Hacker News: jggonz

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 18:04:12 +0000

Thank you for the idea! I was going to add a basic interpreter I've been working on in another project, but I think a port of Frotz is coming first now given how many resources are already available.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 15:13:22 +0000

I've removed the "hand-written" language that the LLM added. I added some information to the "What it is" section on the homepage that reads "The source is real-mode NASM assembly, written with AI, and it is on GitHub."

I thought about having a big flashing heading about the use of AI, but at that point, I think it was becoming more of a warning to AI triggered people than anything useful.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 14:48:16 +0000

^ This... I am the "llm-driver"/"creator" for os8088 and my goal is this. Just to have some fun and make something useful for people (like me) that have dozens of old computers sitting in a room.

And...I do know how to write in assembly, VHDL, and higher level languages, but I also have a life, and I much rather have an LLM write out the assembly for a hobby like this one where I wanted something in 6 days, not 6 months.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 09:24:19 +0000

Yes, you can see the hardware we tested here: https://www.os8088.com/hardware

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 08:52:02 +0000

Yes, agree. I laughed at that when I first saw it last week. I went ahead and cleared all that up on the homepage and the README now.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 08:32:24 +0000

I am not sure I will ever get this to protected mode... The goal was to have something running on slower, older hardware, and once protected mode comes into play, we're letting go many of the constraints that make this an interesting experiment.

Even though I've relied on AI to hammer out the assembly, it has been very educational iterating on it. You end up learning the techniques that other operating systems used to get applications to perform well on slow machines.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 08:12:41 +0000

lol, so disappointing to see the attacks when I'm just having some fun.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:57:46 +0000

Many millions so far...

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:56:57 +0000

I might even port over povray... :)

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:45:04 +0000

I agree. We've just been spending more time on the operating system than the homepage. I'm making some updates, but it's still all going to be written "through" AI for now.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:37:52 +0000

If you want to try the operating system in the browser, you can try it by visiting here: https://os8088.com/demo/

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:35:03 +0000

"Author" of os8088 here.

That's no longer the case. Someone that is contributing to the project is using real hardware to validate the changes. You can check out some of the systems he tested it with here: https://www.os8088.com/hardware

The system does currently run with 256KB of RAM, and you can use some of the basic apps, but not all of them.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:31:43 +0000

We have built in driver support now, so we will be adding network driver support soon. We just added hard drive support that is potentially a bit buggy...

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:30:36 +0000

Yes, it's easy to break. There's no memory protection. However, building packages, drivers, and kernel modules for it has been a fun and educational exercise in memory management.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:27:24 +0000

"Author" of os8088 here. I love seeing what these early limited system could do! Someone shared a video of GOS with me after seeing what os8088 looked like.

I believe os8088 also boots now with just 128k of RAM, but it's very limited in the type of apps you can load. There's a os8088.com/hardware page where one of the contributors to the project that has been helping optimize the operating system tested it out on a bunch of different machines.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:17:48 +0000

"Author" of os8088 here. That's unfortunate. This is a hobby, and yes, it's all written with Claude. I have a bunch of videos up showing the process.

I'm updating the copy of the page to make it extremely clear that it's built using AI so that we can move past that point.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:10:28 +0000

"Author" of os8088 here. You're right, it's hand-prompted.

Claude's Opus and Fable have done a really great job helping me and another contributor shape this operating system. It's been a really interesting way to learn about the different techniques that other operating systems have used to get the performance we saw in LisaOS, MacOS, Windows, GEOS, etc... performance at 640x480 on an XT class machine is tricky! Also, the 64KB segment limitations were very interesting to overcome!

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:06:37 +0000

Author of the AI written os8088 OS here...

Thanks for sharing the promotional video for Visi On. It's cool to see how many different companies gave this a shot back in the 80s.

New comment by jggonz in "Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386"

jggonz — Sat, 08 Aug 2026 23:37:27 +0000

The graphical operating system that could have been for the IBM XT.

A MacOS-like desktop for the Intel 8086, written entirely in real-mode assembly (with Claude). Verified to run on real hardware, with FAT12/16 support, ported apps, games, Sound Blaster support and upcoming Hard Drive support.

Os8088: A powerful Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, 386

jggonz — Sat, 08 Aug 2026 23:37:27 +0000

Article URL: https://os8088.com/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49226923

Points: 251

# Comments: 162