OS News Archive

Today is the second anniversary of OSNews' renaissance. Though OSNews started in Autumn of 1997, there was a long period in which it was in deep-freeze, with only occasional updates. August 2001 bought daily updates, a new back-end, and a lot of new readers, thanks to our new Editor-in-Chief (Eugenia). Since that time we've had:

• 4,247 news postings
• 133,118 comments
• 244 Feature Articles
• 82 Editorials
• 94 Interviews
• 1001 Flamewars

Thanks for reading, and keep coming back!

PC Buyer's Guide has posted a shootout comparing Max OS X to Windows XP to Linux, comparing basic, factory-included functionality. It includes a huge side-by-side chart. The overview seems to be pretty evenhanded, and isn't too preoccupied with declaring a winner and drawing much of a hard and fast conclusion. The bottom line: OS X is a very usable and elegant OS, XP has a leg up on some functionality (and of course more apps), and Linux is an impressive contender.

The B-Free project is a collaborative work aimed at creating a BTRON operating system from scratch, with free distribution. It is a preemptive multitasking operating system constructed through micro-kernel technology, which assumes 32-bit or higher CPUs. The BTRON operating system is a subset of the TRON project, which in turn, is a worldwide open Real Time Operating System (RTOS) specification.

MenuetOS 0.74 is released and includes a Tiny email server, improved Http/Mp3 servers, Fasm 1.48, improved protection, skinning and font additions, Minesweeper and more. The OS is written in 100% assembly and is running off a floppy disk. However, developers are now adding support for a C library and they are looking for more developers to help with fixing the bugs and adding new features.

The company, whose software lets an Intel server run several operating systems simultaneously, releases new software that supports a much wider variety of computers.

The L4Env, the L4 Environment, and DDE, the Device Driver Environment. L4Env is a programming environment for application development on top of the L4 microkernel family. DDE is an environment for Linux device drivers for using native Linux 2.4 drivers together with L4Env.

Rocklyte Systems announced the latest version of its free multi-platform operating system environment, Athene 3.1. Available for Linux and Windows, Athene supports the rare ability of being able to function on competing operating systems, while also maintaining its own independent OS infrastructure (the Athenyx 2003 CDROM series). The 3.1 release of Athene continues to make significant strides in the advancement of its desktop interface.

Do you remember the Contiki desktop OS, an Internet-enabled graphical operating system for constrained systems? I have just ported Contiki to the 8-bit Atmel AVR microcontroller, which is commonly used in various kinds of embedded systems, and have set up a demo server running the Contiki AVR software at http://contiki-demo.sics.se/.

A short, illustrated comparison of mounting partitions in OS X, BeOS, WinXP and Linux.

In various discussions that we've had with readers about advertising, many people have suggested that we devise some more direct way for regular OSNews readers to support the site. (This is usually amid complaints about online advertising in general or about some specific ad method that we're trying out) I personally don't like the idea of soliciting donations, because I want people to get something in return for their monetary support. What we've come up with is an OSNews membership program. For a yearly fee of $20, you will be able to show your support of OSNews and receive the following benefits:

E/OS LX NT v 0.2 is available, a graphical desktop for MS-DOS that can run Windows programs, Linux programs and DOS aplications. It´s based on Linux 2.0.30, Xfree 4.1.0, Wine, Dosemu, and Libc. The system is based on the UMSDOS file system and can only run under DOS as Desktop.

About a month ago, NeTraverse contacted OfB Labs with an early release copy of Win4Lin 5.0, the follow-up to the already impressive Win4Lin 4.0 released in May 2002. Win4Lin, for those not familiar with it, offers near-native (or better) speed "virtualization" of a Windows box so that one can run Windows 9x (95/98/Me) inside GNU/Linux. Read the review at OfB.

The OSI have approved the revised license for the Plan9 operating system according to attendees returning from this year's Usenix Bof, Slashdot.org reports.

Unununium, and interesting project which aims at producing an 'organic' operating system where all components are interchangable at run-time, recently put a screenshot online.They have been making a lot of progress lately, with the website becoming increasingly active and filled with content. This project is a bookmark must-have for any assembly buffs out there as it is entirely written in assembly.