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A microkernel is a minimal computer operating system kernel providing only basic operating system services (system calls), while other services (commonly provided by kernels) are provided by user-space programs called servers. Commonly, microkernels provide services such as address space management, thread management, and inter-process communication, but not networking or display for example.

Later extensions of this concept lead to new architectures such as nanokernels, exokernels and hardware abstraction layers.

Kernel bloat

Early operating system kernels were rather small, partly because computer memories were small. As the capability of computers grew, the number of devices the kernel had to control also grew. Early versions of UNIX had kernels of quite modest size, even though those kernels contained device drivers and file system managers. When address spaces increased from 16 to 32 bits, kernel design was no longer cramped by the hardware architecture, and kernels began to grow. (See History of Unix).

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BugOS - New microkernel operating system for x86 computers, many features: network and Internet modules, file system (FAT); kernel handles memory, tasks, micro kernels, and some base devices: keyboard, video, hdd, and ramdrive.
Meta Description: [ BugOS ]

Cosy - Goal: scalability of highly parallel multicomputer systems. Based on small microkernel that does process management, interprocess communication; all other services are processes out of kernel. Processes and address spaces orthogonal, so Cosy process is like thread in other OSs. Hardware dependencies concentrated in areas of kernel for portability.

404 Microkernel-based and similar Operating Systems - Includes links and brief descriptions of microkernal based operating systems.

Microkernel-based OS Efforts - By Christopher Browne. Brief, clear descriptions and critiquing of microkernel design concepts, with some links. Puts much current activity in larger context.

MorphOS - Goal: Provide modern functionality for a new OS layer and run most Amiga applications as efficiently as possible in a box environment with no Classic Amiga custom chips available.

PETROS - By Trumpet Software International, 32-bit microkernel OS for x86 PCs coded in Object Pascal variant. Built from first principles to focus on small size, modularity, and be fully compatible with Win32 and industry standards; reads FAT-12/16/32. Low cost; free time-locked demo.
Meta Description: [ 32 bit operating system for x86 architecture by Trumpet Software International. ]

ShagOS - Portable object-oriented microkernel OS, dynamically loaded device drivers, fully redesigned and rewritten many times in C++, runs on VAX, x86. Ongoing experiment in using O-O paradigm as framework for full OS, with distributed computing as main aspect in most design decisions.

SUMO - SUpport for Multimedia in Operating systems, Lancaster University: microkernel OS with facilities to support distributed realtime and multimedia applications and ODP-based multimedia distributed application platforms.

The Open Group: Advanced Research - Page listing several research projects: microkernel OSs (MK7, MK++, AD3) and other modules (CONVERSANT, CORDS, GIPC, SHAWS).
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Topsy - Teachable Operating System: tiny multithreaded messaging microkernel, in ANSI C; protected threads, memory managed, and thread/process control. From undergraduate course on concurrency, device programming, OS concepts. Descriptions, documents, theses, downloads, contacts, links. [Open Source, GPL]

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