4 ms·

QNX was the OS that Navigator, show control software, runs on. I ran it for over 6 years, and it was bullet proof and snappy. Isn't Minix a microkernel too? Wha

by eggy 3y ago

QNX was the OS that Navigator, show control software, runs on. I ran it for over 6 years, and it was bullet proof and snappy. Isn't Minix a microkernel too? What makes Minix an untrue microkernel? I ran Minix back in the day - 1990s.

nqwiudhnoaq73 3y ago
Everyone with an IntelME is running Minix :)
- rbanffy 3y ago
  But not as their OS. The little Minix computer is owned and controlled by Intel ;-)
tyingq 3y ago
Fuchsia's Zircon might count also. Google used to specifically call it a microkernel. Though they updated the descriptive language to just "kernel" after it drifted further from LK and the number of syscalls got pretty high.
andsoitis 3y ago
> Isn't Minix a microkernel too? What makes Minix an untrue microkernel? According to http://minix3.org http://minix3.org and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minix Minix is a microkernel. https://wiki.osdev.org/Microkernel https://wiki.osdev.org/Microkernel also lists Mach and AmigaOS and Wikipedia lists a few more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microkernel#Examples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microkernel#Examples
- lproven 3y ago
  [OP here] Minix 3 totally is, but it's also incomplete, and as Dr Tanenbaum has retired, it probably always will be. Mach was valid, but the only successful version, Apple's macOS, has a huge in-kernel "Unix server" derived from FreeBSD code, so it's not a microkernel any more. The OSF's OSF/1 is long gone. So is MkLinux. IPC performance killed Mach, which led to L4, seL4 and many others, none of which have ever gone mainstream or been widely deployed in production, AFAIK. AmigaOS does not count, because it has no memory protection: all code runs in a single memory space, which makes a microkernel-like design simple, as there are no barriers to interprocess communication -- but also no use of an MMU chip whatsoever and as a result it was and is as unstable as classic MacOS or Windows 3.x.
  - sillywalk 3y ago
    As others have pointed out, the Secure Enclave in Apple Silicon runs a variant of L4, so that's 1+billion devices in production.
    - harry8 3y ago
      I'll bet you a signed dollar it is not being run as a multi-server, microkernel based OS. I'd go further and say L4 being designed as microkernel is nothing more than an amusing piece of trivia in it's use by Apple and that the actual OS that does stuff will be as monolithic as any other used by apple.
      - astrange 3y ago
        What a strange thing to say on no evidence. Actually, iOS/macOS itself isn't a monolithic OS anymore as many of the important hardware drivers like wifi have moved to userland processes. Of course, it was never fully monolithic because it does upcalls for things like NFS mounts and disk images.
      - monocasa 3y ago
        You would be wrong; SEPOS is pretty good about splitting work into separate services.
  - balou23 3y ago
    OKL4 was shipped with 1.5 Billion mobile devices using Qualcomm chips Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20120211210405/http://www.ok-labs.com/releases/release/ok-labs-software-surpasses-milestone-of-1.5-billion-mobile-device-shipments https://web.archive.org/web/20120211210405/http://www.ok-lab..., via https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L4_microkernel_family#Commercial_deployment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L4_microkernel_family#Commerci...
- eggy 3y ago
  I ran Mach on my PowerPC Mac in 1997 or thereabouts. I ran Minix as well. QNX was a pleasure while running Navigator.

by eggy 3y ago

nqwiudhnoaq73 3y ago

Everyone with an IntelME is running Minix :)

rbanffy 3y ago
But not as their OS. The little Minix computer is owned and controlled by Intel ;-)

tyingq 3y ago

Fuchsia's Zircon might count also. Google used to specifically call it a microkernel. Though they updated the descriptive language to just "kernel" after it drifted further from LK and the number of syscalls got pretty high.

andsoitis 3y ago

> Isn't Minix a microkernel too? What makes Minix an untrue microkernel? According to http://minix3.org http://minix3.org and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minix Minix is a microkernel. https://wiki.osdev.org/Microkernel https://wiki.osdev.org/Microkernel also lists Mach and AmigaOS and Wikipedia lists a few more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microkernel#Examples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microkernel#Examples

lproven 3y ago
[OP here] Minix 3 totally is, but it's also incomplete, and as Dr Tanenbaum has retired, it probably always will be. Mach was valid, but the only successful version, Apple's macOS, has a huge in-kernel "Unix server" derived from FreeBSD code, so it's not a microkernel any more. The OSF's OSF/1 is long gone. So is MkLinux. IPC performance killed Mach, which led to L4, seL4 and many others, none of which have ever gone mainstream or been widely deployed in production, AFAIK. AmigaOS does not count, because it has no memory protection: all code runs in a single memory space, which makes a microkernel-like design simple, as there are no barriers to interprocess communication -- but also no use of an MMU chip whatsoever and as a result it was and is as unstable as classic MacOS or Windows 3.x.
- sillywalk 3y ago
  As others have pointed out, the Secure Enclave in Apple Silicon runs a variant of L4, so that's 1+billion devices in production.
  - harry8 3y ago
    I'll bet you a signed dollar it is not being run as a multi-server, microkernel based OS. I'd go further and say L4 being designed as microkernel is nothing more than an amusing piece of trivia in it's use by Apple and that the actual OS that does stuff will be as monolithic as any other used by apple.
    - astrange 3y ago
      What a strange thing to say on no evidence. Actually, iOS/macOS itself isn't a monolithic OS anymore as many of the important hardware drivers like wifi have moved to userland processes. Of course, it was never fully monolithic because it does upcalls for things like NFS mounts and disk images.
    - monocasa 3y ago
      You would be wrong; SEPOS is pretty good about splitting work into separate services.
- balou23 3y ago
  OKL4 was shipped with 1.5 Billion mobile devices using Qualcomm chips Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20120211210405/http://www.ok-labs.com/releases/release/ok-labs-software-surpasses-milestone-of-1.5-billion-mobile-device-shipments https://web.archive.org/web/20120211210405/http://www.ok-lab..., via https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L4_microkernel_family#Commercial_deployment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L4_microkernel_family#Commerci...
eggy 3y ago
I ran Mach on my PowerPC Mac in 1997 or thereabouts. I ran Minix as well. QNX was a pleasure while running Navigator.