ReactOS

Could it be the Firefox of Operating Systems?

Published on December 23, 2005 By geekinthecity In OS Wars

Up until about this time last year it was though that Microsoft's dominance in the field of the web browser was indisputable. Along came a little web browser called Firefox, and for the first time ever a Microsoft product actually lost market share. While Linux has long been considered to be the challenger of Microsoft's monopoly in operating systems but has never gone beyond running servers in certain corporate environments. Greater ease of use and more software are the main reasons that Windows continues to dominate desktop computing.

There's a new operating system being developed by open source programmers called ReactOS www.reactos.org with the goal of being fully compatible with Windows programs and device drivers. Although it's still in it's early development, ReactOS can already be downloaded and tried out. One option is a 'Live CD', which is an .iso file that can be downloaded and burnt onto CD-R, which creates a CD that boots the computer, and the entire operating system loads from the CD. The other option is a full installation onto the computer's hard drive.

ReactOS is still in the pre-alpha stage so there is very little support for even the most common hardware. I had to dig out an old ps/2 mouse since my wireless USB mouse didn't work. ReactOS can only be installed on hard drives using the Fat 32 file system only. The NTFS File system is not yet supported and probably won't be for a while yet.

So far ReactOS is small and fast, using just a minute 30 megabytes when installed. Even booting from the Live CD, ReactOS boots up and is up and running in a fraction of the time that it takes a similarly equipped Windows PC. When ReactOS moves beyond initial development towards the first full official release, many of those who will benefit by having a new choice in Operating System will be those who can't afford to or just don't choose to upgrade to new hardware. As Windows get continually bogged down with more and more features that people don't use more and more will just not bother spending more money on an ever more expensive copy of Windows.

It will be interesting to see if the ReactOS developer community can meet their goals without infringing on Microsoft patents. If ReactOS does at one point come to challenge Microsoft then at the very least cater to PC users with basic needs with basic hardware which many would say that Microsoft has forsaken long time ago.

Comments

azdruid

on Dec 24, 2005

Although I am not entirely sure of the ReactOS' team goals, I don't believe they are motivated by the need to make product that can ably compete with Windows. Unlike other opensource endeavors like Linux, which have massive corporate funding, ReactOS really does fall under the category of "Hobby OS" - they've just decided to model their system on Windows. Also, where Microsoft will continue to move forward with their NT platform, the ReactOS team is currently aiming for full compatibility with Windows NT 4.0, which is nearly a decade old. Obviously using this model will allow many applications that continue to support at least Windows 2000 to run fine (in theory), but bear in mind, it's hard work trying to reimplement the Win32 API! The Wine project has been working on it for 12 years.

Don't take the tone of this comment as a shot against ReactOS - I love the project, and admire the progress they have achieved so far. It's just wrong to look at ReactOS as a potential Windows-competitor, or at least at this point in time.

Sembetu

on Dec 28, 2005

I am really excited about this project. It would be extremely awesome to see this program succeed. Mainly, for the fact of just having another toy to tinker with, but also, it would be cool to see what kind of desktop enhancements are possible. Since this project is open, you could imagine the kind of out-of-the-box solutions that companies could provide. Custom branded boxes that are light and have little overhead, but run clean. If this goes right, it could be a very interesting development. Not only that, but the linux community could even incorporate a lot of the technology currently being developed under this platform to Linux, thus eliminating the need for a wrapper like wine. You could actually incorporate the win32 API into the kernel, and have apps run native. Whoa.

Anyway, I will be watching this thread and this software.

Sembetu

ThoriumKnight

on May 19, 2009

I wonder if windowblinds would work on it?

ZubaZ

on May 19, 2009

I wonder if windowblinds would work on it?

I wonder that it's still alive four years after the original post.

angus1949

on May 19, 2009

http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html

Looks like they're still going Zub although still in alpha. Could be interesting one day.

ZubaZ

on May 19, 2009

Could be interesting one day.

I used NT4 for years. Interesting might be an effort.

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