Redox OS – A Unix-Like Operating System Written in Rust | Hacker News Reader

Redox OS – A Unix-Like Operating System Written in Rust

redox-os.org

70 pointsjitl20 comments

It's certainly an impressive feat of engineering, but I'd really like to see a new OS project that isn't a Unix clone. OS development is a monumentally large endeavour and in my eyes it seems like a waste to dedicate that level of energy to copy something in a new programming language.

The flipside is even the Haiku guys cloning Be realized that POSIX compatibility brings applications, and applications are what make an OS useful.

Yep, this is the technical debt OS creators are facing. There was actually a time not that long ago when operating systems deviated wildly and struck out in all sorts of directions, but because of lack of applications most of them died out despite the immense amount of work put in to them.

If you’re not building in some amount of compatibility, building the OS itself is a fraction of the work ahead.

This project has been under development since October 2015. Last release was over three months ago. Curious why it is trending on HN today.

Source: https://www.redox-os.org/news/

My guess is because of this comment on another front page thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35005252

Relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1053/

Does Redox OS bring anything unique to the table, besides being written in Rust?

How did that giant TC-associated crypto donation end up going for them?

It's only a matter of time before the Linux kernel itself is rewritten in Rust. Or, more likely, a Rust-based replacement is written.

Imagine the number of developer years required for even just parity…

20 years, 1000+ devs. Just a guess.

I think it is a Ship of Theseus situation. Once Rust becomes acceptable in the core kernel, module by module, it is going to spread.

I am fully Team Rust for core infrastructure, but I am curious how many security blunders in the kernel are memory errors vs bad security architecture.

Sort of. Is the Linux kernel huge and has an amazing number of man years in it .... certainly.

If starting over from scratch could you ignore most architectures, drivers, etc and support current hardware ... also yes.

A new OS could skip 32 bit mode, alpha, mips, itanium, loongarch, 68k, pa-risc, powerpc, s390, superH, sparc, parallel ports, serial ports, supporting zillions of PCI/PCIe cards that you can't buy any more, messing around with archaic 16 bit bootloaders, etc.

In the same sense that the heat death of the universe is "only" a matter of time, perhaps.

why is it that any mention of Rust on the internet will bring about these wildly-overshooting claims. The amount of production software having been re-written in Rust (or replaced by a Rust counterpart) is minimal. This kind of rewrite is rare for any programming language. Yet claims like this are everywhere.

I thought it was a troll comment.

I find it annoying either way: it doesn't provide valuable/novel information and isn't conducive to productive conversation (in part because it's unclear if it's sarcastic or earnest)

If you're going to write a whole kernel in Rust, why would you settle for making a copy of Linux? Bug-for-bug compatibility with 30 years of cruft isn't exactly exciting or even necessary.

Reposts are fine after a year or so (this is in the FAQ: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html) but the most recent thread was much less than a year ago, so the current post counts as a dupe.

Redox OS 0.8 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33750198 - Nov 2022 (39 comments)

Redox OS 0.8.0 is now released - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33724712 - Nov 2022 (8 comments)

Also related:

An anonymous person donated 299 ETH from Tornado Cash to Redox OS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32955332 - Sept 2022 (120 comments)

An anonymous donor just sent 299 Ether (equivalent to 393k USD) to redox_OS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32923693 - Sept 2022 (124 comments)

Revirt – Virtualization on Redox OS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32457253 - Aug 2022 (16 comments)

Redox OS 0.7.0 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31200377 - April 2022 (88 comments)

Porting QEMU to RedoxOS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27844413 - July 2021 (23 comments)

Arm64 Support for RedoxOS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27078985 - May 2021 (2 comments)

Redox OS 0.6, the micro-kernel based Rust-written operating system - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25535893 - Dec 2020 (8 comments)

Redox OS 0.6.0 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25533563 - Dec 2020 (28 comments)

Redox: Unix-Like Operating System in Rust - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24441578 - Sept 2020 (106 comments)

Debug Programs Using GDB on Redox OS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23985374 - July 2020 (13 comments)

Redox OS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22978950 - April 2020 (2 comments)

Redox OS 0.5.0 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19478720 - March 2019 (27 comments)

Redox – A Unix-Like Operating System Written in Rust - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18442390 - Nov 2018 (168 comments)

Redox OS Release 0.4.1 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16728497 - April 2018 (11 comments)

Redox OS Crash Challenge - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16198342 - Jan 2018 (80 comments)

Show HN: Redox Rust OS – v0.3.3 release - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15290607 - Sept 2017 (76 comments)

This Summer in Redox: A Complete Rewrite of the Kernel - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12844539 - Nov 2016 (45 comments)

The Internet on Redox - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12184240 - July 2016 (5 comments)

Redox – A Unix-Like Operating System Written in Rust - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11318004 - March 2016 (202 comments)

Redox: A Rust Operating System - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10295187 - Sept 2015 (51 comments)

Are you planning a "previous submission" bot which automatically adds a list as the above to all resubmissions? Would save you some time and give immediate insights to those (re)interested in rather frequently posted urls and topics.

More likely a way for the community to build these lists collaboratively. The trouble with the bot approach is that it isn't easy to automatically find all the related submissions; especially if you want to filter out the uninteresting threads.

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