TinyOS

TinyOS is a minimal freestanding i686 kernel written in C++ and booted by GRUB via the Multiboot specification. The project is organized into small modules so it stays easy to extend and can later be ported to other architectures.

TinyOS is authored by UNITRONIX (Krzysztof Nienartowicz). TinyOS source code and documentation are licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3 (GPL-3.0-or-later). See LICENSE, NOTICE and docs/licensing.md.

AI-Assisted Development

TinyOS is developed as an AI-assisted operating system project. AI assistance is used for planning, documentation, implementation slices, code review and test planning, while the repository keeps the project grounded in explicit source files, roadmaps and reproducible build/test commands.

AI assistance is not a runtime dependency. The current TinyOS kernel does not include an AI subsystem; the AI-assisted part describes the development workflow used to grow the system gradually and safely.

Current Project Knowledge

• The current reference target is i686 on QEMU PC hardware, booted as a GRUB Multiboot ISO. A second x86_64 backend exists as a bring-up path: it enters long mode, probes CPU capabilities, loads a 64-bit GDT/TSS with IST stacks and a full 256-vector IDT, and reports memory from the Multiboot2 tag list. It does not run the kernel yet.
• The documented minimum runtime envelope is still 32 MiB RAM; lower-memory runs are experimental probes before any baseline change. The reference ISO has reached 2561K on QEMU/GRUB, while 2560K and 64K do not reach TinyOS serial output.
• TinyOS is a terminal-first OS: VGA text output, PS/2 keyboard input, sysinfo, status/syscheck diagnostics, risk listing, active profile checks, path inspection, filemgr, textedit, fileui and RAMFS metadata.
• The desktop, window manager, graphical terminal, cursor and PS/2 mouse stack was removed. It never implemented a working surface, consumed boot memory and forced boot tests to assert on non-functional systems. A graphical surface returns only after the kernel has processes, a driver model and a framebuffer driver.
• Security work is treated as a high-priority track: trusted package metadata, image/provisioning contracts, integrity diagnostics and password-hashing policy are documented before broader runtime privileges are enabled.
• Project provisioning is host-first for now, with signed/encrypted artifacts, isolated project workspaces, device variants and remote access kept behind explicit opt-in policy.
• Installed-system support is currently a ready contract plus a RAMFS mock: examples/install.profile, install-plan, check-install-profile, /system/install.txt, /system/profile.txt, installinfo, installcheck, install, profileinfo, profilecheck and /receipts/install.receipt exist, while real disk installation is planned after persistent storage and filesystem contracts mature.
• Future portability targets include x86_64 and aarch64, but they should only be promoted after repeatable boot, storage and smoke tests exist for each target.

Features

• GRUB bootable kernel
• text mode VGA output
• polling-based PS/2 keyboard input
• tiny text shell
• shell diagnostics and TinyOS-native RAMFS tools such as sysinfo, status, syscheck, riskinfo, profileinfo, profilecheck, helpsearch, pathcheck, filemgr, textedit, fileui, files, fsmap, show, describe, write and edit
• terminal file workflow: filemgr provides a two-pane RAMFS manager with view, edit, create, delete, copy and move actions; textedit provides an interactive RAMFS editor with load, replace, append, clear, save, reload and file-info actions; fileui remains as a lighter single-pane browser
• static TinyOS device registry with devices diagnostics
• RAM-backed block device scaffold with blockinfo diagnostics
• read-only block VFS mount under /volumes with storageinfo diagnostics
• framebuffer/text-grid surface scaffold with fbinfo diagnostics
• renderer scaffold with renderinfo, rendertest and renderfilltest diagnostics
• terminal UI scaffold with terminalinfo, terminaltest, terminalclear and terminalpaneltest diagnostics
• TUI widget scaffold with widgetinfo, widgettest, widgetdispatch and widgetactiontest diagnostics
• UI event queue scaffold with uieventinfo, uieventpump, uieventpeek and uieventtest diagnostics
• language/runtime manifest with runtimeinfo diagnostics for native and planned sandboxed app targets
• application capability profile manifest with appinfo diagnostics for future native, GUI, web-style and self-hosted apps
• application launch policy dry-checks with launchinfo and launchcheck
• .tapp application package registry, trust store and install-gate checks with tappinfo, tapps, tapp, tappcheck, tappverify, trustinfo and trust
• system management tool manifest with tools, toolinfo and tool <command> diagnostics
• secure image/provisioning manifest with imageinfo, provisioninfo and deployinfo diagnostics
• installed-system contract with installinfo, installcheck, RAMFS install mock, active RAMFS profile checks and host install-profile validation
• project provisioning workbench plan for isolated workspaces, device variants, resource budgets and remote access
• host .tapp signing helpers: keygen-app, trust-app, sign-app and verify-app
• documented minimum runtime target: i686, Multiboot ISO, VGA text mode, PS/2 keyboard and 32 MiB RAM, with experimental low-memory probes down to 2561K
• simple system API layer
• Makefile build and QEMU run targets
• editable from Visual Studio Community as a Makefile project

Quick build

make iso

Build the x86_64 bring-up image:

make ARCH=x86_64 iso
make test-boot-x86_64

Quick run

make run

The default and only boot path starts the TinyOS terminal.

Roadmaps

• docs/os-roadmap.md - staged plan for growing TinyOS into a real OS.
• docs/implementation-roadmap.md - current implementation milestones.
• docs/security-roadmap.md - security and hardening priorities.
• docs/installed-system-pattern.md - target install flow and installed-system documentation pattern.
• docs/provisioning-workbench.md - project provisioning workflow and tool plan.
• docs/system-requirements.md - minimum and recommended runtime/build requirements.
• docs/plan-dojrzalosci-systemu.md - plan wdrożenia dojrzałości (funkcjonalność, bezpieczeństwo, użyteczność).
• docs/x86_64-migration.md - 64-bit port: arch/platform split, boot path, staged gates.
• docs/virtualization-foundations.md - prerequisites and staging for VT-x/EPT, IOMMU and GPU passthrough.
• docs/licensing.md - GPL-3.0 policy and third-party boundary notes.

License

TinyOS project source is licensed under GPL-3.0-or-later. Project ownership and author metadata are recorded in NOTICE. The current ISO build uses GRUB as an external bootloader through grub-mkrescue/grub2-mkrescue; GRUB is also GPL-licensed and compatible with TinyOS distribution.

Quick test

scripts/tinyos-dev.sh install-deps --install
scripts/tinyos-dev.sh check
scripts/tinyos-dev.sh test

Or directly with Make:

make prepare-test-env
make test-boot
make test-boot-x86_64
make test-minimal

The boot smoke test runs QEMU headlessly, writes serial output to build/boot-smoke.log and verifies every marker listed in tests/boot-markers.txt. The x86_64 target does the same against tests/boot-markers-x86_64.txt. If the build toolchain is not installed yet but build/tinyos.iso already exists, use make test-existing-iso. For a longer runtime check, use make test-stability. For experimental low-memory measurements, use make test-lowmem-probe.

Visual Studio note

The included TinyOS.vcxproj is a Makefile project for editing in Visual Studio Community. Use MSYS2 and set the MSYS2_BASH environment variable if the helper script scripts/build.ps1 cannot find bash.exe automatically from the IDE.