There a only a handful of viable operating systems out there (Linux, Windows, and (?). What makes it so difficult to make a fresh operating system?
In: Technology
I’m assuming you mean PC operating systems.
– Driver support. PC’s have lots of different hardware. Good luck either (a) writing hundreds of device drivers, or (b) getting wide adoption if you require a specific brand of motherboard, HDD, NIC, GPU, etc.
– QA and optimization of core features. For core OS functions like memory management, process scheduling, mutliprocessor, I/O handling, filesystems, etc., it’s easy enough for a smart undergrad working alone to write a simple implementation that does the bare minimum to get up and running. It’s a whole lot harder to write a production-quality implementation that has high speed and low memory usage, works well for a wide variety of usage patterns, and is rock-solid bug-free when running on millions of machines with years of uptime.
– Non-OS components. A popular OS is really an entire ecosystem, not just a kernel. You need support, marketing, package management, a GUI system, and applications.
Most of all, you need a compelling reason for users to use your OS. The top dogs all have a rock-solid reason for people to use them:
– Windows is pre-installed on most PC’s.
– Mac has unique branding and marketing, it’s a premium option with high quality (spoiler: it’s not the best OS, only the most expensive).
– Linux is free and open-source and UNIX compatible.
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