How a Computer Should Work — Joe Maloney
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And the thing about an operating system is that you're never ever<br>supposed to see it. Because nobody really uses an operating system;<br>people use programs on their computer. And the only mission in life of<br>an operating system is to help those programs run.<br>— Linus Torvalds
Operating systems today fail to meet this goal. So let's make an<br>appliance instead.
Make it an appliance
The system should consume as little space as possible. It should be<br>possible to build the system and its applications on any low-resource<br>machine — so that even the lowest-tier, no-cost CI/CD options in the<br>cloud can build it. Every machine, new and old, should be able to run it.
Boot quietly, boot welcoming
The computer should boot the appliance with not a single line of text,<br>unless the user invokes a shortcut to show verbose logging or a recovery<br>command line. It should boot with a light background.
Login without the internet
When the computer is booted, if a user must log in, it should never<br>require an internet connection to do so.
If a user wants to boot straight to a desktop and never enter a password<br>at all, they should be able to. This could work by letting the user create<br>an account with no password, or by selecting a disposable guest account<br>that runs entirely in memory and is never saved.
Applications you actually own
A user should be able to download applications from the internet without<br>signing in to anything. They should be able to copy an application to a<br>flash drive, plug that drive into a system that has no internet connection,<br>and use the application there — forever, with no connection ever<br>required.
Upgrade without erasing
If the user decides to upgrade the computer, they should be able to<br>download an ISO and boot it to upgrade only the system — without<br>erasing the disk, and while preserving the user's data and applications.
A server with no setup
If a user has ten machines and wants to set one up as a server, they<br>should be able to do exactly that: create user accounts on it, then boot<br>the other systems on the network, run applications, or log in over the<br>network. There should be no setup required for a single server.
Old hardware is good hardware
With new hardware made expensive by AI demand and other shortages, it<br>doesn't make sense to support only new devices. A user should be able to<br>buy nearly any refurbished machine and run both the appliance and the<br>desktop on it.
If I want to write books, make music, edit photos, or edit videos<br>— why do I need an always-on, internet-connected machine? The answer<br>is that I don't.
Closing Thoughts
I just want a system that gets out of the way and lets me make things<br>— quietly, on my own terms, for as long as the hardware lasts. That's<br>how a computer should work.