The mascot it super cute lion too. How can a project do everything so right? I was browsing some popular python libraries and they just slapped on the first image they got out of ChatGPT. It's nice to see care in the craft.
A mascot is an animal figure that represents a product or sports team. For example, the penguin named Tux is the mascot of Linux, and the mascot for the Brisbane Broncos rugby team is the horse named Buck the Bronco.
It's an OS built around a verified and formally proofed L4 kernel, ie. a microkernel like QNX or MACH. The L4 is a venerable design reaching back at least 25 years, if not longer. It has seen commercial and research uses, e.g. the SIMKO3 mobile phones or the Fiasco distribution. The term "task" is specific here. Running Linux as a custom operating system is a task in microkernel lingo.
Genode is a framework that can run on many places and on higher level has its own abstractions. Lion OS is based on Microkit the framework developed by the seL4 people that will also be verified. So Lion OS/Microkit is basically the outgrowth of the original seL4 research.
On recent news, LionsOS, as of about a week ago (I got notified via their announcement maillist), includes a router/firewall scenario[0].
Do not miss Gernot Heiser's recent talk[1] at the seL4 Summit, where among other things he shows seL4 massively outperforming Linux in a web server scenario.
> To be successful, many more components are needed.
What is the purpose of this OS ? Can it mint Bitcoin ? Can it do fluid dynamics simulation ? Can it act as an interface to a database ? Can it host a database ? Is it interactive ? What kind of interface it presents to the user ?
That’s a rather luridly practical view that’s entirely out of sync with academia and basic research that provides tangible benefits much further down the line.
Yes, but basic reseach in IT is still not random, but usually has a clear goal, or at least some scope. Like indeed, focus on security? Focus on speed? Focus on reliability? Focus on energy efficency (because it is supposed to run on a tiny embedded device for long).
And the gimmick here seems to be in fact, that it is supposed to be flexibel
"is not a conventional operating system, but contains composable components for creating custom operating systems that are specific to a particular task. Components are joined together using the Microkit tool"
That begs the point: Each application will often run better on some OSes than on others. For example, high traffic websites usually aren't run on Windows 11.
no operating system does. That's application software you're thinking of. So no, it can't. But neither can windows, linux, macos, solaris, templeOS or any others
I'm trying to picture in my mind a person who is a fan of Rust and somehow against an OS with a formally-verified kernel no matter the language. I'm not having much success.
It's funny how people always allude to fanatical Rust developers in the most tangential threads, but they never actually turn up and demand we rewrite the entire Kernel in Rust or whatever terrible takes they're alleged to have.
Rust is supported by the [seL4 Microkit](https://docs.sel4.systems/projects/rust/), which is the core framework enabling LionsOS. LionsOS can currently run components written in Rust, and there are some WIP drivers written in Rust in the seL4 Device Development framework (judging from pull requests).
At least someone hasn't complained about it being 'unix like', always without defining what the non-unix-like OS they want would look like, or where the software to run on it would come from.
First, we could start by what UNIX authors did after they considered UNIX done, looking at Plan 9 and Inferno.
Then there are the OSes already done during the 1960 and 1970 outside Bell Labs, as possible ideas.
As from where the software would come from, if we keep recicling UNIX, we will keep getting UNIX regardless of whatever cool features the OS might offer, as most developers are lazy.
Hence why it is great that while Apple and Google OSes have some UNIX there, bare bones POSIX apps will hardly make it into the store.
… except that Rust’s compiler has been qualified for several safety critical standards, with more to come, and has several formal verification tools as well. Amazon even has placed bounties (and paid some) for proving things about the standard library.
Rust is not as immature or evolving in the ways you imply.
1: https://os.inf.tu-dresden.de/L4/l3elan.html
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lions
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Commentary_on_the_UNIX_Opera...
Mascot is, unrelatedly, also a suburb of Sydney.
like reviving OSfree aka 64bit OS/2
It never happened.
Do not miss Gernot Heiser's recent talk[1] at the seL4 Summit, where among other things he shows seL4 massively outperforming Linux in a web server scenario.
0. https://lionsos.org/docs/examples/firewall/
1. https://youtu.be/wP48V34lDhk
What is the purpose of this OS ? Can it mint Bitcoin ? Can it do fluid dynamics simulation ? Can it act as an interface to a database ? Can it host a database ? Is it interactive ? What kind of interface it presents to the user ?
And the gimmick here seems to be in fact, that it is supposed to be flexibel
"is not a conventional operating system, but contains composable components for creating custom operating systems that are specific to a particular task. Components are joined together using the Microkit tool"
https://github.com/seL4/seL4/issues/487
Then there are the OSes already done during the 1960 and 1970 outside Bell Labs, as possible ideas.
As from where the software would come from, if we keep recicling UNIX, we will keep getting UNIX regardless of whatever cool features the OS might offer, as most developers are lazy.
Hence why it is great that while Apple and Google OSes have some UNIX there, bare bones POSIX apps will hardly make it into the store.
Rust is not as immature or evolving in the ways you imply.