[SharpOS Developers] MOSA Newsletter #1

[grover <sh...@mi...>]

Newsletter 1


Introduction


My name is Michael Ruck, also known as "grover". I'm one of the founders of
the MOSA effort and am pleased to bring you this newsletter, which will
hopefully be published more regularly in the future.


MOSA Project


The Managed Operating System Alliance (MOSA) Framework is a set of compiler
tools and libraries, such as a just-in-time compiler, for managed operating
systems based on the Common Intermediate Language.

We have created a project website at http://www.mosa-project.com
<http://www.mosa-project.com/> . The website provides various services to
manage the MOSA project, holds specifications, wiki descriptions and bug
trackers. MOSA now has its own SVN server at svn://svn.mosa-project.com/ and
mailing lists <http://listserv.mosa-project.org/cgi/wa.exe> . We also have
setup an IRC channel #mosa on the FreeNode network for quick chats around
MOSA topics.


MOSA Compiler


The MOSA compiler has been progressing quickly due to the help of MOSA
developer rootnode and is close to reaching its first milestone. The
compiler already passes 31 individual tests combined into 12 test cases.

The x86 backend already supports features a lot of features, such as basic
integral and floating point arithmetics (addition, subtraction, division,
multiplication), logical operations (And, Or, Not, Xor), shifting operators,
static method calls, branch operations, load and store instructions. The
planned feature list for the first compiler milestone is available in the
MOSA  <http://www.mosa-project.com/wiki/mosa-compiler/Release_001> Wiki.

The compiler framework provides several optimization stages, such as Single
Static Assignment, Constant Propagation and Constant Folding. We are working
on some more optimization algorithms, including a simple register allocator
for the first milestone.


MOSA Kernel


The MOSA Kernel Project <http://www.mosa-project.com/wiki/mosa-kernel>  has
opened its doors to facilitate better specification development. The purpose
of the kernel project is not aimed to provide another managed open source
kernel, but to foster managed operating system development as a whole by
defining common interfaces and providing default implementations of these
interfaces. This enables other open source projects to reuse our components
to create their operating system. We strongly ask all interested projects to
contribute to this project to ensure interoperability.


MOSA Devices


In an effort to reduce duplicate device driver development between various
managed OS projects, the MOSA project also proposes a common driver model
framework and driver implementations for common hardware devices. Device
drivers may only use safe code to help ensure stability of the entire
system.


Job Positions


The MOSA Team is seeking new developers interested in standardized
interfaces for managed operating systems, creative people for artwork,
documentation and process management. We also seek an Editor for the next
newsletters.


Final Notes


This is the last newsletter to be sent out on the managed operating system
mailing lists. In future we will only send out MOSA news on the MOSA
<http://listserv.mosa-project.org/cgi/wa.exe?A0=MOSA-ANNOUNCE-LIST>
Announcement Mailing List.