elks VS collapseos

ELKS supported MMU-less operation on 8088 and 80286 machines, but I don't think an ARM port exists: https://github.com/ghaerr/elks

Roughly in the mid-90s I bought at a local surplus store a "Carry 1" industrial 8088 computer which to my surprise I later discovered it could run Linux (ELKS: https://github.com/ghaerr/elks). I ultimately sold it on Ebay because although it was a beautiful piece of old tech, I was struggling to find more space for other things.

Here's one. I had only the central unit, mine had two floppy drives.

I don't think you can replace the OS on these. Unless there is a way to boot them from DOS, but you are looking at 8c086 machine so the choice is limited. Linux or BSD won't work. But ELKS might if it can be made to boot from DOS. Minix 2.02 seems to work.

Yet ELKS works on 16 bit computers with 640k of RAM.

Some small size Linux-like OSes do exist though: one commenter suggested Lunix (which I didn't know, thanks for the link), and a slightly bigger one is ELKS which runs on old MMU-less x86 CPUs. I managed to run it on a 8088 industrial PC ages ago.

https://github.com/jbruchon/elks

I should have a Furby buried somewhere; now that I think of it, it may be the right platform to stick a bigger brain into, make it wireless so that it could be connected to the home IoT network then signal events or alerts.

Something like this is probably a lot more realistic than (as fast) "integrated circuits at home" : http://collapseos.org/

http://collapseos.org/

I know the point of it isn't to run on new hardware, but this would be a way to learn it on a stable platform without having to worry about dealing with constant problems from old hardware before trying to implement it on said.

There is something called Collapse OS I read about here on HN:

http://collapseos.org/

I myself am a collector of old devices, having raised three kids plus being a web dev. Hate throwing them away too I was just think about this today could I extract the CPUs or RAM or something to reuse rather than destory for the metals. I'd like to learn more hardware but no time.

Some hope for Colapse OS [1] perhaps?

[1] http://collapseos.org

http://collapseos.org/

Here is a quick guide to the science for those with the brain worms:

Maybe start with sufficient support for a simple OS that allows you to edit and compile programs. Something like FreeDOS or CollapseOs. Once you have that working you can extend it.

During collapse we'll all be using Dusk OS and post collapse we'll be using cobbled together rugged computers running on Collapse OS. I imagine at that point we can probably put the sub name to a vote. Maybe "r/ordinarylife".

Not Linux....but you could just install Kolibri OS for a very light desktop or consider CollapseOS and DuskOS....think Dusk should run bare metal on now and won't be too bloated, but there's always CollapseOS if you prefer to keep things light