Operating System needing a purpose

[Milk_The_Elephnt]

i need a little project to do while on school holiday so i dug out my positively prehistoric Pentium 2, 64MB RAM laptop and have decided i'm going to try writing a little operating system for it.
the only problem is i need a purpose for this OS, any ideas?
tis gonna be in 16bit real mode Assembly so it'll only be command line or very simple graphics, it wont be able to do anything more than MikeOS. ( <- MikeOS - simple x86 assembly language operating system )
any ideas welcome, serious or silly XD

( i felt this thread fitted best in this forum, though im not certain its the right place, sorry...)

 

[Baez]

Robotics is always a good choice. Even that is sometimes too broad so you can narrow it down to a specific type.

Are you using assembly for learning or performance? Using a lower level compiled language like C will barely make a difference if you're going for performance and will obviously make your life much easier.

 

[carnageX]

Robotics is always a good choice. Even that is sometimes too broad so you can narrow it down to a specific type.

Are you using assembly for learning or performance? Using a lower level compiled language like C will barely make a difference if you're going for performance and will obviously make your life much easier.

And if assembly is still needed, you can still make assembly calls from C I believe .

 

[Milk_The_Elephnt]

Are you using assembly for learning or performance? Using a lower level compiled language like C will barely make a difference if you're going for performance and will obviously make your life much easier.

neither learning or performance...i like assembly ^.^ but i s'pose more for learning. i really should learn C...

and yes you can have inline assembly in C

 

[carnageX]

neither learning or performance...i like assembly ^.^ but i s'pose more for learning. i really should learn C...

You're an odd duck. Lol

and yes you can have inline assembly in C

Aye, that's what I thought.

 

[Milk_The_Elephnt]

You're an odd duck. Lol

haha, yep!

 

[carnageX]

I've mostly forgotten how to do assembly (would have to look at my notes / book again lol), but kudos to you for enjoying it. I prefer higher-level languages lol.

 

[luke127]

Well I suppose if you want to build something small you could make something similar to windows or Linux that uses a GUI. But that's advanced. But if you like a challenge I am sure you could make it. A purpose for a small OS could be to backup your main one? Just an idea.

 

[carnageX]

GUI programming is hard enough as it is; doing it in C or Assembly is difficult.

 

[Milk_The_Elephnt]

A purpose for a small OS could be to backup your main one? Just an idea.

ooo, i like it! thats a good idea

I've mostly forgotten how to do assembly (would have to look at my notes / book again lol), but kudos to you for enjoying it. I prefer higher-level languages lol.

i learnt assembly from a booklet my parents used at collage, when 16 bit processors were new and assembly was still commonly used! (1986 i think...)
Its actually a really good booklet on 16 bit assembler, better than anything i could find on the inter web.

GUI programming is hard enough as it is; doing it in C or Assembly is difficult.

indeed, almost impossible sort of hard...