4 ms·

Author here; I just found this thread. Feel free to ask me anything.

radEd 7y ago
Would you recommend this for someone who hasn't yet officially learned operating systems/compilers, but is looking to break into the realm?
- akkartik 7y ago
  I hope so! It's new so you may find breakage, but I'll try to be very responsive answering questions. Mu doesn't have its own OS at the moment. It runs on Linux and on Soso (https://github.com/ozkl/soso https://github.com/ozkl/soso). I don't know either well, but hopefully I'll at least be a good study partner. And you can definitely ask me questions about the language side and the interface with the OS. Mu doesn't have every feature of modern compilers and OSs, but it should hopefully give you a view of something simple working from end to end that you can then carry with you when making sense of more complex systems.
  - radEd 7y ago
    "Mu doesn't have every feature of modern compilers and OSs, but it should hopefully give you a view of something simple working from end to end that you can then carry with you when making sense of more complex systems." Awesome, that's what I was hoping for: something that will lower the entry bar but still provide useful education for the greater world.
kragen 7y ago
I know you would like to make Mu open source, which is to say, free software. What are the problems standing in your way, and how can we help to solve them?
bitminer 7y ago
What's old is new again. Your thoughts on the benefits of language slightly higher level than assembler are interesting. Others have trod this path before. Bliss32 was the systems language for vax/vms back in the 1980s through 2000s. Most of vms was written in it. It was heavily influenced by PL/360 from the days when IBM 360 or 370 mainframes were mostly programmed in assembler. Both languages emitted very predictable assembler from their higher level constructs. They had no optimizations. But their objectives seemed to be focused on readability and predictable output, like your system. The source code for 99% of vms was published on microfiche and distributed with the binary tapes. Worth finding a copy and the accompanying text on vms internals and data structures. An excellent intro to nonTorvalds operating system architecture.
- akkartik 7y ago
  Fascinating. Glad to have this on my radar.

Would you recommend this for someone who hasn't yet officially learned operating systems/compilers, but is looking to break into the realm?

akkartik 7y ago
I hope so! It's new so you may find breakage, but I'll try to be very responsive answering questions. Mu doesn't have its own OS at the moment. It runs on Linux and on Soso (https://github.com/ozkl/soso https://github.com/ozkl/soso). I don't know either well, but hopefully I'll at least be a good study partner. And you can definitely ask me questions about the language side and the interface with the OS. Mu doesn't have every feature of modern compilers and OSs, but it should hopefully give you a view of something simple working from end to end that you can then carry with you when making sense of more complex systems.
- radEd 7y ago
  "Mu doesn't have every feature of modern compilers and OSs, but it should hopefully give you a view of something simple working from end to end that you can then carry with you when making sense of more complex systems." Awesome, that's what I was hoping for: something that will lower the entry bar but still provide useful education for the greater world.

kragen 7y ago

I know you would like to make Mu open source, which is to say, free software. What are the problems standing in your way, and how can we help to solve them?

bitminer 7y ago

What's old is new again. Your thoughts on the benefits of language slightly higher level than assembler are interesting. Others have trod this path before. Bliss32 was the systems language for vax/vms back in the 1980s through 2000s. Most of vms was written in it. It was heavily influenced by PL/360 from the days when IBM 360 or 370 mainframes were mostly programmed in assembler. Both languages emitted very predictable assembler from their higher level constructs. They had no optimizations. But their objectives seemed to be focused on readability and predictable output, like your system. The source code for 99% of vms was published on microfiche and distributed with the binary tapes. Worth finding a copy and the accompanying text on vms internals and data structures. An excellent intro to nonTorvalds operating system architecture.

akkartik 7y ago
Fascinating. Glad to have this on my radar.