I've really been enjoying 's lab notes exploring designs for a new OS: alexanderobenauer.com/labnotes/000/
Lots of dreams here dating back to Smalltalk, BeOS, Plan 9, OpenDoc, and more, but the synthesis is carving the seams in an engaging way.
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Thanks, Andy!
The thinking is still early, but I'm glad to know these explorations resonate.
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While I have not read the whole series yet, I think that at least some of the ideas in the first few notes are either already implemented or the framework is there to implement them in .
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For instance, on BeOS and now on Haiku, contacts and emails are stored as individual files, with extended FS attributes holding most of their data. Thus you can edit your contacts directly from the file manager:
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Replying to @geoffreylitt @gordonbrander and @yoshikischmitz
It basically works exactly like that. Here's the Contacts editor on Haiku, BeOS' spiritual successor... which is actually just a file manager window with a specific set of attributes displayed.
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For "universal data portability", most things on Haiku that read or write files use "data translators," system-wide add-ons that handle images, text, etc. Apps with custom file formats can thus enable every other app on your system to read/write its files and vice versa.
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The idea of items being movable between apps (in your "universal data portability" article) is also present on Haiku, called "replicants." Primarily it's used for desktop widgets, but any app can provide a replicant "surface" if it wants to: haiku-os.org/docs/welcome/e
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Ah, this is great, I knew about a bunch of these elements from the Be days but haven't followed how Haiku's been evolving them. Do you happen to know the key diffs here vs. BeOS's implementation?
Well, the on-disk format is the same (or nearly so) as Haiku reimplements the Be File System. The userspace APIs are also largely similar, with some slight tweaks. But everything in-between is liable to be somewhat or even very different.
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Haiku on 32-bit x86 is still largely binary-compatible with BeOS R5, though that is less and less relevant these days.