Re: Ada OS based on Minix3

[Freejack <dimonax@nospam.net>]

Cedric.Lannock wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I came across Ada at the beginning of the year and read quite a few
> books about Ada. A few month later I joined a Linux workgroup within a
> local computer association. This way I learned about Ada and had a
> look into Tanenbaum's book on operating systems (http://www.amazon.com/
> Operating-Systems-Implementation-Prentice-Software/dp/0131429388/
> ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226066518&sr=8-1) and Minix 3
> (http://www.minix3.org/).
> 
> I thought about an operating system written fully in Ada. When surfing
> the net I came across the various discussions about that subject.
> 
> What taking the Minix 3 system as basis for porting it to Ada? The
> Minix 3 is a modern micro kernel os and has about 4.000 Lines of code.
> It is full Posix compatible. Some guys have added real time
> functionality to it (see ACM.org for further reading). Thus it would a
> good place to start. As it has to few lines of code it should be
> possible to build a kernel in overseeable time.
> 
> Another thought to get this project taking some speed would be not to
> rewrite all the available C code but to develop a translator c2ada. It
> would us getting startet and the resulting code could be enhanced and
> improved.
> 
> Do you think this would make this project doable?
> 
> Regards
> 
> Cedric Lannock

A better approach, in my humble opinion, would be start with an existing
kernel and expand outward.
For the longest time I've been thinking about making a Ravenscar Linux
Kernel Runtime Module. From there it could be expanded to include a full
Ada Runtime Environment, add an ABI, it's own System Calls, etc...
gradually replacing the functionality of the existing kernel, while
adding it's own OO functionality.

With this approach, you get an active test platform, access to an
"interface" that most developers are already familiar with(i.e. Posix),
while having the ability to gradually add more extensive non-posix
features to the platform. I'm certain the additional OO features will
attract users of other High Level language tools(Java, Haskell, OCaml,
etc..), at the same time it wouldn't alienate users of the more common
"system level" language tools(C, Assembler, Fortran, etc...).
Gradually, as more OO and Functional "paradigm"(I hate that word)
features are added, developers will begin to test, work with, and use
those features in thier userspace apps.

It really only takes a few developers to get a Kernel Module started and
working. The OpenRavenscar project has already done alot of the work for us.

What do you guys think?

dimonax