Initial commit - Begun rewrite of website generator

pages/2012-05-29-Hoby-Kernel-Restart.md

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+layout: post
+title: "Restarting a hoby kernel"
+subtitle: "Once more, from the top... "
+tags: [osdev]
+
+Many years ago, I got interesting in trying out Linux. Having used Windows
+since my parents started using Windows computers at work and declared our old
+Macintoshes obsolete I realized it would mean quite a change and didn't really
+want to go all in right away. Somehow I found out about VMWare Workstation - an
+Intel processor emulator made for running virtual computers within Windows and
+installed one of the first versions of Ubuntu in it.
+
+I played around with Ubuntu Linux for a while, but then I started thinking
+about the computer emulator I was using and wondered whether I could make
+a program myself that would boot in it. In other words, could I write a program
+that ran by itself on a computer with no operating system?
+
+The answer turned out to be yes. With a lot of help and tutorials from what
+later became [osdev.org](http://www.osdev.org) and many more that
+I unfortunately can't remember or find anymore, I wrote a small binary
+executable in Assembly that could run of the boot sector on a floppy disk.
+I was amazed! Could it really be this simple? I immediately set out to write an
+entire operating system. Nothing fancy; I just wanted to boot the computer and
+get into a desktop environment with a text editor and a compiler so I could
+keep adding to the system from within it. Shouldn't be too hard, should it?
+
+Almost ten years later, I think I got the routines for basic BIOS-assisted
+screen printing down...
+
+There are several reasons why things are moving so slowly. First and foremost:
+It wasn't that easy. Operating systems are advanced stuff, and combined with my
+own lack of any formal education or experience in programming or computer
+systems this means progress is slow.
+
+Next is a lack of time. Back when I found VMWare Workstation and started this
+journey, I was on summer holiday from school and had all the time in the world.
+Then school started again. Then came the Christmas holiday and I realized I had
+forgotten everything. So I threw everything out and started again from scratch.
+This time I got a bit further. Then school started again.
+
+And that's how it's been since then. School started, ended and begun again.
+Then I did a year in the army. Then university (engineering physics). Then
+I met a girl, got engaged, bought a house, worked for a year with project
+management, went back to university... Still, every now and then I've restarted
+development of my operating system dream.
+
+So, how will I ever get out of this reset loop? Well, I've got a plan. Most
+important, I think, is to have realistic expectations. That shouldn't be as
+much a problem as it used to be. As time has passed I have grown to understand
+my limitations better than I did when I was 15. Also, my main goal of
+programming now is recreation. A moment of peace by myself when I can
+concentrate on a problem I appreciate. If I never get a stable virtual file
+system going, that's ok. If I build a working tcp-ip stack and get a web server
+running under my own operating system, that's ok too, but it's not my goal.
+Still, this doesn't mean I want to keep rewriting the code for setting up the
+Interupt Vector Table for the x-th time next time I have a week of university,
+which brings me to the next part of the plan.
+
+Documentation. I'm going to restart my development efforts once again, but this
+time I plan to be more careful about documentation. My thought is that if
+I write down what I do and why, I won't have to do it again in six months but
+can just read through my old notes. Who knows; this plan might just be crazy
+enough to work.
+
+I've obviously tried this before. It worked somewhat but I made a big mistake.
+I called my notes a "tutorial". I did that because I wished it to be
+a tutorial, that beginners could learn from my years of mistakes. Some people
+didn't like this and a few unnecesarily harsh comments got me of the osdev
+scene for a while. Then university started again and I was back in the loop.
+
+This time I won't make that mistake. I still wish to make those notes public,
+though, because I still think that I and possibly others may benefit from them.
+I'll be clear though, that I am not a profesional programmer and have never
+pretended or wanted to be one. I appreciate feedback in the case anyone reads
+this and I can be reached through email or twitter (links below). Please try to
+stay constructive, though.
+
+Anyway, this is already way more text than anyone would bother to read, so
+I guess I'll just cut it off here and we'll see where this series of notes
+finally takes us.