include to new versions of popular DE’s, like KDE for example.
And one thing yet. Much more significant, that OS Bluebottle represent really alternative part for mostly modern operating systems.
In my opinion and for me, there is, for example, even OpenSource environments for future mobile phones and pda’s, like GNU/Linux with Qt4/Qtopia on one side and Oberon-like Open systems on other side.
Unfortune, hide force of Oberon-like systems did not opened yet. I made some classical variant of minimalistic GNU/Linux Qt2/Opie system on uClibc for x86, that called ROS-Linux http://www.teleology.ru , but if it will be possible in future, for me, probably, is more interesting to work on minimalistic Oberon system, Bluebottle-like system with main orientation on ARM for now. One of the target of this work, for example, can be fully redesign and improvement UI of that system for revolutionary enhance usability – for example, see my concept of 3D interface – Space.
Actually, task-based UI’s ala Oberon (and not completely abandoned in Bluebottle) are extremely efficient. They may not be what we are used to these days, but they keep you very focused on what you are doing instead of on the WB cartoon most desktops appear to be these days.
…This looks like MS Singularity. I wonder which idea came first…
>…This looks like MS Singularity. I wonder which idea came first…
🙂 It must be perephrased. MS Singularity – good example of how and from where usually MS take ideas. Oberon, Active Oberon is straight descendants of Pascal, Modula and Niclaus Wirth scool.
It seems there was an earlier operating system based on Oberon; comparable to a LISP machine but running on Oberon I guess. More info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberon_programming_language
Well, BluebottleOS is still based on Native Oberon which somehow is the “earlier operating system”. The idea of Niklaus Wirth was to closely integrate language and system which together have then been named Oberon. Native Oberon boots from one floppy into a simple GUI. Look here:
http://www.oberon.ethz.ch/native/
The Jaos page on the Bluebottle site mentions it has a Java Virtual Machine. Does this mean you can run java off of Bluebottle? I thought getting a JVM was extremely hard, with the certification process added to that (it took BeOS long enough).
Interesting, that Java was designed on Oberon basis and after deeply Oberon studing by Sun. In my opinion, Java – rough enought realisation some ideas of Oberon.
Haven’t looked at it, but running Java programs doesn’t mean it is certified. A JVM isn’t that hard to write if it need not be fast. It won’t be certified though, and some features are hard to test (mainly those dealing with threads).
– Morin
I’ve looked at Oberon and it looks like a language that makes sure you know what you are doing before it lets anything compile. While it is probably a first going to be annoying compared to the ever obedient C… when it comes to debug you’ll be thanking yourself. I’ve actually thought about writing an Oberon compiler myself just to see how it goes.
The original only took two pages of EBNF… but then came Oberon2 and this is like Oberon3 anyone know how many pages of EBNF it takes now?
If you look at the grammar for Oberon-2, it’s only 45 productions! Compare that with the Java grammar … actually, has anyone SEEN a full Java grammar … ?
See: ftp://ftp.inf.ethz.ch/pub/software/Oberon/OberonV4/Docu/Oberon2.Re…
The successor language to Oberon-2 is called Component Pascal. It has just 33 productions, but it does pretty much everything a software engineer would want.
The source of an Oberon-2 compiler is available with a tool called POW! (Programmer’s Oberon Workbench). Oberon-2 is also available badged as JOB, which compiles to Java bytecode.
And Component Pascal is available Open Source for a number of platforms, including JVM and .NET .
there is only 1 word that can describe this os…… a joke
So should OSNews only report Windows and Mac?
This is one of the most interesting OS projects I’ve heard of in quite some time. Front page material for sure.
Thanks for posting it.
I don’t care if the GUI is beautiful or not. Just have a look how many things are accomplished with so little source code. The concept of multi-tasking, security and software components is also very innovative compared to the mainstream operating systems.