7 ms·

Endless Operating System

68 points by peterdemin 6y ago

khaledh 6y ago
This seems to be just another GNU/Linux distribution. I think the word "operating system" should be reserved for systems with sufficiently original kernel and/or system code.
- GNOMES 6y ago
  I couldn't locate anywhere on the site where it noted the upstream distro. For those that are curious, I found on Distrowatch that it's based on Debian.
  - dylan-m 6y ago
    Yep, Endless OS is built on Debian, although it has an immutable root filesystem with ostree. Users don't really touch Debian packages. System updates (and rollbacks) all happen atomically, with a reboot. This is a bit more ordinary now, but Endless has been a pioneer in that space. For desktop apps, it is focused on Flatpak, including a large library of Endless-specific offline content and learning apps in its own flatpak repository. Many of these have moved to Flathub, such as https://www.flathub.org/apps/details/com.hack_computer.Clubhouse https://www.flathub.org/apps/details/com.hack_computer.Clubh.... There is a lot of stuff in Endless OS to improve the experience for users with limited connectivity. That's why there are so many simple apps with big content libraries, why ostree is very useful, among other things. We do a lot of stuff upstream, but you can get a pretty good idea what we're all doing over at https://github.com/endlessm/ https://github.com/endlessm/.
riffic 6y ago
they seem to be positioning itself the same way Ubuntu was back in 2004 or so, before Canonical made a hard pivot into where they are today. That space isn't an easy one to operate in. This is the distrowatch page describing the technical details underpinning Endless: https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=endless https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=endless
- lproven 6y ago
  Not really, no. Ubuntu was broadly a continuation of the UserLinux project. A simple, easy-to-install distro, with a single example of each of the mainstream app categories. An installer that asks only the most essential questions; no software ones, no hardware-config ones, not even a root password. But nonetheless a mainstream distro with mainstream choices. Endless is quite different.
geocrasher 6y ago
"useful resources for students and families" "and even works without internet access." "free for individuals and non-commercial use up to 500 computers" I'm confused- who are they targeting? At endlessos.org, I found this: "We're not changing the way technology works... we are working to make it better. We develop our tools to meet the needs of real users with diverse technical challenges to work with. We design them with access, agency, and usability in mind. This approach allows us to create as much positive impact as possible for our communities." Am I the only one who finds such marketing speak to be a sure sign to run the opposite direction and stick with a well known FOSS distro?
- marcodiego 6y ago
  AFAIK they are aiming the educational market. With some emphasis on developing countries and non-connected schools. The OS, for example, comes "with over 50,000 Wikipedia articles".
  - geocrasher 6y ago
    I did see that too- but if that's the case, why not just explicitly say so instead of all the vaguespeak.
    - marcodiego 6y ago
      Probably to avoid narrowing the public.
offtop5 6y ago
Actually I think students need to learn to use apt. I swear, the entire reason I got comfortable with the command line is because when I was 16 I couldn't afford a Windows license, and I ordered a free Ubuntu CD. I'm still very good with the terminal and it serves me well in my six-figure career
- jordache 6y ago
  think about barrier of entry. Your anecdotal life story of overcoming early challenges with linux, that benefited your subsequent career is likely not scalable to the entire human population. I think any reasonable person will align with the notion that low barrier of entry, coupled with an engaging curriculum to grow their level of computing expertise, will net much greater success.
  - offtop5 6y ago
    But why not. The worst thing that happens is maybe a teacher needs to reflash the OS, if you tell kids that no we're not going to play Minecraft today, we're going to make Minecraft you can inspire a lifelong love of programming. Sometimes you just got to strap yourself in and embrace the the terminal. If you're too afraid to try you'll never learn. Once around the same time I actually fried a motherboard by not mounting it properly, a nice computer repair shop owner gave me a bunch of motherboard spacers for free and told me to never Mount the motherboard directly to the case again. I actually love programming in that it's one of the last Fields where you can teach yourself how to do amazing things for free. Sure if you need to deploy things you might need to spend two or three bucks a month on AWS, but even then you can get so much done locally.
    - jordache 6y ago
      You need a carrot at the end of the stick. Ramp up the complexity, with appropriate award system, to help with engagement. Your retroactive approach is saying - gosh, if I had my present day wisdom when I was I kid, then imagine all tactical things I can learn like apt or vim. I'm saying that is not a sustainable approach given a dataset that is the human population.
realo 6y ago
Wow! Church of the machine God strikes... (From Deus Ex) https://images.app.goo.gl/5KHWS599ddTmkvVb8 https://images.app.goo.gl/5KHWS599ddTmkvVb8
mlinksva 6y ago
They announced a pivot (in terms of organization, not technology) early this year https://www.endlessos.org/post/launching-endless-os-foundation https://www.endlessos.org/post/launching-endless-os-foundati...
ThinkingGuy 6y ago
This seems to be similar to Internet-in-a-Box. http://internet-in-a-box.org/ http://internet-in-a-box.org/
lproven 6y ago
Endless is a rather interesting distro. It's aimed to be suitable for non-technical users on fairly low-end hardware, with an internet connection that might be intermittent at best. Some salient but unusual features: • A desktop that is GNOME adapted into a non-desktop metaphor, more like a smartphone: a full-screen app browser, and an app switcher that's loosely like the Windows taskbar. • A read-only root filesystem, with no package manager. • All apps are Flatpaks. • OS upgrades are atomic, whole-system-at-once, like Android or iOS upgrades on a smartphone.
- Maursault 6y ago
  > ...with no package manager. What is the difference between a package manager and an App Store?
  - lproven 6y ago
    This seems like a very simple question and I am inclined to treat it as a trick one, but I will be trusting and try to answer it. The difference is huge. A package manager installs, removes, updates etc. components of the OS. It manipulates files in /bin, /sbin, /lib, /usr and so on. In Endless, the root filesystem is read-only and immutable. It is not possible to modify any of the files provided with the OS in any way, including all of those paths above and others. Flatpak apps are containerised and all of their components are within the app bundle, typically in `/var/lib/flatpak` I believe. (I am not a GNOME user and don't use Flatpak much, but I have a couple of Snap apps installed.) Nothing goes anywhere else or is allowed to install dependencies etc. Think of it like a Smartphone. Android and iOS are both *nix OSes. The entire OS is essentially a single image, kept in Flash, and booted into RAM each time you turn on. The user can't change it in any way. Apps are kept in a separate chunk of flash memory and they can't change the OS. OS updates are a single big file that updates the entire OS partition in one operation. It's a little bit like booting a Live USB with a persistent storage file: nothing can change the SquashFS, but you can add your own files and have them survive a reboot. Endless works the same way. It is comparable to Red Hat Atomic Workstation, Core OS, Chrome OS, and SUSE MicroOS.
  - hangtwenty 6y ago
incrudible 6y ago
This is curious branding. In my language perception, the word "endless" is pretty much universally associated negatively. Even the girl in the stock photo seems to evoke "how long is this going to take?".
- bckr 6y ago
  There is a nice video game that I played on the Wii called "Endless Ocean". The expression on the girl's face on this web page to me looks like "this is cool". So for me "Endless"="Wondrous"
slim 6y ago
this comes preinstalled on asus low end netbooks
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

68 points by peterdemin 6y ago

This seems to be just another GNU/Linux distribution. I think the word "operating system" should be reserved for systems with sufficiently original kernel and/or system code.

GNOMES 6y ago
I couldn't locate anywhere on the site where it noted the upstream distro. For those that are curious, I found on Distrowatch that it's based on Debian.
- dylan-m 6y ago
  Yep, Endless OS is built on Debian, although it has an immutable root filesystem with ostree. Users don't really touch Debian packages. System updates (and rollbacks) all happen atomically, with a reboot. This is a bit more ordinary now, but Endless has been a pioneer in that space. For desktop apps, it is focused on Flatpak, including a large library of Endless-specific offline content and learning apps in its own flatpak repository. Many of these have moved to Flathub, such as https://www.flathub.org/apps/details/com.hack_computer.Clubhouse https://www.flathub.org/apps/details/com.hack_computer.Clubh.... There is a lot of stuff in Endless OS to improve the experience for users with limited connectivity. That's why there are so many simple apps with big content libraries, why ostree is very useful, among other things. We do a lot of stuff upstream, but you can get a pretty good idea what we're all doing over at https://github.com/endlessm/ https://github.com/endlessm/.

riffic 6y ago

they seem to be positioning itself the same way Ubuntu was back in 2004 or so, before Canonical made a hard pivot into where they are today. That space isn't an easy one to operate in. This is the distrowatch page describing the technical details underpinning Endless: https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=endless https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=endless

lproven 6y ago
Not really, no. Ubuntu was broadly a continuation of the UserLinux project. A simple, easy-to-install distro, with a single example of each of the mainstream app categories. An installer that asks only the most essential questions; no software ones, no hardware-config ones, not even a root password. But nonetheless a mainstream distro with mainstream choices. Endless is quite different.

geocrasher 6y ago

"useful resources for students and families" "and even works without internet access." "free for individuals and non-commercial use up to 500 computers" I'm confused- who are they targeting? At endlessos.org, I found this: "We're not changing the way technology works... we are working to make it better. We develop our tools to meet the needs of real users with diverse technical challenges to work with. We design them with access, agency, and usability in mind. This approach allows us to create as much positive impact as possible for our communities." Am I the only one who finds such marketing speak to be a sure sign to run the opposite direction and stick with a well known FOSS distro?

marcodiego 6y ago
AFAIK they are aiming the educational market. With some emphasis on developing countries and non-connected schools. The OS, for example, comes "with over 50,000 Wikipedia articles".
- geocrasher 6y ago
  I did see that too- but if that's the case, why not just explicitly say so instead of all the vaguespeak.
  - marcodiego 6y ago
    Probably to avoid narrowing the public.

offtop5 6y ago

Actually I think students need to learn to use apt. I swear, the entire reason I got comfortable with the command line is because when I was 16 I couldn't afford a Windows license, and I ordered a free Ubuntu CD. I'm still very good with the terminal and it serves me well in my six-figure career

jordache 6y ago
think about barrier of entry. Your anecdotal life story of overcoming early challenges with linux, that benefited your subsequent career is likely not scalable to the entire human population. I think any reasonable person will align with the notion that low barrier of entry, coupled with an engaging curriculum to grow their level of computing expertise, will net much greater success.
- offtop5 6y ago
  But why not. The worst thing that happens is maybe a teacher needs to reflash the OS, if you tell kids that no we're not going to play Minecraft today, we're going to make Minecraft you can inspire a lifelong love of programming. Sometimes you just got to strap yourself in and embrace the the terminal. If you're too afraid to try you'll never learn. Once around the same time I actually fried a motherboard by not mounting it properly, a nice computer repair shop owner gave me a bunch of motherboard spacers for free and told me to never Mount the motherboard directly to the case again. I actually love programming in that it's one of the last Fields where you can teach yourself how to do amazing things for free. Sure if you need to deploy things you might need to spend two or three bucks a month on AWS, but even then you can get so much done locally.
  - jordache 6y ago
    You need a carrot at the end of the stick. Ramp up the complexity, with appropriate award system, to help with engagement. Your retroactive approach is saying - gosh, if I had my present day wisdom when I was I kid, then imagine all tactical things I can learn like apt or vim. I'm saying that is not a sustainable approach given a dataset that is the human population.

realo 6y ago

Wow! Church of the machine God strikes... (From Deus Ex) https://images.app.goo.gl/5KHWS599ddTmkvVb8 https://images.app.goo.gl/5KHWS599ddTmkvVb8

mlinksva 6y ago

They announced a pivot (in terms of organization, not technology) early this year https://www.endlessos.org/post/launching-endless-os-foundation https://www.endlessos.org/post/launching-endless-os-foundati...

ThinkingGuy 6y ago

This seems to be similar to Internet-in-a-Box. http://internet-in-a-box.org/ http://internet-in-a-box.org/

lproven 6y ago

Endless is a rather interesting distro. It's aimed to be suitable for non-technical users on fairly low-end hardware, with an internet connection that might be intermittent at best. Some salient but unusual features: • A desktop that is GNOME adapted into a non-desktop metaphor, more like a smartphone: a full-screen app browser, and an app switcher that's loosely like the Windows taskbar. • A read-only root filesystem, with no package manager. • All apps are Flatpaks. • OS upgrades are atomic, whole-system-at-once, like Android or iOS upgrades on a smartphone.

Maursault 6y ago
> ...with no package manager. What is the difference between a package manager and an App Store?
- lproven 6y ago
  This seems like a very simple question and I am inclined to treat it as a trick one, but I will be trusting and try to answer it. The difference is huge. A package manager installs, removes, updates etc. components of the OS. It manipulates files in /bin, /sbin, /lib, /usr and so on. In Endless, the root filesystem is read-only and immutable. It is not possible to modify any of the files provided with the OS in any way, including all of those paths above and others. Flatpak apps are containerised and all of their components are within the app bundle, typically in `/var/lib/flatpak` I believe. (I am not a GNOME user and don't use Flatpak much, but I have a couple of Snap apps installed.) Nothing goes anywhere else or is allowed to install dependencies etc. Think of it like a Smartphone. Android and iOS are both *nix OSes. The entire OS is essentially a single image, kept in Flash, and booted into RAM each time you turn on. The user can't change it in any way. Apps are kept in a separate chunk of flash memory and they can't change the OS. OS updates are a single big file that updates the entire OS partition in one operation. It's a little bit like booting a Live USB with a persistent storage file: nothing can change the SquashFS, but you can add your own files and have them survive a reboot. Endless works the same way. It is comparable to Red Hat Atomic Workstation, Core OS, Chrome OS, and SUSE MicroOS.
- hangtwenty 6y ago

incrudible 6y ago

This is curious branding. In my language perception, the word "endless" is pretty much universally associated negatively. Even the girl in the stock photo seems to evoke "how long is this going to take?".

bckr 6y ago
There is a nice video game that I played on the Wii called "Endless Ocean". The expression on the girl's face on this web page to me looks like "this is cool". So for me "Endless"="Wondrous"

slim 6y ago

this comes preinstalled on asus low end netbooks

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]