MIT To Release Next-Generation OS "Cesium"

snowphoton writes: "Slant-Six magazine has an article about Cesium, a fascinating (and soon public) operating system from the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science. A virtual machine, an object-oriented database-driven filesystem, and a 3D GUI mean that this isn't your father's operating system." This article doesn't address licensing, except to say that it "is due to be released by the end of the year for free," so it will be interesting to see just what "free" means here. Update: Yep, it's a hoax. Fun! Tricks are neat!

Comments

OMG... No more crappy DX8 overlays

[Talez]

Cesium's architecture and abilities are enough to make even the most jaded computer enthusiast start frothing at the mouth. *starts frothing at the mouth* I've tried out "3D" Windows desktops to little satisfaction. Most of them are just crap, buggy, DirectX8 overlays. If this does what it says it does, I dont think I'll ever need another operating system for hobby use. Heh... should be fun when this little sucker is released... I hope it can run on plain old x86 hardware :) Talez

Cesium employs RadioActive-X

[EccentricAnomaly]

The elimination of the directory/file paradigm seems like a good one as well as the virtual machine... but I don't know about the HTML and XML for all human readable text... and what good is a 3D GUI?

Can anyone think of a good reason to have a 3D GUI? It seems like a waste of compute power.

Re:Cesium employs RadioActive-X

[javaman235]

Actually, I think a 3D GUI is a great idea. Consider your existing desktop as it is, but it is being rendered on a flat 3d, plane, exactly in front of you. If the 3d engine is written intelligently, this won't take a whole lot more resouces than you existing desktop does, because it is outputting the same thing to your monitor...the BEAUTY of this system however, is that a programmer has the ability to do incredible things with the GUI, because that 3d functionality is there, at such a low level...things like taking a window and zooming out to infinity on minimalize, or renering it partially transparent when it loses focus...the possibilities are limitless.

OF COURSE things like this would take resources, but you can bet that the MIT guys will think of this, and give you options to balance your GUI kewlness factor against your system resources, like any OS from Windows to Linux does.

Performance issues?

[George Walker Bush]

virtual machine, an object-oriented database-driven filesystem, and a 3D GUI mean that this isn't your father's operating system

Especially not in the area of PERFORMANCE, I'll bet!

The coolest thing ever to happen on an OS

[Uttles]

Another interesting little tidbit is that Cesium was intended to be well documented from the very start. Error messages are dynamically generated and context sensitive, meaning that almost any error comes with a plain English description of exactly what happened, how it probably happened, and how to fix it.

I have nothing else to say, that in istelf is all I ever wanted from my OS.

Re:Never heard of any such Cesium project...

[Cato the Elder]

I didn't find anything on the web either, although of course project names get changed a whole bunch.

But the article was supposedly written by a
"Harvey M. Dunkirk" who says he's an assistant to one of the lab's directors.

However, no such person appears in the LCS directory--and "Support Staff" is listed for some of the people there.

Mighty fishy--I welcome a clarifying comment from anyone with more first-hand knowledge.

interesting anagrams of ...

[jaiteend]

Harvey M Dunkirk...

HARVEY DRUNK KIM
HEAVY DRINK MURK
MY VERA HURD KINK
HA DRUNK VERY KIM

Sorry, but since this one is sounding more and more of a hoax, someone had to do it.

Re:Never heard of any such Cesium project...

[Mr. Piccolo]

Not to mention that there's no such thing as the "Advanced Operating Systems Group" listed at the Laboratory for Computer Science homepage. Is there one?

I smell a hoax.

Re:Even if it is false...

[javaman235]

I've thought about it too...I assume your a programmer:

What do you think about a file system abstraction layer (FSAL) that allows for the treatment of all files as objects? I found the Object oriented FileSystem an inspiring bit of the hoax.

An object oriented FileSystem would mean files that have methods, and properies as metadata, and implementing it as an abtraction layer would mean not limiting existing functionality, but extending it, particularly if it can reference physical files and hold metadata.

Can you imagine that when GIMP is installed, instead of defining internal functions for, say, resizing a jpeg, you simply associated the functions with the object that corresponds to a JPEG itself , with a reference to the particular module that contained the functions. From here, ANY program the needed image processing capabilities could call ANY method that the GIMP has DIRECTLY on the file object without ever digging through the thousands of lines of code that the Gimp has and copying it!!! (provided that the GIMP module with the given method is in the FSAL's DB.)

Hoax or not, that is simply one of the most powerful things I could imagine happening to open source...Every new piece of code being instantly available to new programmers as an instatly accessable, ever growing API, accessible just through reading what methods are registered with a given file type.

Very efficient hoax.

[David Hume]

This was also a very efficient hoax. "Harvey M. Dunkirk" has been a member of Slant-Six since "10/29/2001 3:09:40 PM." See: Slant-Six Information for Harvey M. Dunkirk. The Slashdot story was posted by Timothy on October 29, @06:58PM. Four hours from start to successful completion.