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Operating Systems Software

Syllable - The Little OS with a Big Future? 397

Posted by simoniker from the um-ah-dah-leh dept.
Vanders writes "Tired of endless Windows security problems? Intrigued by Linux's power but discouraged by its complexity? Tempted by Mac OS but not thrilled with the hardware cost? In an OSNews article, Michael Saunders takes a look at Syllable, the OS that picked up where AtheOS left off over two years ago. Michael takes you through Syllable and shows you what we have been doing these past few years."
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Syllable - The Little OS with a Big Future? More

Syllable - The Little OS with a Big Future?

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  • Sure (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 02, 2004 @03:46PM (#9864679)
    If it can solve the problems Linux has on the desktop, namely incredibly poor software installation and ugly graphics, it might have a chance. It seems promising, but then again, so does Linux. I've been wishing Linux on to the desktop, but it just doesn't seem like it's happening.

    Question: Is there any way to use Linux device drivers with this os? How hard would it be to "port" Syllable to Linux?

    • Re:Sure (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:11PM (#9864829)
      Poor software installation ? Have you ever seen apt-get and portage ?

      • Re:Sure (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Stevyn ( 691306 )
        Portage is the best thing since sliced bread. KDE looks beautiful, better than windows.

        I think his frustrations must stem from RPM based distros like SuSE, Fedora, and Mandrake. RPMs were a good idea, but horrible in practice. Portage is still a tradeoff though. You'll get faster applications and it's easy to install them, but it can take a while to compile. I'll still go with portage any day over RPMs. I think those distros should ditch them because it's really hindering linux adoption.

        • Re:Sure (Score:2, Informative)

          by spacecowboy420 ( 450426 ) *
          I know for a fact that apt-get works on fedora and urpmi works great on Mandrake. Their ease of use makes me curious as to how portage is better. A packaging system that solves dependencies as it installs is the goal of all three - so again why is it better? With portage, you wait for a compile. With apt-get/urpmi the package and it's dependencies are installed rather smoothly - I have yet to see a problem (as long as your sources are good). I rarely need to actually install an rpm as long as I have the plf

          • Re:Sure (Score:3, Interesting)

            by secondsun ( 195377 )
            Portage is better than urpmi because anyone can make an ebuild that works with the tree which requires no though for what the person has on their system. For example, if I want to use the video preview of KDE in a portage system I pass it a flag when I install. If I want to use a rpm based distro I woul dhave to grab the tar balls, grab the xine-dev rpm for my version of linux, futz with the makefiles so everything points in the right direction, then compile.

            • Re:Sure (Score:3, Insightful)

              by Tony Hoyle ( 11698 )
              I gave up on portage simply because the simplicity you describe is its greatest weakness.

              Sure, you can pass flags when you first install, but it doesn't save them for each app, so when you do an upgrade of your system all the recompiles take the default settings - *and* the default dependencies. That sucks.

              I really wanted a copy of lynx that didn't require X (like, you know, every other frikkin distro ships by default). This worked fine for about 10 minutes until I accidentally unmasked a later version

              • Re:Sure (Score:3, Insightful)

                by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 ) *
                Then you did it wrong. Don't just pass flags in when you install unless you want them temporarily. Instead, add them to make.config like you're supposed to, and they'll be there when up upgrade.

                And why did you do a

                emerge lynx
                without doing a
                emerge -p lynx
                first. And how the hell do you "accidentally" unmask a package?

                You must be purposefully trying to spread FUD about Gentoo to make that kind of complaint about portage.

              • Re:Sure (Score:2, Informative)

                by Anonymous Coward
                Try man portage.

                There is a new overlay in /etc/portage that can contain a bunch of files:

                package.unmask
                package.keywords
                package.use
                a nd many others

                These files apply the USE flags and keywords to only the specific package every time you emerge.

                Portage's greatest secret. If only because it didn't exist when people were looking for it :-/

              • Re:Sure (Score:4, Informative)

                by Nasarius ( 593729 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @06:42PM (#9865712)
                echo net-www/links -X >> /etc/portage/package.use

                Portage has had this feature for many months now. BTW, I assumed you're actually talking about links, because lynx has no X USE flag.

          • I used both and I got so fed up with urpmi I switched distros. The database gets outdated so fast and it has a lot less packages than the portage system. I ended up having to manually compile a lot of tarballs because I couldn't find rpms for new programs. I was stuck using kde 3.2 for a while. I love portage because I don't have to wait 3 months to get a new package, or not get it at all. Search through the portage database and see how many outdated packages you have. And for most programs, the compi

    • Re:Sure (Score:3, Informative)

      by Vanders ( 110092 )
      Question: Is there any way to use Linux device drivers with this os?

      Almost all of the drivers are Linux drivers, originally. They have been ported to use Syllable API's, but they're not that different. If you know enough about device drivers you can port a driver from Linux in a couple of days. Some people have ported drivers in a matter of hours.

    • Re:Sure (Score:2, Informative)

      by MrHanky ( 141717 )
      Software installation is Linux is a breeze. It's so simple that a Windows or Mac user will have difficulties adapting to it. Instead of Googling for a utility, download it from Fileplanet or worse (alright, not worse, but maybe from Fileplanet), double-clicking on the .exe and clicking yes and next a couple of times, unchecking all the obnoxious 'default to this application for whatever you don't want it to do' and finally pressing OK, you just simply type 'apt-cache search $whatever' to find what you need,
      • to find what you need, and 'apt-get install emacs21' to install it.
        I can't decide if this is a joke or not.

    • Re:Sure (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Hatta ( 162192 )
      To keep this on topic, the biggest obstacle to any new OS is the number and quality of applications available. It doesn't appear that they're using X, so it won't be easy to port existing applications. But since they're POSIXish, it may be possible to make an Xsyllable port much like the Xdarwin port.

      Of course, that would just be bringing the problems of linux onto Syllable. You still wouldn't be able to, for instance, copy and paste non-text objects between different apps. But still, a working system w

    • Re:Sure (Score:4, Interesting)

      by ajs ( 35943 ) <ajs@ajs . c om> on Monday August 02, 2004 @05:24PM (#9865313) Homepage Journal
      Define ugly graphics.

      There are about 2000 themes for various desktop systems (from Gnome to KDE to WindowMaker) and of those there are probably about 20-30 that are solid enough that I would consider them full default-theme replacements.

      Are you refering to all of those, or did you just install some random distribution and declare it "ugly" (by your standards)? Are you refering to the lack of 3D acceleration on the desktop (e.g. what MacOS/X gets from having written their desktop on top of an Open/GL layer)? If so, that's a valid concern, but starting with the work x.org has done and implementing the rest would certainly have been easier than writing from scratch.

      Question: Is there any way to use Linux device drivers with this os?

      Probably not, and even if this OS were able to take advantage of Linux drivers, I doubt that it could take advantage of the larger subsystems like filesystems, networking stacks, cryptography, etc.

      What I'd really like to see is some of these (obviously massively talented) people who go off and do their own thing, actually starting with a working system like BSD or Linux, but building something of their own, not just a distribution.

      For example, these folks seem to want a system designed for the end-user with lots of media features... ok, so why wouldn't you start with a Linux kernel that supports just about every graphics and sound board on the planet... then layer on pieces as needed. Perhaps a modified X server would help, perhaps not... use it if you need it. Perhaps the filesystems aren't quite up to what you want, but you can always modify existing code. Maybe gstreamer is a good support library for what you're doing, perhaps not.

      Well, you get the idea.

      When Linus started off, he wanted something that didn't exist. BSD wasn't actually available for x86 yet, and down-porting it from Suns and VAXen was more work than he could afford. Meanwhile, Minix was too limited to even work as a good starting point. That's no longer the case, and efforts like this one seem to me much like Linus having decided that he wanted to write his little terminal server by first designing his own system bus.

      Still, I wish them all the luck in the world. I hope it works out well for them... it's just that I can't help thinking about how much more they could do with a good starting point.

      • Re:Sure (Score:5, Informative)

        by Vanders ( 110092 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @05:34PM (#9865373) Homepage
        ..so why wouldn't you start with a Linux kernel that supports just about every graphics and sound board on the planet...

        Not to be too crude, but it is because the Linux driver model sucks large Dyson Spheres through capilary tubing. It has an extremely high Lovelace value. Anyway, the Linux and Syllable kernel APIs (I'm talking about the driver->kernel API, not the API's that define how a driver is managed) are very similiar, so much so that most drivers are ported from Linux in about a week or two. The SiS 900 NIC driver was ported by Michael Krugger in half a day. I ported the Ymfpci OSS driver in about a week of a few hours a day. Syllable has the advantage of being able to draw on a large driver codebase while at the same time totally avoiding what many of us see has the total sucktitude of Linux driver management in general.

        Maybe gstreamer is a good support library for what you're doing, perhaps not.

        Actually, ffmpeg drives almost all of the media codecs currently available.

        Syllable did not spring into life from a total vacum. It was forked from AtheOS, when AtheOS was already at quite an advanced stage. Kurt wrote AtheOS for fun. I and many other developers thought AtheOS was very cool, and I created Syllable to keep it alive and keep it cool. If I were to sit down today, and AtheOS and Syllable did not exist, I would probably do exactly as you describe and start with Linux. I don't think it would be half as well designed as Syllable is.

        • Re:Sure (Score:2)

          by ajs ( 35943 )
          Sounds reasonable. This is clearly one of those cases where a little information (especially information filtered through Slashdot and a casual perusal of a screenshot-heavy site ;-) can be a dangerous thing.

          Thanks for the info on the origins, and like I say: good luck!
    • > If it can solve the problems Linux has on the desktop, namely incredibly poor software installation and ugly graphics, it might have a chance.

      Pick some random bit of hardware out of your junk drawer, and some random desktop machine. Wipe the disk. Try to install windows. Can't find the driver floppy or CD for the hardware? Go to the website and see if there are drivers for the version of windows you have.

      If you're lucky you'll find it. If you're not - let's say you have a Voodoo 3 card - you're

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @03:47PM (#9864681)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:not quite there guys. (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:38PM (#9865051)
      It's not, at least not where it matters to the user! Consider:

      Driver installation. In Linux, mess around compiling your kernel and/or modprobing modules and editing /etc/conf.modules. In Syllable, just copy the driver into a directory.

      User-interface: single toolkit and desktop, sane design. Consistency is the result.

      Plus, there are other things. The initscripts are cleaner and shorter (one of the factors involved in the sub-10-second boots), the GUI subsystem is like X and a toolkit all-in-one, and others.

      So install it, and you'll see that it's not as complex at all!
      • Driver installation. In Linux, mess around compiling your kernel and/or modprobing modules and editing /etc/conf.modules. In Syllable, just copy the driver into a directory.

        I'm reminded of the good old days, when installing a driver was as simple as clicking on the driver's icon and dragging it into the System:Extensions folder. Alas, most modern operating systems aren't anywhere near as usable as MacOS was in 1989...

        Nice to see some are at least starting to get a clue...

      • This sounds like the Amiga DEVS: directory, where each driver was a *.device file, IIRC.

      • Re:not quite there guys. (Score:4, Funny)

        by Brandybuck ( 704397 ) on Tuesday August 03, 2004 @12:03AM (#9867012) Homepage Journal
        User-interface: single toolkit and desktop, sane design. Consistency is the result.

        At least until someone ports GNOME or KDE over. Please, pass a law banning freedom or we will never get a free desktop suitable for the masses!

  • The question is... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 02, 2004 @03:50PM (#9864705)
    Is their web site powered by Syllable? And can it withstand the /.?

  • Finally! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Daneurysm ( 732825 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @03:51PM (#9864714)
    the OS that picked up where AtheOS left off over two years ago

    Finally!

    I've been severely missing an Os that excells in lack of support, lack of compatibility and an unsurpassed vapor-are factor.

    I'm in...

  • *Sigh* Where are you BeOS? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by NightWulf ( 672561 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @03:56PM (#9864752)
    Now *there* was a great OS. Small, lean, easy to use, ran great. I know there's an attempt at an opensource BeOS but it seems to be a long way away. I looked at Syllables website, atleast they have a livecd, I might as well try it, got nothing to lose. Until then i'll still keep my midnight candlelight vigil until BeOS comes back.

    • OMFG, you need an Amiga, man, dude, holy crap! (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Until then i'll still keep my midnight candlelight vigil until BeOS comes back.

      Like totally you totally need like an Amiga, man! Dude, holy crap, the Amiga with OS/2 Warp was like the greatest system ever and you could install it on like a NeXT and it was like so cool because like... uhhh... ummm... JUST TRUST ME, IT WAS THE GREATEST OS EVER!

      Except of course for JoS. And Freedows, which begat the equally successful Alliance OS.

      And don't forget Haiku OS [haiku-os.org], which nobody knows what it is or why anybody

    • Re:*Sigh* Where are you BeOS? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by craqboy ( 588418 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @07:05PM (#9865818)
      there are many different Beos opertating systems that have tried to pick up where Be left off. I just installed BeOS Max [beosmax.org] last week and love it. I have my tv tuner card working with firefox and some other stuff. I never thought an OS would run as good on the lil pentium 200 with 256 Mb of ram.

  • Holy AtheOS (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:02PM (#9864793)
    Can you run AtheOS and still believe in God?

    • Re:Holy AtheOS (Score:5, Funny)

      by spektr ( 466069 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:27PM (#9864942)
      Can you run AtheOS and still believe in God?

      Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide, and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter by it. For the gate is small, and the way is narrow that leads to life, and few are those who find it. -(Matthew 7:13-14)

      Translated into a more contemporary language, this means that you might still be on the safe side, at least as long as you don't touch Windows.

  • i remember AtheOS... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by torpor ( 458 ) <ibisumNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:03PM (#9864796) Homepage Journal
    ... sorta sniffed at it when my aging BeBox arrived at its final unsupported destination, but ... I don't remember if this project had architecture-neutrality as a spec ... and i retired the BeBox and bought a powerbook instead, abandoning x86 forever (or at least as much as possible)...

    still, a powerpc port of another new and interesting OS would be an interesting endeavour. anyone care to answer the question as to how portable syllable is?
    • when you say you retired your BeBox - do you still have it? I've been looking around, trying to find one.... if you're willing to get rid of it I'd love to know!

  • MacOS Comparison (Score:3, Insightful)

    by eeg3 ( 785382 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:23PM (#9864908) Homepage
    "Tempted by Mac OS but not thrilled with the hardware cost?"

    Ugh, having the start menu at the top isn't really making it like MacOS, and it sure seems that's the only similar thing. It doesn't even integrate the application menus into the title bar. Another great part of MacOS is the fact it "just works." I doubt you get this with Syllable. Furthermore, the MacOS UI is a lot nicer.

    Moreover, I doubt this OS will really take off with a "big future." BeOS/QNX/etc were a lot spiffier, and they didn't survive. I wish them the best of luck, however.

    • Re:MacOS Comparison (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Huh? It was suggested as an alternative OS, not a Mac OS replacement, you cretin! As for QNX, I like the way you say it "didn't survive".

      That's the QNX used in millions of embedded devices, is making a profit, and doing very well eh? http://www.qnx.com

      You are astoundingly ill-informed!
      • How does "Tempted by Mac OS but not thrilled with the hardware cost?" equal to just an alternate OS? It's comparing MacOS and Syllable. It's insinuating syllable is a free x86(cheaper hardware) version of a macos-like alternative. Which it's not. That's like saying "tempted by Walmart, but not thrilled with the distance there? Go to Bob's Backyard Retail Store." That's insinuating Bob's backyard retail store and Walmart are similar.

        "You're astoundingly lacking in the reading comprehension department!"
    • I think the editor was pointing out that Syllable runs on any system you want (x86 for example) while you have to run OSX on comparably more expensive PowerPC MAC hardware. THe comment wasn't comparing the interface of the OS's at all.
    • QNX made a big splash with its free download and live floppies but its hardly a failure; the move was intended to attract developers and was a triumph. QNX lives in the embedded world, where it is the most popular OS.

    • Re:MacOS Comparison (Score:2, Interesting)

      by snuf23 ( 182335 )
      It doesn't even integrate the application menus into the title bar. Another great part of MacOS is the fact it "just works."

      Number one thing I HATE about MacOS is the application menu integrated into the title bar. And this is coming from someone who used Amigas and Macs long before Windows or UNIX/Linux. I can't tell you HOW many times on OS 9 I've had to handle support calls where the user is out of memory because they have closed all the windows and don't realize the applications are still open.
      Integra
      • Actually, the reason that having the menu-bar at the top rocks is that it's much faster to access the menu (Fitt's law). Measurements show that Mac users can get to the menu 5 times faster on average than Windows users.

  • Lacking? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mullen ( 14656 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:32PM (#9864988)
    What's lacking: Some features and subsystems not yet coded; limited range of apps; occasional stability issues.

    Wow, just glad it's missing the little things that don't matter.

  • AtheOS (Score:2, Funny)

    by KillerHamster ( 645942 )
    How do you pronounce that? And for that matter, how do you pronounce BeOS? Just wondering, in case I ever have to communicate with a live human about it.

  • Opportunity (Score:5, Interesting)

    by iamdrscience ( 541136 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:33PM (#9865000) Homepage
    I don't know if Syllable will be the ones to take advantage of it (or if anyone will), but I think that in the next few years there is a real opportunity for somebody to take over the PC operating system market. Microsoft has delayed Longhorn numerous times already, and it looks like the difference between WinXP and Longhorn will be as vast as the difference between Windows 3.11 and Win95. That added to the fact that many Windows users are already unsatisfied enough to be looking for something new.

    Apple will not be the ones to usurp windows because their hardware is too expensive for most people. Linux or other BSDs won't be the ones to take over because they're too difficult for most people. Even the most user-friendly distros like Mandrake and Redhat, despite their continuing progress and great efforts, have some problems. Most fundamentally I think it's the fact that despite all of the friendly aspects, it's very difficult for a user of Linux to avoid ever using the command-line. I think the way OSX uses the command-line is much more appropriate -- if you want to use it and learn it, it's there and you can use all of its power, but realistically, no normal user will ever be FORCED to learn how to use it.

    If Syllable manages to get some momentum, they might be able to do it. We'll see.

    Apple could become a contender if they decided to take the leap towards porting OSX to the PC, or working to make their hardware cheaper. Neither of those look very likely though, but they're certainly possibilities, and things I would love to see happen.
    • That added to the fact that many Windows users are already unsatisfied enough to be looking for something new.

      Market share, as reflected in the Google Zeitgeist for June [google.com]:

      Windows (all) 91%, Windows XP 51%, Mac 3%, Linux, 1%

      The only visible trend is the growing dominance of XP, it's share rising at the rate of about 1% a month.

  • One of the pros was low memory use? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LWATCDR ( 28044 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:47PM (#9865099) Homepage Journal
    How is 64 Megs low memory usage?
    Seems like a pretty good chunk of memory if you ask me for a less than complete OS.

  • Is it me or .... (Score:4, Funny)

    by theManInTheYellowHat ( 451261 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @04:53PM (#9865123)
    Or is there only 2 different menu systems now?

    There is the "Start" button which reveals the program listings and there is the CDE type dock system. Syllable seems to have the Start button. With all the different OS's there should be more than 2 menu mechanism's.

    I actually liked Program Manager.

    I guess everyone is trying to give the new users a break.

  • Macs are not expensive (Score:5, Informative)

    by nsayer ( 86181 ) <nsayer@MENCKENkfu.com minus author> on Monday August 02, 2004 @05:23PM (#9865304) Homepage
    The old saw about Macs being expensive is old and tired.

    It is more accurate to say that you cannot buy a "cheap" mac. That is, the lowest price mac you can get is more expensive than the least expensive PC you can buy. But those two machines won't wind up being even close to either other in features or TCO. This is particularly the case with laptops.
    • It is more accurate to say that you cannot buy a "cheap" mac. That is, the lowest price mac you can get is more expensive than the least expensive PC you can buy. But those two machines won't wind up being even close to either other in features or TCO. This is particularly the case with laptops.

      Bullshit.

      When I was in the market for as new laptop, I compared an Apple Powerbook to a Dell Inspiron. The Inspiron was less expensive and had better graphics capability. I'm not talking about a matter of 50 b

  • Why oh God Why (Score:2, Interesting)

    by thebdj ( 768618 )
    Why do we keep trying to bridge this "gap" between Linux and windows? I mean really there is a gap there for a reason. I do not expect nor do I want every modern home user using the operating system that since its inception has been FGBG (For Geeks By Geeks).

    There are other more geek-ish OSes, yes. However, linux is the mainstream one with the most support. There are a few reasons that the gap should stay the huge gap that it currently is.

    If it became a mainstream operating system, maybe not even ne

    • Re:Why oh God Why (Score:5, Informative)

      by Gurney5 ( 39490 ) <me@@@other-space...com> on Monday August 02, 2004 @07:22PM (#9865886) Homepage
      (I'm a member of the Syllable community.)

      We are not trying to bridge any supposed gap between Linux and Windows. We're dissatisfied with Windows as a desktop OS, and we're dissatisfied with Linux as a desktop OS. So, we're working on a completely different OS that meets our needs.

      We do not expect every modern home user to use Syllable.

      I honestly find the final argument in thebdj's post humorous. It reminds me of the "Everything that can be invented, has been invented" argument, and reminds me of the arguments against Linux five to ten years ago, which suggested that Windows and MacOS were "enough."

      thedbj's reading an awful lot into the Syllable project that simply isn't there. When I look at the tremendous amount of work being put into Syllable for such little reward, the idea that we're making Syllable simply to be cool is ludicrous.
      • Don't mind him. There are trolls like him on Apple stories calling Apple to abandon their xnu kernel for a linux kernel. They don't get that now that portage has been ported to OSX, we will have access to all that "linux" available on Gentoo.

  • Syllable development? (Score:4, Funny)

    by aclarke ( 307017 ) <spam.clarke@ca> on Monday August 02, 2004 @07:53PM (#9866054) Homepage
    I'm glad to hear that Syllable development is finally progressing. Now I can use the syllables "fug", "nrut", "lurg" and "gip".

    You might say that this is very "lurgciting" news...

  • Hardware cost? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by JeffTL ( 667728 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @10:08PM (#9866528)
    I suppose you haven't seen the eMac or iBook, then. Yes, you can get a Dell for less, but are the bottom Dells as good? Will they hold up as well or last as long? Are the batteries as good?

  • Not worth it yet (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ShadowRage ( 678728 ) on Monday August 02, 2004 @10:20PM (#9866593) Homepage Journal
    so far my experience with syllable has left a bitter taste in my mouth, not only did it lock up on startup, but left my machine hanging. (power button didnt even respond!)

    of course maybe that was only a problem with the machine's hardware, or compatibility with it.. but still, even linux doesnt do that, nor does beOS or bsd or anything else I've tried..

    I'd give it several more releases before trying it.

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