SkyOS Now Free (As In Beer) 88
Beardydog writes "SkyOS, the commercial, alternative OS created almost entirely by Robert Szeleney, became free (as in beer) sometime last month. Alternative OS enthusiasts can be forgiven for missing it, as the website has been largely derelict, and the forums overrun with spam, since the project was halted in 2009. It's not clear from the announcement whether the ISO available is the traditional build, or the version rebuilt around Linux. The post announcing the free version provides a license name ('public') and registration code that must be entered during setup. While it isn't quite the open-sourcing that most followers hoped for, it's heartening to know SkyOS won't be completely lost in the mists of time."
For a blast from the past, check out our old stories about SkyOS.
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>Android
First, Android is half closed. You have to bring your own bits to the table to make it work. Amazon did it with the Kindle Fire, and Google has Google Play. But basically no individuals are equipped to leverage Android on their own.
Second, every OS has to start somewhere. I can read your words in 1996 and imagine it about the Linux Kernel.
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Just like MINIX [wikipedia.org]?
Re:And we care...why? (Score:5, Insightful)
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He WROTE AN OPERATING SYSTEM!?
I thought it was pretty AWESOME when it was just those AMBER BOOKS!
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Unless of course you're the curator of the alternative OS museum.
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Re:And we care...why? (Score:4, Insightful)
You have to bring your own bits to the table to make it work. Amazon did it with the Kindle Fire, and Google has Google Play.
Because an Operating System isn't an Operating System, unless you can get a bundled app store with it...
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Well, as part of ensuring less fragmentation in Android between OS versions, Google has created a huge framework (Google Services Framework) to isolate apps from the OS. GSF is a big, binary only library with system level privileges that ensure it doesn't need to ask for more permissions ever.
Of course, AOSP does not have this, and excepting the few app stores outside of Google Play, apps are few and far
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Though in 1996 we didn't actually have tons of free operating systems. Linux added something that was missing.
Then again, this release is hopefully nothing serious, other than a way to say that he's abandoned the project and doesn't really care if people use it or not.
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Kind of. 1996 was the days of OS2 Warp and Windows 95 which notably wasn't free but easily pirated. Linux helped more in the server space and with the emergence of the BSDs. Open/FreeBSD was kind of the bad boys on the block. Linux was already pretty mainstream by 96, we used to use it to drive our 20 node dial up ISP at the time feeding data from a ISDN line.
It was the earlier parts of the 90's where Linux made its ground. Minux was the best that was out there until Linux came along.
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Minix rather ... or for the real pedantic type MINUX
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Ohhhh ... I give up :/
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I guess you don't know why AOSP is called AOSP and Android is called Android. That would be because not all of Android is in AOSP, because Android is not completely open.
Re:And we care...why? (Score:5, Informative)
But basically no individuals are equipped to leverage Android on their own.
Applications are the easy bit. See F-Droid [f-droid.org]. The hard part is getting device drivers for your hardware...
Not again (Score:2, Insightful)
The last thing I come here to read is that somebody else doesn't care about something. What in the hell can I learn from that? I don't give a damn whether you care or not. If you have something useful to say, then say it. If not, shut the hell up.
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slashdotted (Score:2, Funny)
I wonder if the server is running SkyOS?
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Not likely enough (Score:2, Insightful)
Just "gratis for copying" is not enough for not getting lost in the mist of time since it does not help against bit rot: hardware moves on. At some point of time, it will get hard to get devices for this to run on.
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At some point of time, it will get hard to get devices for this to run on.
Considering that would mean a time when x86 emulation software such as DOSbox becomes hard to find.. I don't see it happening until geeks lose interest in the history of computing. Which may have to involve a global thermonuclear war or similar.
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You say that, but it's a veritable nightmare getting the x86 version of NextStep to work in an emulator. Even the emulated hardware has moved too far ahead.
Torrent-Please (Score:1)
Re:Torrent-Please (Score:5, Informative)
has some torrent and magnetlink in the comments. Not sure if its a new version or the links work.
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Sayeth the Wiki...
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Moss: [snorts] SkyOS is the cloud!
Singularity (Score:1)
Legacy Software is quite a problem now with bugs and exploits. I wonder when we will move away from them. It looks to me like all the money hungry corps are moving to closed environments based on the same on crap technology, just locked down.
Such a shitty world we live in. I hope linux gaming takes off. Thats the only thing
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Of course any new operating system would be perfectly coded, free of all bugs and security concerns.
too little too late (Score:5, Informative)
This would have been great... several years ago. His arrogance of demanding that he would only release the source if only someone fully dedicated to leading the project that was the final nail in the coffin. He never deemed anyone worthy of the position so it fell into obscurity. I think we would be better off if the source had just been deleted and page taken down.
Oh yeah, the reason it died is that he drove away the other developers.
SkyOS underwent many changes after this surge in popularity. Because of significant differences at the source level, Szeleney stopped thinking of what was under development as the fifth version of his operating system, and the name "SkyOS 5.0" was rebranded to simply "SkyOS". A more professional demeanor was taken throughout the project
"professional demeanor" means he started acting like an arrogant asshole.
As the years progressed and the other founding members of SkyOS distanced from the project,
turns out that people dont like to be pushed around by arrogant assholes.
SkyOS isn't an operating system, it's a cautionary tale.
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turns out that people dont like to be pushed around by arrogant assholes.
Yet we still have OpenBSD and Linux developers, and frankly, both Linus and Theo are arrogant assholes.
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turns out that people dont like to be pushed around by arrogant assholes.
Yet we still have OpenBSD and Linux developers, and frankly, both Linus and Theo are arrogant assholes.
Arrogant: adjective: having or revealing an exaggerated sense of one's own importance or abilities. I don't think arrogant is QUITE the appropriate term here, do you? No, I must insist. High-handed, maybe, churlish, perhaps. Linus and Theo are the real deal. Whatever their sense of their own importance and abilities is, I doubt it is exaggerated beyond the simple truth. Anyway, it's utterly beside the poin
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"turns out that people dont like to be pushed around by arrogant assholes."
Then why do you linux guys take this from Linus all the time?
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And you know this how? By the many years of experience you've had with your tongue up his ass?
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We don't. What serious linux user ("guru"?) doesn't keep their own source tree? My own has dozens, if not hundreds, of modifications grown into it over the years. (delete qlogicfc? Uh, NO -- it's the only driver that works with some of my (ok, old as dirt) cards. 2min and it lives on in my tree.)
For the record, *every* major distro maintains their own kernel tree.
Well that sounds encouraging... (Score:5, Funny)
>> the website has been largely derelict ... the forums overrun with spam ... the project was halted in 2009 ... not clear from the announcement whether the ISO available is the traditional build, or the version rebuilt around Linux.
Sounds great. I'll install it at once.
AndNothingOfValueWasGained (Score:1)
yes it will. with no development since something like 2009 and none expected in the future... what good is a bunch of compiled bits of an incomplete operating system without the source code and license to do something with it?
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So where do I need to go to get this free beer?
You need to compile it from source.
I'll say one thing... (Score:4, Funny)
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LOOKS FINE ON MY COMPUTER!!!!
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It's not our fault if the english language doesn't have two different words to describe two different things.
Even if we used "gratis" or "free of charge", people would still ask which meaning is to be understood when we use the word "free" and using the word "libre" would have other people complain that it's not in english.
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Both words really do have the same meaning when put in context. As in "this product is free from price" has the same meaning of "you are free to take that with you" and as "you are free to say what you like". But languages evolve continuously over time so that "free" has become a shortcut word to mean "no cost".
What about the word "free" from "I have some free time". Is that "gratis" or "libre"? There may be a distinct meaning to Spanish and French speakers but I think many English speakers would disagr
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It's a nearly meaningless phrase to those who aren't intimately familiar with Richard Stallman's political philosophy. Beer isn't free. Free beer is free. "Free (as in beer)" is merely nonsensical.
Not only this, but it's nonsensical to any who are remotely familiar with beer. To homebrewers (of beer, from which homebrewed software gets its name) the the beer is Free as in Freedom. We give beer freely, and collaborate, and share our recipes to create the beer and benefit by improvements on the recipes that other homebrewers make and bring back to us. Like 'Free Software' it does cost something to make 'Free Beer'. "Free as in Freedom, not Free as in Beer" -- Fools, Draconian copyright laws do no
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Oh, I forgot... Use this instead: "Free as in Liberty, not Free as in Promotional"
It's almost like one would have to purposefully try to be ambiguous to come up with the other phrase. "as in beer"? what does this even mean? Commerical beer or homebrew, or ancient beer or recipies for beer or actual beer?
Further: This is what you've done:
Free - Having Freedom
You don't define shit by using the term itself, morons.
RMS's ideals are grand, but his communication skills are terrible or just plain troll
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Agreed. This term needs to die and stop being used. All the beer I know I have had to pay for.
The term means the opposite of what it was created for.
It's terrible. It's stupid. It contradicts itself. It needs to be removed from use.
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Who cares? free (as in beer) is a fun way to put it.
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GP is just a pedantic neckbeard.
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No. Because that's not what it says.
It doesn't say, "free as in free beer". It says, "free as in beer".
Any non moron who gets beer usually pays for it.
The default state is that you pay for beer.
You are wrong.
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No. Because that's not what it says.
Are you by any chance mentally retarded?
Any non moron who gets beer usually pays for it.
Yes. That doesn't change the fact that 'free beer' is commonly known from events, parties (maybe not so much in your mum's basement, i give you that.), and, in that context, unambiguously means 'gratis'.
And that is why anyone with at least half a brain understands 'free as in beer' is to be taken as 'free as in free beer'.
The default state is that you pay for beer.
This is completely irrelevant.
You are wrong.
You're special.
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And it's wrong. It's meaningless and it's misleading.
Go to a store and ask for free beer.
Good luck.
So now we are waiting (Score:2)
... for SkyNet?
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... for SkyNet?
No, that already exists [wordpress.com]. We're just waiting for the moment it becomes self-aware and inevitably concludes we are a threat.
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Oh Gosh,
how do we prepare against that?
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Was it so hard?
Syllable is the more interesting project (Score:2)
Taking architectural cues from AmigaOS and BeOS, its actually pretty attractive. Gobo Linux was another interesting one that should have gotten more attention.
Technically, Qubes is a desktop OS also. However, the hypervisor part of it is also a main UI feature and once a user acclimates to that they still have most of the Linux-isms to deal with.
Its great for techies though!
Just wait until Murdoch hears about it.... (Score:1)
Released on printed disc? (Score:2)
Does anyone know if SkyOS ever had a "release" on a professionally printed CD/DVD? I can't seem to find actual evidence of this -- only the ability to download/burn a SkyOS Live CD.
Well, that's not good. (Score:2)
All the beer I personally know I had to pay for.
This term, "free as in beer", needs to die in a fire.
It means the opposite of what it is supposed to mean.