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Topic: Software

The end run around the OS is underway

Summary: The operating system may be losing its luster. In fact, you could argue that the operating system--Linux, OS X and Windows--will become an application that just happens to boot first.

Larry Dignan

By for Between the Lines |

The operating system may be losing its luster. In fact, you could argue that the operating system--Linux, OS X and Windows--will become an application that just happens to boot first. And hardware vendors are on to the OS's diminishing importance.

Let's connect a few dots:

  • On Tuesday, Dell rolled out a new line of laptops and one of the best features was the ability to get your email, contacts, calendar and other items without booting the operating system, a process that can take awhile (at least on my system).
  • On Thursday, Intel talked up software that can wake a system out of sleep mode to take a PC phone call. It's probably a security disaster waiting to happen, but it's handy for PC calls via the Internet.

The common thread: These efforts from Dell and Intel are arguably taking away some of the tasks that the operating system would normally do. My working theory: The OS is being slowly downplayed as hardware vendors and Web developers grab more control over the user experience. The OS will never be totally irrelevant, but it will be increasingly less important. It'll be plumbing. Simply put, the OS is being squeezed between hardware vendors that are cooking up their own applications to handle key tasks and the so-called Webtop, which will deliver programs through the browser.

Indeed, Mozilla had a casting call last week for developers to cook up ideas for the successor to Firefox. The effort is very conceptual, but does indicate that folks think the browser will poach more work from the OS.

Toss in virtualization, which will become the most important layer of the software stack and manage the OSes, and there are enough items to argue that the OS glory days are gone.

How soon will this scenario play out? It'll be years--perhaps a decade. The OS isn't going away anytime soon, but its role is being nibbled at slowly but surely. I'm sure that Microsoft, Apple and the folks behind the various flavors of Linux would beg to differ. But the writing is on the wall: While people are focused on winners and losers in the OS wars the reality may be that they all lose.

Thoughts?

[poll id=91]

update: VIDEO: A world without Windows?

Topics: Software, Operating Systems

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140 comments
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  • Not exactly correct...

    The Dell's and others that do this wonderful magic use something called a "hypervisor" which is a fancy word for "Small Operating System". The OS most of them load up is.... drumroll please... Linux. They load up a limited and small version of the linux kernel.

    This doesn't bypass the OS, it changes it.

    As for the browser, if they enhance it to consume more of the roll the OS takes, it'll take as long as an OS to load. At which point you've gained nothing; you've just rearranged the blocks.

    More interestingly, most machines will come loaded with multiple operating systems. The hypervisor and at least one other. This means the idea that the operating system is a core element will diminish. Buy a Windows game, load Windows to run it. Buy a mac application and load OSX. Something simple? Load Wine or just run it natively on your linux hypervisor.
    shawn_dude
    Reply Vote

    • what is "system" and what is "iron"

      i answered "plumbing".
      and i am offering, more as a question than a disagreement,
      as someone who has had to do some work liaising between hardware, software,money and market, what happens if/when that linux kernel is embedded on a chip that is turned on by the bios? and is part of a system with a 20-100 gig solid state hard drive? how far from he iron does something have to be to be not "plumbing"?
      gabrielbear@...
      Reply Vote

    • My thoughts exactly

      The fact that two vendors have come up with ways to give PCs some capabilities w/o the need to boot the computer all the way into the main OS is hardly reason to think the OS is on the downturn.

      If you have a system you'll need some sort of software to operate it. Hence the name [b]Operating System[/b].
      tikigawd
      Reply Vote

    • well....

      personally ive tried the dual booting thing, ive used Linux alot in the past, the main problem with Linux is that developers don't release content for Linux, instead people have to make it work, and for games that absolutely blows some times. i know hat wine works, and for the most part it works good, But it has trouble with quite a few more graphical intensive apps, one other problem with Linux that made me switch back was the issues with drivers, it really depends on your setup but i had lots of problems (i was using ubuntu) BUT i highly doubt that the company whom makes your laptop and the os that is running on it couldn't port the drivers to Linux.

      -e
      EmenbladE
      Reply Vote

      • Not quite...

        I think you're confusing desktop Linux with plumbing Linux.

        The type of Linux they're referring to is specific to the architecture of the machine it runs behind... There are no driver issues and it works like a super bios or in place of the bios if it's embedded. I'm pretty sure pc's will evolve to a place where the bios is an OS of some sort or other. Eventually this will provide instant on computing.
        awasson@...
        Reply Vote

        • Okay - I'm Confused...and Much As I Hate to Admit It

          I'm kind of agreeing w/Anton - how can you NOT have an OS that's in some way proprietary? Even Linux can't run a lot of applications not specifically written for it - in fact, you often have problems w/a "Linux version" of an app that will install and run fine on Ubuntu, say, but not install at ALL on Xandros....
          drprodny
          Reply Vote

      • Greetings EmenbladE

        The driver issue is changing ,you know the song "Times ,they are achanging" from a short time ago.

        Just one small issue- The word "whom" seems inappropriate when referring to a company. I suggest "that" is the correct word.
        Couldn't help it , it just stuck out like a sore toe.

        Peace and Joy man.
        elderlybloke
        Reply Vote

    • it already is plumbing, so nothings changed

      The OS is plumbing by definition. Seems the writer of the article is confusing application and OS. BIOS is an OS, Hypervisor is an OS. Windows, Linux, OSX, Unix, MVS, VMS, the roll call is endless ... these are Operating Systems that enable applications to run on hardware ... i.e., they are the software plumbing for the system. OS is now, has always been, and probably always will be, simply the plumbing between the application and the hardware. The article's premise is specious. :-)
      Trial Software
      Reply Vote

      • Further than that...

        Even the BIOS is an operating system of a kind. The situation is something a kin to the human brain running the body. There are some very simple but fundamental things that are operated in the human body by certain parts of the brain, things that have to stay operational under any, or certain circumstances, even unconsciousness if the body is to keep running.

        All these new vendor driven methods are doing is saying "lets throw on a new mini OS that can handle this one specific function or functions without having to make the primary OS get involved. The end result is not really a diminishing role for the OS, its a more strongly divided role for OS's, speeding up or making more efficient particular tasks.

        The only way one can start saying that the desktop OS is on the way out is if some where there is an outside system that drives the applications as opposed to a desktop OS. I do agree, that may be on its way some day, but yeah, its not going to be real soon.
        Cayble
        Reply Vote

      • Not only that...

        Correct, the OS is the software that allows the various pieces of hardware to interact with each other, the user, and other software. Everything else is a collection of applications bundled with the OS, although MS has often tried to push the idea that they are integral. Not only that, but the browser wars of the 90's were basically MS's way of squashing Netscape in order to keep the browser from becoming a platform replacing large portions of the Windows desktop functions. So, if anything this article illustrates things coming full circle rather than a new change.
        jleroi
        Reply Vote

  • RE: The end run around the OS is underway

    I don't know if the OS will go away completely, but I do think it will become a commodity. Why? OLPC decided to go with Linux FIRST, before MS bullied them into accepting a (non-existent) scaled-down version of Windows XP. I think this shows MS is worried that their OS will become just one choice out of many. Also, Ubuntu has made Linux newsworthy, so that more people are being exposed to the idea of CHOOSING an OS. Dell started shipping laptops with Ubuntu Linux preinstalled. And as you wrote above, many kinds of apps can now be launched via the browser. The writing is on the wall.
    barence773
    Reply Vote

    • Nothing new

      Mainframe...

      zVM, running guests, running apps, just bigger, secure, scalable.


      If corporations were not run by airline magazine no one would care about this.
      redgreen_fan@...
      Reply Vote

      • To redgreen

        Um,err,what? I no comprehend effendi
        elderlybloke
        Reply Vote

      • Mainframe?

        The 'mainframe' has been replaced by modular datacenters in most enterprise environments.
        nextbend
        Reply Vote

      • to redgreen

        Brain...

        ideas, swirl, continually.

        On paper, meaningfully, can't put.

        If messages are generated by programs the kielbasa would run for the senate.

        -----
        What is this, a Zippy cartoon?
        fromthehip
        Reply Vote

  • RE: The end run around the OS is underway

    "will become an application that just happens to boot first."
    I don't think so.

    It's not about the OS role being changed. It's more about the role of the browser becoming like the OS.
    The OS is not an application, it's a platform. It's not what it can do. It's what it can provide for other applications.
    The more OS developers think of the OS as a platform the longer the OS is going to be around. But when they start think about it as an application (a piece of software that directly provide the user with a certain function) it will become one.
    amreldib
    Reply Vote

    • Exactly; it's the applications that count.

      Many applications use capabilities of the operating system. Even those like Realplayer whose owner would prefer not to think about Microsoft.

      So long as there are applications that make use of capabilities the operating system will be front and center of computing. That's a good working definition of forever.
      Anton Philidor
      Reply Vote

      • Applications are so far above what's being discussed

        I think you take too rigid a view. The services and libraries
        that applications use are already separated from core
        kernel services. Yes, you get them on the same disk, but,
        as an example, the operating system's spell-checking
        service knows nothing about the job scheduler in the
        kernel, and vice-versa.

        Many applications are written to a virtual machine, and
        here too we see clearly separated layers: application,
        [libraries and apis], virtual machine, and then the whatever
        that labors below.

        Could "modern operating systems" be split into two
        bundles, core kernel services, and user libraries and
        services, and core kernel services delegated via a
        hypervisor? It feels possible to me. I don't think the
        applications will care because they will still have their
        libraries.

        Let's imagine one writes applications to sell. Would a
        world of writing for Windows and letting virtualization take
        care of expanding your market to Mac, Linux, etc., users
        sound like a bad thing?
        DannyO_0x98
        Reply Vote

        • "Could 'modern operating systems' be split..."

          You might ask the company which insisted on making the browser an inextricable part of the operating system in code and soon in interface.

          And remember, too, that someone running Windows on a Mac has paid for a copy of Windows. Given that people have often invested in applications, I wonder how many are using OS X to underlie a Windows PC. And Wine necessarily always trails its target.

          If the current situation were the world made new, then the strategy you discuss would deserve to be considered. In the current situation, I suggest software evolves rather than leaps, and that evolution will continue a number of assumptions about how software should work. Namely, atop an elaborate operating system.
          Anton Philidor
          Reply Vote

          • Modular

            Actually the whole purpose of Vista was to create a modular OS. Sure, they added a few additional features for the consumer. Ultimately Vista was created for Microsofts benefit, of course they don't want you to know this. The modular nature of Windows will become even more apparent in Windows 7, and then it will become a selling point.

            At that point it will be entirely possible to load only the modules needed to create an environment required to access the internet and load a browser.

            There is a consumer shift away from PC towers. Microsoft is well aware of this. Just take a look at the sucess of webooks. Mobile phones. iPods. Even the DS is networked.

            A monolithic OS is just too unwieldy to run on all these machines as there are too many interdependancies between the components. The processing power would be unsuffecient, and there is not enough storage space, and 80% of the features would be redundant

            If MS can continue the modularisation with Windows 7 that it introduced with Vista then I forsee a future where Windows will be able to install on all those devices. Determined by the serial number provided.

            Therefore, if all you need to do is check email and browse the web, you will be able to install a stripped down version of Windows 7 that only installs the minimum number of modules to allow this functionality.

            After many years of function creep and additional features MS have finally cottoned on to the idea where less is more.
            Bozzer
            Reply Vote
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