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Operating Systems of the Future

Posted by timothy on from the at-last-nirvana dept.

An anonymous reader writes: "'Imagine computers in a group providing disk storage for their users, transparently swapping files and optimizing their collective performance, all with no central administration.' Computerworld is predicting that over the next 10 years, operating systems will become highly distributed and 'self-healing,' and they'll collaborate with applications, making application programmers' jobs easier."

3 of 384 comments (clear)

  1. A vision of OS future : tiny reliable components. by chrysalis · · Score: 5, Interesting

    IMHO, future operating systems will tend to something like the ErOS operating system . This OS is based on multiple tiny extremely reliable components, within a strong capability model to provide a high level of security.
    It's definitely a good approach, although ErOS is still quite experimental yet.


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  2. Hmmm... by dghcasp · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Oh, you mean something like Plan 9 from Bell Labs?

    I predict that there will never be a revolutionary new operating system until we break free of the chains imposed by Posix compliance. Until then, we're stuck with files that have to be streams of bytes, ugo-style permissions, non-wandering processes, incompatable RPC calls, &c.

    And the real pain is there have been OS'es that have had simple & elegant solutions to problems that are hard under unix (Aegis, Multics, VMS, TOPS, ...) that were pushed aside by the steamroller that is Unix.

    But to be fair, many of the forgotten O/S's are now forgotten because they weren't as general purpose as Unix. Unix is the great compromise. But it's hard to strive for the best when you've already accepted compromise.

  3. The #1 Rule of Network Security by Guppy06 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    "Imagine computers in a group providing disk storage for their users, transparently swapping files and optimizing their collective performance, all with no central administration."

    Whoever thought up this pipe dream apparently doesn't understand the Zeroth Law of Network Security: If you want information to be secure, DON'T PUT IT ON THE FUCKING NETWORK!

    Seriously! As if most business OSes don't default to the least-secure settings already! Why would you want to run important apps on a system where the default is to share anything and everything with any computer in listening distance?