An operating system that will survive the apocalypse is presented

The theme of post-apocalypse has long been firmly established in all spheres of culture and art. Books, games, films, Internet projects - all this has long been firmly established in our lives. There are even particularly paranoid and fairly wealthy people who seriously build shelters and buy cartridges and stewed meat in reserve, hoping to wait out the dark times.

However, few people thought about what would happen if the post-apocalypse was not entirely fatal. In other words, if after it at least part of the infrastructure, relatively complex production, and so on are preserved. And the main tasks will not be finding uncontaminated water or fighting zombies, but restoring the old world. And in this case, computers may be required.

Developer Virgil Dupras presented Collapse OS is an open source OS that can even run on calculators. More precisely, it runs on 8-bit Z80 processors, which underlie cash registers and other devices. Author believesthat by 2030, global supply chains will exhaust themselves and disappear, which will lead to the cessation of microelectronics production. Because of this, components for new PCs will have to be found in the trash.

Despite the rather controversial statement, Dupras believes that microcontrollers will be the basis of future computers. It is they, according to the author of the system, that will be most often encountered after the apocalypse, in contrast to 16- and 32-bit microcircuits.

“In a few decades, computers will be in such a state that they will no longer be repairable, and we will no longer be able to program microcontrollers,” says the Collapse OS website.

It is reported that Collapse OS can already read and edit text files, read data from an external drive and copy information to media. It can also compile assembly language sources and reproduce itself. Supports keyboard, SD cards and a range of interfaces.

The system itself is still being developed, but the source code is already Yes on GitHub. And you can run it on simple Z80-based PCs. Dupras himself used such a computer, called RC2014. In addition, Collapse OS can, according to the developer, be launched on the Sega Genesis (known as Mega Drive in Russia). You can use a joystick or keyboard for control.

The author has already invited other specialists to join in the creation of a “post-apocalyptic” operating system. Dupras plans to launch Collapse OS on the TI-83+ and TI-84+ programmable graphing calculators from Texas Instruments. Then it is planned to launch on the TRS-80 model 1.

In the future, support for various LCD and E Ink displays, as well as various floppy disks, including 3,5-inch ones, is promised.

Source: 3dnews.ru