Linux - KernelThis forum is for all discussion relating to the Linux kernel.
Notices
Welcome to LinuxQuestions.org, a friendly and active Linux Community.
You are currently viewing LQ as a guest. By joining our community you will have the ability to post topics, receive our newsletter, use the advanced search, subscribe to threads and access many other special features. Registration is quick, simple and absolutely free. Join our community today!
Note that registered members see fewer ads, and ContentLink is completely disabled once you log in.
If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us. If you need to reset your password, click here.
Having a problem logging in? Please visit this page to clear all LQ-related cookies.
Get a virtual cloud desktop with the Linux distro that you want in less than five minutes with Shells! With over 10 pre-installed distros to choose from, the worry-free installation life is here! Whether you are a digital nomad or just looking for flexibility, Shells can put your Linux machine on the device that you want to use.
Exclusive for LQ members, get up to 45% off per month. Click here for more info.
I'm made my own Operating system before and it was a really cool experience! But however I was interested in the linux kernel and how it worked. Then I wondered if it would be possible to make an OS with just the linux kernel. Now its only a kernel and I know but is it still possible to give it a shell and program it into an functional OS? if yes then correct me if im wrong but wouldn't that be a good idea? Linux already has support for many many devices and can run on tiny cellphones and crappy toasters. It can even run on something with very limited technology so thats why im thinking about this. It would just be pretty convenient
that is what pretty much any linux distribution is. just a few programs on top of a kernel. of course you can roll your own. LFS is a good project that will make sure you get only what you absolutely need. Personally I'd pick Arch or any other minimal distro. Otherwise rolling my own is far to much work for me.
that is what pretty much any linux distribution is. just a few programs on top of a kernel. of course you can roll your own. LFS is a good project that will make sure you get only what you absolutely need. Personally I'd pick Arch or any other minimal distro. Otherwise rolling my own is far to much work for me.
I wanna do it with a way that involves coding and actually looking into the kernel itself.
Plus I have tried using LFS multiple times and have failed every single time. Compiling the kernel from source the regular
Way was so much easier.
Think about that a bit: everything would be done in the kernel, so there would be no security level separation. Everything the user did would take place as a kernel process, and would HAVE to. You would have to fold in TONS of code to make it properly multiuser and add safety between users, recreate all of the security features of a ton of packages that work above the kernel to add OS features, security management, device management, network management, user management, and basically everything GNU because none of that preexisting software would work. And all of that would have to be pretty good before you could shim on an interface to support something like Xwindows or a different GUI!
When you got halfway done you might have something that would look like a broken hybrid between MS-DOS and MPM-II that would not run most applications not explicitly written just for it.
DARN! Now I feel like I am talking myself into something.
Think about that a bit: everything would be done in the kernel, so there would be no security level separation. Everything the user did would take place as a kernel process, and would HAVE to. You would have to fold in TONS of code to make it properly multiuser and add safety between users, recreate all of the security features of a ton of packages that work above the kernel to add OS features, security management, device management, network management, user management, and basically everything GNU because none of that preexisting software would work. And all of that would have to be pretty good before you could shim on an interface to support something like Xwindows or a different GUI!
When you got halfway done you might have something that would look like a broken hybrid between MS-DOS and MPM-II that would not run most applications not explicitly written just for it.
DARN! Now I feel like I am talking myself into something.
I have made an entire OS from SCRATCH 0 of that sounds pretty hard believe it or not. and luckily I am going for a dos like OS
the os is not the linux kernel itself, the os is split into different parts (like kernel, shell, and others). It was made intentionally. You can [try to] make a new os based on the linux kernel (if you wish), but creating a full os is not the same as creating/building a kernel. And obviously you need to specify exactly what do you mean by os. How do you want (for example) run firefox on it?
Building in a shell is obviously not impossible because GRUB does it. The GRUB kernel is basically a stripped-down Linux kernel with limited hardware support and no process management. The GRUB shell is a kernel module that gets loaded and can then read the configuration file and create a menu from it. The commands in the file map to other modules, not to external programs.
I think it would be a fun project to have the Linux kernel start a shell that emulates CMD.EXE. Start the screen in blocky 80x25 character mode and have a retro DOS environment on a modern 64-bit computer.
Source for the kernel is available. Source for the shells are available. Building the minimal modules and a shell into the kernel would certainly be possible. Obscene, but possible.
Let me know what you come up with. I suspect several of us might like to take a look at the results.
I see. I was able to boot up tiny linux into a virtualmachine and I can see that it does infact
does already have a shell. However, I'm gonna need more than the basic commands to get an spinoff up and running.
Is there a way to install packages over into tinycore linux? I'm using the bare metal one with only a terminal.
LinuxQuestions.org is looking for people interested in writing
Editorials, Articles, Reviews, and more. If you'd like to contribute
content, let us know.