NSCoreOS

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🚀 Overview

NSCoreOS is an ambitious open-source operating system project that aims to combine:

• High Performance: Lock-free concurrency, multi-core optimization, zero-copy I/O
• Security: Memory safety (Rust), ASLR, Stack Canary, NX/W^X, MAC framework
• AI-Driven Optimization: Real-time workload analysis and automatic parameter tuning
• Multi-Architecture: First-class support for x86_64, AArch64, RISC-V, and LoongArch
• POSIX Compatibility: Full IEEE Std 1003.1-2017 compliance

Development Status: Early Development (v0.1.0-alpha planned)

Target Release: Q1 2029 (v1.0.0)

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✨ Key Features

Architecture & Performance

• Hybrid Kernel: Critical services in kernel-space, drivers and filesystems in user-space
• Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL): Architecture-agnostic design via trait abstraction
• Dual-Architecture Parallel Development: x86_64 and AArch64 developed in lockstep
• Microservice Framework: Dependency injection, AOP, event-driven communication

Advanced Capabilities

• AI Self-Optimization: Adaptive I/O scheduler, TCP congestion control, and CPU scheduling
• Virtualization: Built-in Type-1 hypervisor (Intel VT-x, AMD-V, ARM VHE)
• Container Support: Kernel-level cgroups and namespaces
• Multi-ABI Compatibility: Linux (glibc translation), Windows (Wine-like), macOS (Mach-O)

System Features

• Filesystems: Native support for ext4, NTFS, Btrfs; read-only XFS, ZFS
• Graphics: Vulkan-based composator and native UI framework
• Networking: Full TCP/IP stack with BBR/CUBIC congestion control
• Web Engine: Lightweight, high-performance browser engine built in Rust

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🏗️ Architecture

NSCoreOS follows a layered architecture:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│         User Space                      │
│  Applications | POSIX | Web Engine      │
└─────────────────────────────────────────┘
              ↓ System Calls
┌─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│      Microservices Layer                │
│  Process | Filesystem | Network | IPC  │
└─────────────────────────────────────────┘
              ↓ DI Container
┌─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│      Kernel Core Framework              │
│  DI | Event Bus | AOP | Sync Primitives │
└─────────────────────────────────────────┘
              ↓ HAL Interface
┌─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│      Hardware Abstraction Layer         │
│  MMU | Interrupt | Timer | I/O          │
└─────────────────────────────────────────┘
              ↓ Platform Code
┌─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│      Platform Support                   │
│      x86_64  |  AArch64                │
└─────────────────────────────────────────┘

For detailed architecture documentation, see docs/architecture/SYSTEM_ARCHITECTURE.md.

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🎯 Development Roadmap

We follow a milestone-based development approach with incremental releases:

• M0 (Week 1-2): Infrastructure & Build System
• M1 (Week 3-5): Hardware Abstraction Layer
• M2 (Week 6-9): Memory Management
• M3 (Week 10-14): Process & Thread Scheduling
• M4 (Week 15-20): Filesystem (VFS + FAT32)
• M5 (Week 21-27): Network Stack (TCP/IP)
• M6 (Week 28-32): IPC Mechanisms
• M7 (Week 33-40): Graphics System
• M8 (Week 41-48): MVP Integration & Optimization
• M9 (Week 49-60): AI Framework Integration
• M10 (Week 61-72): RISC-V & LoongArch Support

See docs/progress/ROADMAP.md for detailed milestone planning.

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🚀 Quick Start

Prerequisites

• Rust 2024 Edition (nightly)
• QEMU 8.0+ (for testing)
• Clang/LLVM 16+
• NASM (for x86_64 bootloader)
• UEFI SDK (optional)

Building

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/nscoreos/nscoreos.git
cd nscoreos

# Build for x86_64
cargo build --target x86_64-nscoreos

# Build for AArch64
cargo build --target aarch64-nscoreos

# Run tests
cargo test --workspace

# Run in QEMU (x86_64)
./tools/qemu/run_x86_64.sh

# Run in QEMU (AArch64)
./tools/qemu/run_aarch64.sh

Current Status

⚠️ Note: This project is in early development. We are currently working on Milestone M0 (Infrastructure).

Currently implemented:

• ✅ Workspace structure
• ⏳ Custom target definitions (in progress)
• ⏳ Linker scripts (in progress)

Planned for v0.1.0-alpha1:

• Basic bootloader (UEFI)
• Kernel entry point
• Minimal print output

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📚 Documentation

• Master Implementation Plan - Complete development roadmap
• System Architecture - Technical architecture overview
• HAL Design - Hardware abstraction layer design
• Development Roadmap - Milestone planning
• API Documentation - Rust API docs (rustdoc)
• Architecture Decision Records - Technical decisions (ADR format)

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🤝 Contributing

We welcome contributions! NSCoreOS is an open-source community project.

Ways to Contribute

1. Code: Pull requests for bug fixes, features, or optimizations
2. Documentation: Improve docs, fix typos, write tutorials
3. Testing: Write unit tests, integration tests, or report bugs
4. Review: Code review, architecture feedback
5. Community: Answer questions, help new contributors

Getting Started

1. Read CONTRIBUTING.md for contribution guidelines
2. Check Good First Issues for beginner-friendly tasks
3. Join our Discord server (coming soon)
4. Read the development guide (in progress)

Code of Conduct

We are committed to providing a welcoming and inclusive environment. Please read our Code of Conduct.

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🎓 Learning Resources

If you’re interested in OS development in Rust:

• Phil Opp’s OS Dev Blog
• Rust OSDev Community
• Writing an OS in Rust
• Redox OS - Pure Rust OS
• Theseus OS - Component-based OS

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🛠️ Tech Stack

• Language: Rust 2024 Edition
• Build System: Cargo (workspace)
• Testing: Custom test framework + QEMU
• CI/CD: GitHub Actions
• Documentation: rustdoc + mdBook

Key Dependencies

# Core
spin = "0.9"           # Spin locks
lock_api = "0.4"        # Lock API
buddy_system_allocator = "0.9"  # Physical memory allocator
volatile = "0.5"        # Volatile accesses
bitflags = "2.4"        # Bit flags

# Logging
log = "0.4"
defmt = "0.3"           # Format for embedded systems

# Platform-specific (optional)
x86_64 = "0.14"         # x86_64 support
aarch64 = "0.1"         # ARM64 support
riscv = "0.10"          # RISC-V support (future)

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📊 Project Status

Component	Status	Target Version
HAL	🏗️ In Design	v0.1.0-alpha2
Memory Management	⏳ Planned	v0.1.0-alpha3
Process Scheduler	⏳ Planned	v0.1.0-beta1
Filesystem	⏳ Planned	v0.1.0-beta2
Network Stack	⏳ Planned	v0.1.0-beta3
Graphics	⏳ Planned	v0.2.0-beta2
AI Framework	⏳ Planned	v0.3.0

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🗺️ Project Goals

Short-term (3 months)

• Complete M0-M2 (Infrastructure + HAL + Memory)
• Achieve 80%+ test coverage on dual architectures
• Build community of 3-5 active contributors

Mid-term (12 months)

• Complete M0-M6 (Process, Filesystem, Network)
• MVP demo system (command-line version)
• Performance: 60% of Linux on Phoronix Test Suite

Long-term (36 months)

• Complete M0-M10 (Full MVP)
• Support 4 architectures (x86_64, AArch64, RISC-V, LoongArch)
• AI framework automatic optimization
• Active community with enterprise users

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📜 License

NSCoreOS is dual-licensed under:

• MIT License (LICENSE-MIT or http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)
• Apache License, Version 2.0 (LICENSE-APACHE or http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)

You may choose either license for your use.

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🙏 Acknowledgments

• Rust Project: For the amazing language and toolchain
• Rust OSDev Community: For invaluable resources and discussions
• Phil Opp: For the excellent “Writing an OS in Rust” blog series
• Redox OS: For demonstrating a pure Rust OS is possible
• Linux Kernel: For decades of OS research and development

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📮 Contact & Community

• GitHub: https://github.com/nscoreos/nscoreos
• Issues: https://github.com/nscoreos/nscoreos/issues
• Discussions: https://github.com/nscoreos/nscoreos/discussions
• Email: contact@nscoreos.org (coming soon)

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