Anyone have any experience with SkyOS?

[DnetMHZ]

I read some reviews and interviews with the developers, and it seems pretty interesting.

I signed up to be a beta tester. We'll see how that goes.

Anybody used it at all?

http://www.skyos.org/

 

[Megatomic]

Looks like a nice UI. I've heard of it before but I've never used it. If you get in let us know how you like it.

 

[silverpig]

I've heard of it but have never tried it...

 

[n0cmonkey]

I read about it occassionally on osnews. I'm not increadibly interested.

 

[DnetMHZ]

Once I get my download link and get it installed I'll report back.

 

[timswim78]

I think that they may have a hard time selling a new OS for x86 machines. I think that people who wish to pay money will buy Windows or a commercial flavor of linux. Those who don't wish to buy an OS will use linux, freebsd, or something else.

 

[DnetMHZ]

Originally posted by: timswim78
I think that they may have a hard time selling a new OS for x86 machines. I think that people who wish to pay money will buy Windows or a commercial flavor of linux. Those who don't wish to buy an OS will use linux, freebsd, or something else.

The final version of the OS is going to be free (as was the previous release), they charge for the beta simply to fund development.

 

[timswim78]

Originally posted by: DnetMHZ

Originally posted by: timswim78
I think that they may have a hard time selling a new OS for x86 machines. I think that people who wish to pay money will buy Windows or a commercial flavor of linux. Those who don't wish to buy an OS will use linux, freebsd, or something else.

The final version of the OS is going to be free (as was the previous release), they charge for the beta simply to fund development.

That's not the way that I read it.

4. Is SkyOS a commercial operating system?
Yes. As of SkyOS 5.0, SkyOS will be a commercial operating system.


5. Is SkyOS open-source?
No. SkyOS is a closed-source operating system.

8. How much does SkyOS cost?
As of right now, there is no version available for sale. SkyOS v5.0 is in beta phase, and joining the beta-testing team costs $30 USD. As a member of the beta team, you have access to the following:
- All of the betas and release candidates before v5.0 final is released;
- Access to the special beta forum;
- A copy of 5.0 final when it is released.

 

[n0cmonkey]

People still use Amigas. There is a new Amiga, Inc. There's hardware and software.

SkyOS has a place. :beer:

 

[OffTopic1]

No experience with SkyOS, however I like to know more. Is there a hardware compatible list available?

It look to me like another *nix variant like QNX/BEOS that isn't going to go much beyond beta.

 

[timswim78]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey
People still use Amigas. There is a new Amiga, Inc. There's hardware and software.

SkyOS has a place. :beer:

I'm glad to see that people are working on new OS's. Hopefully, they will come up with some great, innovative ideas.

 

[Nothinman]

I don't really see the point. IMO it would make sense for them to put their efforts into already existing software like WINE and Gnome, I mean why waste time writing low level things like hardware drivers, TCP/IP stack, VM, etc that are already available in good, well tested areas like Linux and FreeBSD. I mean hell, unless the About page is out of date, the thing doesn't even support USB2 yet.

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
I don't really see the point. IMO it would make sense for them to put their efforts into already existing software like WINE and Gnome, I mean why waste time writing low level things like hardware drivers, TCP/IP stack, VM, etc that are already available in good, well tested areas like Linux and FreeBSD. I mean hell, unless the About page is out of date, the thing doesn't even support USB2 yet.

Yep. They are wasting their time.

What they should do, if they want to sell closed source software, is create a new GUI and various desktop applicatigosn for a Linux or BSD based operating system and try to compete against OS X rather then redoing something that is already freely aviable to them.

 

[gsaldivar]

From their front page:

Would you be interested in buying a computer with SkyOS pre-installed on it, and if so, how much would you be willing to spend?

Yes, and I would be willing to spend up to $500. 20.0 % (1364)
Yes, and I would be willing to spend up to $800. 10.5 % (715)
Yes, and I would be willing to spend up to $1000. 6.9 % (468)
Yes, and I would be willing to spend up to $1500. 5.1 % (349)
Yes, and I would be willing to spend over $1500. 1.8 % (121)
No, I would rather just use my current system 55.7 % (3800)

lmao

 

[n0cmonkey]

Some of you guys are so disappointing. Choice is fine when it comes to Linux, but choose to do something you find fun that doesn't involve some of that crap and you're wasting your time. Whatever. I hope they're having fun. I also hope the Debian people stop wasting their time and start helping out the redhat group. Redhat has the bigger user base, so it only makes sense. :roll:

 

[Nothinman]

Lots of people are wasting their time on various projects, but usually there's a reason like licensing or something. To me it seems like the SkyOS people are trying to come up with a unix-like OS that looks pretty and runs Windows executables and call me crazy but we already have the base of those things in many forms.

I also hope the Debian people stop wasting their time and start helping out the redhat group. Redhat has the bigger user base, so it only makes sense

It's hard to say who has the bigger userbase since there's no way to accurately gauge it. And as I said, there's a valid difference between those two projects and they share a lot of common code so the overlap is a lot smaller.

Are you really telling me that you think it's smarter for the SkyOS people to start from scratch writing an OS when they could have just as easily taken one of the BSD kernels and had at least 50% of the work done already? Adding a filesystem and kernel graphical system to FreeBSD would probably be a lot easier than writing one from scratch. If they would have done that they would be able to concentrate on what they're really shooting for which seems to be an in-kernel graphical system and a UI they like, instead of worrying about writing drivers for network cards that has been done at least 3 times already.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Lots of people are wasting their time on various projects, but usually there's a reason like licensing or something. To me it seems like the SkyOS people are trying to come up with a unix-like OS that looks pretty and runs Windows executables and call me crazy but we already have the base of those things in many forms.

I also hope the Debian people stop wasting their time and start helping out the redhat group. Redhat has the bigger user base, so it only makes sense

It's hard to say who has the bigger userbase since there's no way to accurately gauge it. And as I said, there's a valid difference between those two projects and they share a lot of common code so the overlap is a lot smaller.

Are you really telling me that you think it's smarter for the SkyOS people to start from scratch writing an OS when they could have just as easily taken one of the BSD kernels and had at least 50% of the work done already? Adding a filesystem and kernel graphical system to FreeBSD would probably be a lot easier than writing one from scratch. If they would have done that they would be able to concentrate on what they're really shooting for which seems to be an in-kernel graphical system and a UI they like, instead of worrying about writing drivers for network cards that has been done at least 3 times already.

I'm just saying I think they should do what they want to do. I don't see any point in giving them crap for that. :beer:

 

[Netopia]

Originally posted by: OffTopic

No experience with SkyOS, however I like to know more. Is there a hardware compatible list available?

It look to me like another *nix variant like QNX/BEOS that isn't going to go much beyond beta.

I don't know about QNX, but BeOS wasn't a *nix variant. It was a brand new from the ground up OS based on nothing but itself. It had a Posix compliant shell, but you could probably write one of those for Windows, so that doesn't make it *nix.

Joe

 

[n0cmonkey]

Isn't QNX popular in the embedded world or something?

 

[DnetMHZ]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey
Isn't QNX popular in the embedded world or something?

I believe so.

 

[Childs]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Are you really telling me that you think it's smarter for the SkyOS people to start from scratch writing an OS when they could have just as easily taken one of the BSD kernels and had at least 50% of the work done already? Adding a filesystem and kernel graphical system to FreeBSD would probably be a lot easier than writing one from scratch. If they would have done that they would be able to concentrate on what they're really shooting for which seems to be an in-kernel graphical system and a UI they like, instead of worrying about writing drivers for network cards that has been done at least 3 times already.

If they can come up with a better OS than its not wasting their time IMO. Where's your sense of adventure? Yeah there maybe other projects out there that they could base a new OS off of, but who's to say that the existing approaches are the right path to take. Linus wasn't wasting his time. In a endevour like this, there's no way to tell if they wasted their time until their goals are unattainable. Even then, some of the techniques they used might be useful in other projects.

Personally, I think software, especially OSes, should be rewritten every so often. Eventually you reach a point of deminishing returns when you continue to build on something time after time. You end up with lots of baggage.

Just my $.02.

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Lots of people are wasting their time on various projects, but usually there's a reason like licensing or something. To me it seems like the SkyOS people are trying to come up with a unix-like OS that looks pretty and runs Windows executables and call me crazy but we already have the base of those things in many forms.

I also hope the Debian people stop wasting their time and start helping out the redhat group. Redhat has the bigger user base, so it only makes sense

It's hard to say who has the bigger userbase since there's no way to accurately gauge it. And as I said, there's a valid difference between those two projects and they share a lot of common code so the overlap is a lot smaller.

Are you really telling me that you think it's smarter for the SkyOS people to start from scratch writing an OS when they could have just as easily taken one of the BSD kernels and had at least 50% of the work done already? Adding a filesystem and kernel graphical system to FreeBSD would probably be a lot easier than writing one from scratch. If they would have done that they would be able to concentrate on what they're really shooting for which seems to be an in-kernel graphical system and a UI they like, instead of worrying about writing drivers for network cards that has been done at least 3 times already.

Well, before Linux there was Minix, BSD, and The HURD was just around the corner

 

[Nothinman]

If they can come up with a better OS than its not wasting their time IMO

If it didn't work for IBM when Windows wasn't nearly as ingrained in society as it is now, what makes you think these guys can do it?

Where's your sense of adventure?

I guess I'm getting old, I'd rather not sit around reinventing the wheel every few years.

Linus wasn't wasting his time

Linus wasn't doing it as a commercial endeavor, he was doing it because he wanted unix on his PC and there wasn't anything else available. Do you really think Linux would have gained as much momentum as it did if it were closed source?

Personally, I think software, especially OSes, should be rewritten every so often. Eventually you reach a point of deminishing returns when you continue to build on something time after time. You end up with lots of baggage.

But OSes are some of the most difficult things to write properly, so why waste your time reinventing something that's already been written and debugged? Especially considering how many we have available already.

Well, before Linux there was Minix, BSD, and The HURD was just around the corner

Minix and BSD had licensing issues and HURD has been "just around the corner" for 20 years =)

 

[OffTopic1]

Originally posted by: Netopia

Originally posted by: OffTopic

No experience with SkyOS, however I like to know more. Is there a hardware compatible list available?

It look to me like another *nix variant like QNX/BEOS that isn't going to go much beyond beta.

I don't know about QNX, but BeOS wasn't a *nix variant. It was a brand new from the ground up OS based on nothing but itself. It had a Posix compliant shell, but you could probably write one of those for Windows, so that doesn't make it *nix.

Joe

Sorry to call it *nix...just grouping everyone under one umbrella (DOS/Windows was based off Unix too, BeOS file system was based of Unix, and QNX has the most elegant microkernel there is). I loved BeOS/QNX, and was hopping one of them become a viable alternative to Windows, because IMHO, it would be a better for me to migrate from Amiga.

I remembered running QNX off a single floppy with GUI, browser & text editor.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

If they can come up with a better OS than its not wasting their time IMO

If it didn't work for IBM when Windows wasn't nearly as ingrained in society as it is now, what makes you think these guys can do it?

It didn't work? Plenty of institutions still rely on OS/2. It didn't make IBM as much money as they had hoped, but that doesn't mean it "didn't work."

Where's your sense of adventure?

I guess I'm getting old, I'd rather not sit around reinventing the wheel every few years.

It's not. They're making a new and exciting wheel-like thing.

Linus wasn't wasting his time

Linus wasn't doing it as a commercial endeavor, he was doing it because he wanted unix on his PC and there wasn't anything else available. Do you really think Linux would have gained as much momentum as it did if it were closed source?

BSD was quite available. If it wasn't for that stupid lawsuit, Linux might have been working on BSD instead. :Q