Novium OS

Novium OS is a hobby x86 operating system built from scratch. The architecture is heavily inspired by Linux, but stripped down to the absolute basics. If you are into low-level engineering, feel free to open a PR or share ideas.

Note

Directories like mm/, ipc/, lib/, fs/, userspace/, and some files inside of arch/ currently contain stubs and placeholder files because the core kernel is still being built out.

If you want to find files that are not stubs, take a look around here (though a few placeholders are still mixed in):

• arch/ – Low-level boot and architecture-specific code
• drivers/ – Basic hardware support

About the project

I wanted to build a hobby OS that is clean, and easy to extend. The main idea is just to build it step by step without over-engineering the code.

Current status

Right now, I'm focusing on getting the core x86 foundations solid:

• Stable x86 booting
• Basic console output
• Handling early hardware input
• Setting up memory management and interrupts
• Long-term: a lightweight desktop interface

Project structure

The layout is inspired by the Linux kernel, but kept pretty simple:

• arch/ - low-level boot and architecture-specific code
• drivers/ - basic hardware support
• kernel/ - core kernel code such as scheduling and interrupts
• init/ - startup and kernel entry
• include/ - shared headers and interfaces
• mm/ - memory management
• fs/ - filesystem work
• ipc/ - inter-process communication
• lib/ - utility code
• Documentation/ - notes and planning files

Boot flow

The current boot path is pretty straightforward:

boot.S -> setup.S -> bootstrap.S -> hw_init.c -> init/main.c

For a detailed walkthrough of each stage, see Documentation/boot_flow.md.

Build and Run

System Dependencies

To compile and run Novium OS, you need a 32-bit capable compiler toolchain and the QEMU emulator

Linux (Ubuntu / Debian)

The primary development environment for Novium OS is Linux (Ubuntu/Debian) you can also use Windows with WSL.

sudo apt update && sudo apt install build-essential gcc-multilib qemu-system-x86 make bear 

Windows (via WSL2)

You can build Novium OS on Windows using the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL2) and a native Windows emulator.

1. Install WSL2 (Ubuntu) by running this in PowerShell as Administrator:

   wsl --install

2. Download and install QEMU for Windows to its default path (C:\Program Files\qemu).

3. Open your WSL2 Ubuntu terminal and install the compiler tools:

   sudo apt update && sudo apt install build-essential gcc-multilib make bear

4. Link WSL2 to your Windows QEMU by running these lines in your WSL terminal:

   echo "alias qemu-system-i386='\"/mnt/c/Program Files/qemu/qemu-system-i386.exe\"'" >> ~/.bashrc
   echo "alias qemu-system-x86_64='\"/mnt/c/Program Files/qemu/qemu-system-x86_64.exe\"'" >> ~/.bashrc
   source ~/.bashrc

Compile

Once your dependencies are installed (either on native Linux or inside WSL2), build the OS:

make clean
bear -- make

Execution

launch the kernel directly through QEMU:

make run

or run the raw floppy disk image to include the bootloader:

make run-raw

Roadmap

• Boot chain and protected mode
• Basic console output
• Interrupt handling (IDT, PIC, IRQs)
• Keyboard and timer drivers
• VBE / framebuffer graphics
• Memory management
• Basic scheduling
• Simple filesystem
• Boot from a hard drive
• Lightweight desktop interface

See Documentation/todo.md for the detailed task list.