5 ms·

I think there is a very real need for a distributed operating system. Operating systems ultimately just virtualize hardware, and its clear to anyone that has us

by c3534l 4y ago

I think there is a very real need for a distributed operating system. Operating systems ultimately just virtualize hardware, and its clear to anyone that has used VMware or Xen that we're building such a system piecemeal and constantly reinventing the operating system wheel. I think this is absolutely where OS design is inevitably destined to evolve into.

renox 4y ago
There's a need but don't forget that all the previous distributed OSs(Plan9, Mosix,..) didn't succeed. So 'inevitably destinated to evolve'? No..
- jdougan 4y ago
  I think it's gonna be like steam engines...lots of historical attempts until the stars align and suddenly people see the need.
  - StillLrning123 4y ago
    Funny thing about steam engines is that we think about them as a thing of the past. But in reality steam engines just scaled up and turned into steam turbines, which are a backbone of society
- stonogo 4y ago
  They succeeded just fine. Most people don't have a use for a distributed operating system, so they were not commercially viable. Since many of them were never meant to be commercial products, it's not really accurate to claim they were unsuccessful. The principles involved work fine to this day.
- c3534l 4y ago
  It wasn't the right time yet. Virtualization has only just come to the data center and taken off. People no longer have their single expensive PC, but utilize a multitude of devices. Cloud storage is just making its way onto people's phones and devices. The full suite of VMware products is essentially already a commercially lucrative operating system for the data center / cloud. I think this is a long term trend rather than a fad. Its not the hottest new framework, but rather the culmination of incremental changes over decades. We might not call it an operating system - we'll probably give it a fancier name to generate hype. But the idea is the same none the less.
  - laumars 4y ago
    Your comment is about 10 years out of date. Possibly more. VMWare usage is actually on the decline now with many companies switching to cloud services (which are generally running Xen). And containerisation, while not a like-for-like replacement for virtualisation, has also eaten aware at some of VMWares market share. Particularly with services like k8s. Those that are dependent on running Windows might still use VMWare but Microsoft Hyper V has also eaten away at VMWares market share too.
    - c3534l 4y ago
      I mean, alright. Xen and Hyper-V then. VMware is just what I'm most familiar with in the data center.
      - laumars 4y ago
        But even in cloud computing, the really compelling offerings (ie serverless) is all containers. Xen is only used as an additional security boundary (ie Docker running on top of Xen). Containers are the software abstraction providing the “distributed” aspect of the GPs argument. And as for Hyper-V, that’s only there for people locked into the Windows ecosystem. You rarely see much distributed computing happening in Windows. Frankly it’s silly to even mention Windows in the same conversation as Plan 9 and other distributed systems.
        c3534l 4y ago
        Okay, but lets say containers are how we manage applications at scale. And so now you want these containers to still be distributed among regions, among different computers, to be increasingly interconnected, online, to be efficient. Maybe even you want kubernetes on bare metal for extra performance. Lets say that's the trend. Where is it going? Its moving towards grouping together heterogenous hardware in different locations as a single abstraction and managing that. You're going to want to abstract away various forms of memory, processors, GPUs, networking, file systems, and you're going to want something like a task manager, you're going to want to manage permissions and licenses. That is, you want the next layer of abstraction beyond that of a single computer. Docker, virtualization, hyperconverged disaggregated infrastructure - whatever the specific incarnation is, they represent different solutions to the same underlying, long-term trends.
- hulitu 4y ago
  I would not consider VMS and Aegis/Domain OS as unsuccessful. They got however in the hands of HP who killed them.

by c3534l 4y ago

renox 4y ago

There's a need but don't forget that all the previous distributed OSs(Plan9, Mosix,..) didn't succeed. So 'inevitably destinated to evolve'? No..

jdougan 4y ago
I think it's gonna be like steam engines...lots of historical attempts until the stars align and suddenly people see the need.
- StillLrning123 4y ago
  Funny thing about steam engines is that we think about them as a thing of the past. But in reality steam engines just scaled up and turned into steam turbines, which are a backbone of society
stonogo 4y ago
They succeeded just fine. Most people don't have a use for a distributed operating system, so they were not commercially viable. Since many of them were never meant to be commercial products, it's not really accurate to claim they were unsuccessful. The principles involved work fine to this day.
c3534l 4y ago
It wasn't the right time yet. Virtualization has only just come to the data center and taken off. People no longer have their single expensive PC, but utilize a multitude of devices. Cloud storage is just making its way onto people's phones and devices. The full suite of VMware products is essentially already a commercially lucrative operating system for the data center / cloud. I think this is a long term trend rather than a fad. Its not the hottest new framework, but rather the culmination of incremental changes over decades. We might not call it an operating system - we'll probably give it a fancier name to generate hype. But the idea is the same none the less.
- laumars 4y ago
  Your comment is about 10 years out of date. Possibly more. VMWare usage is actually on the decline now with many companies switching to cloud services (which are generally running Xen). And containerisation, while not a like-for-like replacement for virtualisation, has also eaten aware at some of VMWares market share. Particularly with services like k8s. Those that are dependent on running Windows might still use VMWare but Microsoft Hyper V has also eaten away at VMWares market share too.
  - c3534l 4y ago
    I mean, alright. Xen and Hyper-V then. VMware is just what I'm most familiar with in the data center.
    - laumars 4y ago
      But even in cloud computing, the really compelling offerings (ie serverless) is all containers. Xen is only used as an additional security boundary (ie Docker running on top of Xen). Containers are the software abstraction providing the “distributed” aspect of the GPs argument. And as for Hyper-V, that’s only there for people locked into the Windows ecosystem. You rarely see much distributed computing happening in Windows. Frankly it’s silly to even mention Windows in the same conversation as Plan 9 and other distributed systems.
      - c3534l 4y ago
        Okay, but lets say containers are how we manage applications at scale. And so now you want these containers to still be distributed among regions, among different computers, to be increasingly interconnected, online, to be efficient. Maybe even you want kubernetes on bare metal for extra performance. Lets say that's the trend. Where is it going? Its moving towards grouping together heterogenous hardware in different locations as a single abstraction and managing that. You're going to want to abstract away various forms of memory, processors, GPUs, networking, file systems, and you're going to want something like a task manager, you're going to want to manage permissions and licenses. That is, you want the next layer of abstraction beyond that of a single computer. Docker, virtualization, hyperconverged disaggregated infrastructure - whatever the specific incarnation is, they represent different solutions to the same underlying, long-term trends.
hulitu 4y ago
I would not consider VMS and Aegis/Domain OS as unsuccessful. They got however in the hands of HP who killed them.