[dba-Tech] Another OS operating system

Hans-Christian Andersen hans.andersen at phulse.com
Mon Jan 28 03:50:10 CST 2013


Hi Mark,

No, Haiku is meant to be binary compatible with BeOS, so it does not run Linux binaries from the outset (but it is entirely possible, of course).

Haiku is not a new OS. It has been around for a while actually. It's been around since the early 2000's. The history behind BeOS was that it was a new operating system that was designed to be heavily multi-core and multi-tasking (remember back in those days when the Pentium Pro machines were actually capable of multiple processors?). The company, Be Inc., was trying to compete in a heavily Windows dominated market and they were selling machines called BeBox's.

Unfortunately, no one was interested in buying anything that wasn't Microsoft at the time, so BeOS never had any traction in the industry, despite being vastly superior (in every way conceivable) to Microsoft Windows.

When Apple was failing to produce an update to their operating system, Mac OS 9, BeOS was one of the two options Apple was considering as being the next update to Apple OS. Unfortunately for Be Inc., Steve Jobs had returned to Apple and was pushing for NeXT, since this was his project prior to (re)joining Apple.

Apple decided to go with NeXT. BeOS's last ditch effort to stay alive among the sharks (Microsoft) failed and the company folded in 2001.

It's a shame. BeOS was an amazing operating system. It was far ahead of everything out there from a technology point of view and it ran circles around every other OS in terms of performance and stability at the time.

Palm then acquired Be Inc and did bugger all with it (as usual), so the Haiku team took it upon themselves to rewrite BeOS and they called it Haiku. It's been in alpha forever because it is enough of a forgotten OS that few people care, but enough care to spend time working on it with a passion.

Unfortunately, Haiku can only claim to be BeOS compatible. They had to rewrite everything, so it isn't really the same OS underneath, but they've done an excellent job considering!

R.I.P. BeOS.

- Hans


On 2013-01-28, at 1:15 AM, Mark Breen <marklbreen at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello Jim
> 
> Do you think that Linux apps will install and run on Haiku?  If not, does
> it have future at all?
> 
> I do admire the vision of anyone that attempts to start a new OS.
> 
> 
> 
> On 28 January 2013 07:10, Jim Lawrence <accessd at shaw.ca> wrote:
> 
>> So here is something interesting...another OSS and it is not Linux
>> 
>> It is called Haiku. Whether the OS, based on BeOS, will make it past the
>> development stage is a question as they are still trying to put enough
>> funds
>> together to make the dream a reality.
>> 
>> Below is their site:
>> https://www.haiku-os.org/
>> 
>> Here is a Wikipedia oversight:
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiku_(operating_system)
>> 
>> And a link to many images of the various product screens:
>> 
>> http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&sugexp=les%3B&gs_rn=1&gs_ri=hp&cp=8&gs_id=
>> 
>> 4&xhr=t&q=Haiku+OS&biw=1174&bih=649&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&um=1&ie=UTF-
>> 8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=bSIGUaPJNpCUigLw7oHoDg
>> 
>> And finally a article from a recent product convert:
>> http://blog.leahhanson.us/falling-for-haiku-os.html
>> 
>> Jim
>> 
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