Hello Genodians!
I have something to confess, I am still in love with the traditional desktop. Especially the one that can be found in RISC OS. RISC OS is a *very* different system compared with Genode. It (RISC OS) is insecure by design and the kernel is written in ARM assembly. It is a single tasking os , but the WiMP system adds cooperative multitasking. The system is driven around with SWI's (software interrupts). This might sound archaic and to some extent it is. But it is probably the fastest desktop system around. Most programs have the minimal RAM requirement set to 4M, so a very low footprint. It is also tied to ARM32 cpus. Acorn in England, which invented RISC OS also invented the ARM cpu. In my opinion RISC OS is good as it is. When I say insecure, I mean that there is no isolation between the components. I actually like that because it gives me freedom as a coder to do whatever I like.
So.. Genode..
RISC OS will not work on future ARM cores because of end of line for aarch32 compatible cores. It can't easily be ported because of its design.
My vision is to make a hybrid system with Genode and RISC OS. In my opinion both systems can gain from it. RISC OS gets modernised ways of security and other things that probably never will work in a traditional setup. Genode would gain a desktop as an alternative to Sculpt.
This is a giant project that involves just about all aspects of an operating system.
A little list of where I intend to begin:
* Make Genode running on a 64bit only core, Ihave chosen the Rockchip RK3588 SoC because I have a board and that it features a lot of nice things. * Find a good way to run 32bit arm code. I am looking at the Unicorn cpu emulator. I have done some tests with it and it seems to be ok. The only drawback is the lack of *none* 1:1 mmu mappings. RISC OS relies on mmu fully functional. I have no way of solving that at the moment except to redevice it, a very difficult task. * Establish ways of protocols for communication with the RISC OS layer and core Genode.
I will start alone , but if the project takes off I will invite others.
I have no other coding projects planned for 2023, so this will be the one!
Happy Hacking!
Michael
(I am micken on irc , say hello if you want! )