NightShade01

Ok here is a complex question....what languages is it possible to write and operating system in. It doesn't matter whether or not it's a practical OS just a matter of if it's possible. I was posed the question in a class today and only C++ was determined to be a valid answer. Java didn't work because it comlies to slowly and you would need a way to get the JRE on the computer before but i couldn't find a reason that VB.NET wouldn't work. Thoughts anyone...?

AntiNinja

Assembly...

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King

VB would not even come close to working; it is a very high level language and just won't work.

C/C++/Assembly are going to be the optimal choices.

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Pizentios

C++, C or ASM.

thread moved to the lounge.

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Polyphemus_

C, C++, Assembly or Pascal. VB .Net is, just like Java, an interpretted language. Besides that, it depends heavily on the Windows API.

Sane

Polyphemus. Why Pascal? I thought that was a very high level language that can't do much stuff, primarily intended for teaching?

grimpirate

I would venture to say that theoretically you could write an OS in any language. However it would be indirectly and would be a lengthier process. For instance, using any language whether interpreted, high-level, low-level, etc. you could produce a compiler which takes your new code and translates it into the machine code that you would need in order to make the OS. This of course would be the equivalent of creating an assembler. So as was stated before an assembler would be the most obvious choice. In regards to Java if you created a bootstrap loader to get the JVM onto the harddisk and a small shell to launch it then you could have a Java enabled OS. An example of a non C++ OS is MenuetOS which is written entirely in assembly code.

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Mad_guy

You can write an OS in many languages. Everything from machine code to say, OBERON, C# or even Java (look at jNode and Singularity.) It really depends on the language implentation if you're considering a language such as that (for example, Singularity is a system built on nothing more than a primitive runtime for C# and a garbage collector, both written in C#. The actual kernel is written in C# entirely and thus pretty much the entire OS.)

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DaWei

If you write an OS that relies on someone else's code to reach the machine, then YOU didn't write an OS. You wrote a services layer. Personally, I used assembler in all of mine, but I needed maximal performance in a real-time environment. I'd be happy to use C in the outer layers.

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a thing

1. Since when are OSs written in one language?
2. I know Linux is written in C with some Assembler. Most of the lower level GNU tools (probably a better term for that, I'm refering to stuff like the shell, cat, grep) that work with it are in C.

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