[Savannah-register-public] [task #6403] Submission of Loper

[Stanislav Datskovskiy]

URL:
  <http://savannah.gnu.org/task/?6403>

                 Summary: Submission of Loper
                 Project: Savannah Administration
            Submitted by: asciilifeform
            Submitted on: Wednesday 01/17/2007 at 18:30
         Should Start On: Wednesday 01/17/2007 at 00:00
   Should be Finished on: Saturday 01/27/2007 at 00:00
                Category: Project Approval
                Priority: 5 - Normal
                  Status: None
                 Privacy: Public
        Percent Complete: 0%
             Assigned to: None
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any
                  Effort: 0.00

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Details:

A new project has been registered at Savannah 
This project account will remain inactive until a site admin approves or
discards the registration.


= Registration Administration =

While this item will be useful to track the registration process, *approving
or discarding the registration must be done using the specific Group
Administration
<https://savannah.gnu.org/siteadmin/groupedit.php?group_id=9067> page*,
accessible only to site administrators, effectively *logged as site
administrators* (superuser):

* Group Administration
<https://savannah.gnu.org/siteadmin/groupedit.php?group_id=9067>


= Registration Details =

* Name: *Loper*
* System Name:  *loper*
* Type: non-GNU software & documentation
* License: GNU General Public License V2 or later

----

==== Description: ====
Please note:
This project has only recently moved beyond the planning stage; most of the
existing materials consists of (handwritten) notes, pseudocode, small code
snippets, and mathematical work. There is no published code base yet.


Abstract:
Loper is a Free operating system and programming environment inspired by the
historic Lisp Machines.  Currently it targets the x86 architecture, but
eventual portability is planned.  The purpose of Loper is not to replace
existing operating systems, but rather to provide a convenient platform for
experimenting with new ideas in computer science.


Detail:
Languages of the Lisp family coexist uneasily with the decidedly
procedurally-oriented I/O and storage facilities provided by traditional
operating systems.  A Lisp-based OS resolves some of these difficulties; in
addition, it opens up fields previously closed to the Lisp programmer, such
as device driver development.

Porting an existing Lisp to "bare hardware" (as in the famous Mozitz project)
is not the Right Thing; for when the output of a C compiler is involved at any
point, the system becomes "non-Lispy" at a fundamental level.  The primary
design goal of Loper is for every part of the system, including the boot
loader, memory manager, UI, etc. to be fully editable at runtime. This is
feasible through the use of a blend of conventional and Just In Time
compilation.

Some interesting features include: the rejection of the concept of "files":
programs should not be required to be aware of the distinction between RAM
and disk, any more than they are currently asked to understand the different
levels of CPU cache they might reside in. RAM is viewed as merely a cache of
disk. Additionally, the entire notion of separate applications is dispensed
with: it results in unnecessary duplication of effort.

Long-term goals include unusual and experimental features such as: automated
conversion of Free device drivers written in C to the Loper system; automated
porting to new architectures; implementation of advanced human interface
features such as "infinite undo."


Summary:
1) Loper is simultaneously an operating system, a (Scheme-like) language, and
a programming environment. It is quite certainly not intended to replace any
existing operating system, for it is not compatible with any existing
software, and moreover such compatibility is not among the planned goals of
the project.
2) All OS and application development can be accomplished from within the
system.


==== Other Software Required: ====
There are no software dependencies.






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