JsOS

JsOS is an open-source operating system (unikernel) written in JavaScript and based on runtime.js.

It's built on V8 JavaScript engine and uses event-driven and non-blocking I/O model inspired by Node.js. At the moment KVM is the only supported hypervisor.

It tries to be compatible with npm module ecosystem and supports some of the Node.js API.

WARNING: project is in development and not ready for production use.

Ready ISO image

Download

System requirements

CPU: x86_64
RAM: >256MB

Installation

First thing is the command line tool runtime-cli, it will add runtime command to the shell. Type runtime to get full usage help.

npm install runtime-cli -g

Make sure QEMU is installed, it enables running applications locally.

brew install qemu           # OSX
sudo apt-get install qemu   # Ubuntu

Getting Started

Clone this repository and install dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/prophessor/jsos.git JsOS
cd JsOS
npm i

Run project locally in QEMU:

runtime start

That's it, operating system should start.

How does it work?

There are two main components: operating system kernel and a JavaScript code.

The kernel is written in C++ and manages low-level resources like CPU and memory, runs JavaScript using embedded V8 engine. Library drives the entire system and manages hardware devices (usually virtualized by hypervisor). Some low-level code written in JS and compiled.

License

Apache License, Version 2.0