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Z-OS Alpha 0.2. It boots. It has a desktop. It discovers hardware. It runs Z+ programs. It speaks HTTPS. It's real, and it's early.

ALPHA 0.2

Z-OS Alpha 0.2

UEFI bootable. x86-64. 100K+ lines of kernel C across 300+ source files. Desktop environment, signal chain engine, hardware discovery, native browser with TLS 1.3, NVMe storage, networking, end-to-end encrypted chat, image viewer, first-boot tour, Z+ compiler and runtime, 85+ Z+ programs.

View on GitHub Learn Z+

Quick Start

Option 1: QEMU (recommended)

Run Z-OS in a virtual machine. No hardware required.

$ git clone https://github.com/theBullfish/zeos.git

$ cd zeos

$ make run

Requires: QEMU with OVMF UEFI firmware, cross-compiler toolchain.

Option 2: USB Boot (bare metal)

Write Z-OS to a USB drive and boot real hardware.

$ make usb

$ sudo dd if=build/zeos.img of=/dev/sdX bs=4M status=progress

Replace /dev/sdX with your USB device. Boot with UEFI enabled.

What's in Alpha 0.2

UEFI bootstrap + framebuffer console

Desktop: panel, dock, snap/tile, spring physics

Command palette

First-boot welcome + guided tour

IDT + keyboard/mouse IRQ handling

PCIe bus enumeration + hardware discovery

Physical memory manager (bitmap allocator)

Virtual memory manager + heap

Timer + TSC calibration

Per-CPU preempt + SMP scaffold

Signal chain engine

NVMe storage driver

Networking (TCP/IP, DNS, HTTP, DHCP)

Native HTTPS — TLS 1.3 + Mozilla CA bundle

Native browser (HTML, CSS, navigation, history)

End-to-end encrypted chat (HMAC-SHA256 + AES-XTS)

Image viewer with baseline JPEG decoder

Z+ compiler — lex / parse / typed AST / 3-pass check

Z+ tree-walking runtime — programs execute end-to-end

Z+ feedback edge (`<~`) + multi-tick buffer

85+ Z+ programs across every industry

Sacred corners + spring animations

Hardware telemetry framework

Component provenance system

Bare-metal first boot (CN60 Chromebox)

AI inference routing

Multi-monitor support

ARM64 HAL backend (Raspberry Pi 4/5)

Tested Hardware

Device	Status	Notes
QEMU/KVM	Tested	OVMF UEFI, virtio — recommended for first look
ASUS Chromebox CN60	0.2 boot pending	Primary bare-metal target, x86-64 UEFI. Booted under Alpha 0.1; 0.2 hardware boot in progress.
ASUS Z13 (Ryzen AI MAX+)	Primary dev	128GB unified, TB4, daily driver
Any x86-64 UEFI	Should work	UEFI + GOP framebuffer required

Requirements

arch: x86-64

boot: UEFI (no legacy BIOS)

ram: 4 GB recommended for QEMU (Alpha 0.2 build is larger than the OVMF default fits)

display: GOP framebuffer

storage: USB boot or QEMU image

build: GCC cross-compiler, NASM, QEMU + OVMF

EXPERIMENTAL

Z-OS Alpha 0.2 is experimental software for developers and tinkerers. It will break. APIs will change. Do not use it for production workloads. This is an invitation to explore, not a promise of stability. If you find bugs, open an issue on GitHub.