On Tue, 10 Apr 2001, Karl Ramberg wrote:

> > A microkernel OS would definately be cooler than Linux, and a No-OS would
> > be ever better, but I'm thinking in practical terms...  Linux would
> > provide us the ability to run on many platforms (like the OS-requiring
> > version of Squeak now) and provide us with drivers galore.
> Drivers is an unsolved issue in SqueakNOS as far as I know. To connect it to
> my
> Epson printer fx would be a hassle...

Exactly.  You'd be writing your own driver or driver framework + driver
for it at this point.  "Hassle" is an understatement. :)

This is why I usually advocate an existing kernel for drivers and TCP/IP
stack.  To this, those who would like as little of an OS as possible
usually rebute with OSKit <http://www.cs.utah.edu/flux/oskit/> which is a
kit of building blocks, if you will, for a operating systems.  You can use
Linux and FreeBSD drivers.  OSKit is very neat, but is extremely limited
in that it only runs on x86 and Digital DNARD (StrongARM).

There's also OSKit-mach for all of you microkernel fans:
<http://mail.gnu.org/pipermail/bug-hurd/1999-November/003554.html>

NetBSD and OpenBSD also support a pretty wide array of hardware, at least
compared to OSKit and Darwin.  I don't know much at all about either's
architecture, but perhaps their kernels are lighter or more similar to a
microkernel.

Aaron

Aaron Reichow  ::  Twin Ports ACM VP ::  http://www.d.umn.edu/~reic0024/
"The profit system follows the path of least resistance and following the
path of least resistance is what makes a river crooked." -U. Utah Phillips