[Coco] Possible OS-9 Project

[John E. Malmberg]

James Ross wrote:

> - It would be written in 100% Intel Assembly Language.  Ok, I know,
> this is heresy, but ... hey, assembly is assembly isn't it?  Anyway,
> when Motorola dropped the 6809 like syntax in the 680x0 series, I
> thought that was heresy too! At that point I didn't feel like I needed
> to stay loyal to Motorola anymore :) There will never be an assembly
> language syntax we liked as much as the 6809!

That choice eliminates a number of platforms that would run as a host.
It currently is a rare assembly language programmer that can really do 
better than the optimizer on a good C compiler.

> - And here is where is applies to this group.  It would have a binary
> / emulation compatibility mode that could run original CoCo OS-9 Level
> I/II applications.  Yet the file system, screen, and keyboard calls
> would use the real physical devices and not emulated ones.  Hence,
> you could share the screen and data files amongst native 32 bit apps
> and original CoCo OS-9 programs. 

Using the real devices requires a special module for each display card. 
  The video card manufacturers are allegedly only providing the 
information to run their cards at the fastest speeds to a certain 
operating system vendor.  The graphics drivers for LINUX are functional, 
but since the money and marketshare is with the other vendor, that is 
where the drivers are optimized.

So it would be better to provide a library that could interface to both 
X-11/Motif and Microsoft Windows than to try to get to the hardware.  I 
am not sure what Macintosh needs now that their OS is UNIX based.

> - The design would match that of the System User's Guides and System's
> Programmer's Manual as closely as possible. No more and no less (at
> least for the final first version), but on an Intel, full 32bit
> address space.  The only feature not available on the 6809 that would
> be added is task memory protection. So that the OS itself or other
> programs would not be clobbered by a rogue app.  Also the ticks could
> probably be 1000 per second instead of 10. 

There are already a number of botique mini-unix like OS's out there, 
none with any mainstream applications.

Having a way to run COCO applications, or being able to recompile them 
on current hardware would be nice.

Otherwise, the best way to get what you want is to start with a mininal 
LINUX kernel, and add the OS-9 API to it.

The two dominant programming APIs for new development is the WIN32 model 
and the LINUX model which has overtaken "The Open Group" Official UNIX 
standard.

If you are going to make something have memory protection, in order to 
use it properly, you also need instruction restart.  Instruction restart 
give you virtual memory.

> So there you have it.  So that is what I am thinking about starting.
> Is it worth it?   I am not sure.  It would be fun to try and tinker
> with.  I've longed for a desktop replacement to Windows, other than
> Linux.  This could be the foundation for such an OS.  I am not a big
> Linux fan on the desktop, whole other topic though.  

It is up to you and who ever wants to join you.  I do operating system 
work for a living, and have no interest in creating one on my own time.

But providing a way to run my old programs on modern hardware, or 
develope new programs on my modern hardware to run on the older stuff, 
then I am interested.

One project that I would like to see is something that could interpret 
Super Extended Color Disk Basic on either OS-9 or another platform that 
would be free of any copyright issues.

A bonus is if the EXEC and USR calls would also work.

-John
wb8tyw at qsl.net
Personal Opinion Only