frontpage.
newsnewestaskshowjobs

Open Source @Github

fp.

Open in hackernews

ravynOS: Pre-alpha open-source OS based on Darwin, FreeBSD, Apple open-source

https://ravynos.com/
43•Bluestein•1h ago

Comments

gnuplustoejam•49m ago
What, exactly, is the point of this?

The Mac GUI is closed source. You're not cloning it without being sued by Apple's turbo lawyers or at the very least receive a C&D. This is for console applications?

macOS will now be ARM-only. If you buy Apple hardware you already have a license for the real thing.

Why run a TBD meme OS when you could run Darwin, FreeBSD, Linux, etc. or real macOS to accomplish whatever unclear goals are presented here?

*sigh* This is for no one, there is no viable use case. The ReactOS team will be sending a fruit basket.

Bluestein•44m ago
... or flowers for the grave? :)
Bluestein•37m ago
PS: The FAQ speaks to this somewhat:

  "This is a huge effort. Y'all must be crazy!
   Yes. Here's to the crazy ones... because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones that do.

   In all seriousness, though, it's not my first rodeo. I have no illusions about the scale of building an OS or how long projects like Haiku, ReactOS or GNUStep took to get usable. This is just something I like doing in my Copious Spare Time™ and that I hope will be useful someday.

  I've always liked Apple's design and elegance, but am not thrilled with the direction of recent macOS® or how closed the hardware has become. And I'm a big believer in open source. So ... let's build something that feels as elegant, without all the lock-in, and maybe (just maybe) I can get it to a point that reasonably useful Mac apps build & run on it. And if not, we'll build a lot of cool pieces along the way and learn a ton. I'm OK with that."
efficax•33m ago
I dunno you could definitely do a "wine but for macos" kind of implementation, e.g., https://www.darlinghq.org/ without breaking IP laws
reactordev•30m ago
why do anything? why Linux? why FreeBSD? why Mac at all? Why build your own wind turbine when corporations make large ones? Why build a cyclekart when you own a car? Why workout when everyone's going to die?

With that mindset, everything is useless and nothing has a point. Have I made my point?

Bluestein•17m ago
> Why workout when everyone's going to die?

I regret to actually say this, and mean no controversy - but, I have been actually asking myself just that - and, not in the "workout or not" sense, alone. In the "does anything have a point", way. Apologies.-

PS. To indeed contribute something: I am a big fan of the "doing things because of the joy of doing things" itself theory of it all, which is, seemingly, an antidote.-

BirAdam•5m ago
In general, things have meaning because people assign meanings to them. Nothing inherently has meaning as meaning exists only within the human mind/soul. If you are searching for meaning, you will find nothing.
baron3dl•23m ago
I've always been shocked by the lengths of time people will commit to proving wrong the folks who tell them "you can't do that."
seabrookmx•20m ago
> when you could run Darwin

That's what this is. Darwin isn't installable today. Apple just dumps a bunch of source code. Previous attempts at making Darwin bootable didn't go far and had no GUI.

travisgriggs•46m ago
Everyone gets to name their projects for their own reasons. If the pitch is basically an “alternate apple” macOS, I would have chosen one of the other other (alternate) apple varieties as the root of my OS. Missed opportunity I guess.
mixdup•36m ago
>but we're not a fan of the ever-closing hardware and ecosystem

What has changed about Apple's ecosystem vis a vis openness, hardware, or the 'ecosystem'?

The macOS ecosystem is pretty much the same as it has been since 1997

reactordev•35m ago
a lot of the kernel extensions are closed source proprietary. The core is still open but a lot of what makes modern Mac, Mac, are those kexts.
mixdup•23m ago
how has that changed over the past 20 years? the proprietary parts of Mac OS X and now macOS have been proprietary from the beginning
radicaldreamer•21m ago
There used to be a bootable Darwin instance that Apple published, which on paper would've made things a bit easier, but they stopped publishing it a while ago. It never resulted in any serious OS with a UI however.
WorldMaker•20m ago
By referencing the 90s it is a reminder that Mac started on an entirely closed source kernel. It's a regression towards the Mac mean more than a regression away from it.
soupbowl•30m ago
Good luck! There are many attempts at doing something similar. We can't really see anything to judge it by, yet.
masijo•24m ago
Would be nice to have a screenshot in the overview page
dang•22m ago
Related. Others?

New OS aims to provide (some) compatibility with macOS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45997212 - Nov 2025 (165 comments)

RavynOS Finesse of macOS. Freedom of FreeBSD - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38485596 - Dec 2023 (176 comments)

RavynOS – Finesse of macOS, freedom of FreeBSD - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32492514 - Aug 2022 (366 comments)

Playa Phone

https://playaphone.com/
220•cutoff•2h ago•92 comments

I turned my security cameras into an automatic bird identification system

https://jasontucker.blog/how-i-turned-my-security-cameras-into-an-automatic-bird-identification-s...
40•speckx•46m ago•18 comments

ravynOS: Pre-alpha open-source OS based on Darwin, FreeBSD, Apple open-source

https://ravynos.com/
43•Bluestein•1h ago•18 comments

ChatGPT Work Tool and Skill Reference

https://codex-tool-reference.simonw.chatgpt.site/
102•ijidak•3h ago•44 comments

Launch HN: Almanac (YC S26) – AI that knows your company

https://usealmanac.com/
19•kushagrchitkar•1h ago•18 comments

C++26: Standard Library Hardening Experiments

https://www.cppstories.com/2026/hardening-experiments/
46•ibobev•2h ago•26 comments

The Snow/Leavis ‘two cultures’ clash

https://aeon.co/essays/at-the-heart-of-the-snow-leavis-two-cultures-clash
39•Hooke•2h ago•19 comments

Launch HN: Hebbian Robotics (YC S26) – Build scalable robotics data pipelines

https://github.com/Hebbian-Robotics/hflow
22•kstonekuan•2h ago•6 comments

OpenShot 4.0 – Open-source video editor

https://www.openshot.org/blog/2026/08/30/openshot-40-record-edit-color-like-never-before/
428•metrofun•7h ago•99 comments

Konrad Zuse Museum shutting down due to lack of funding

https://www.heise.de/en/news/Zuse-Computer-Museum-ZCOM-in-Hoyerswerda-faces-closure-11344513.html
38•virtualritz•41m ago•10 comments

DNS abuse and criminal infrastructure

https://labs.ripe.net/author/andrew_campling/dns-abuse-and-criminal-infrastructure-beyond-definit...
45•jruohonen•1d ago•28 comments

Agent memory as a file format

https://calpaterson.com/memoryfields.html
123•ingve•6h ago•60 comments

Navigation app for people with blindness and low vision

https://seas.harvard.edu/news/smartphone-navigation-app-people-blindness-and-low-vision
20•geox•4d ago•8 comments

Breaking Claude Code Opus 5 Auto Mode

https://embracethered.com/blog/posts/2026/breaking-claude-code-opus-5-and-automode/
290•Recursing•9h ago•96 comments

uv: Deduplicate all files in the wheel cache

https://github.com/astral-sh/uv/pull/21327
178•tosh•11h ago•84 comments

Malleable software = solid bases and custom code

https://www.mdubakov.me/malleable-software-solid-bases-custom-code/
76•tablet•6h ago•27 comments

Damn fine tiny cafe

https://sandyuraz.com/blogs/tiny-cafe/
330•thecsw•3d ago•57 comments

I attended the State of the Map conference

https://povesham.wordpress.com/2026/08/30/state-of-the-map-2026-openstreetmap-conference/
54•altilunium•8h ago•4 comments

Study: Blue light impairs the eye's ability to distinguish fine detail most

https://research.uga.edu/news/blue-light-has-a-surprising-effect-on-your-eyes-study-finds/
79•giuliomagnifico•9h ago•42 comments

You Probably Own This 7-Eleven (and That's Why It Looks So Sad)

https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/you-probably-own-this-7-eleven
4•iamnothere•57m ago•0 comments

The art of CHIP-8

http://beyondloom.com/blog/artofchip8.html
42•surprisetalk•1w ago•7 comments

Apache Iggy, a message streaming platform in Rust, graduates to an Apache TLP

https://iggy.apache.org/blogs/2026/08/24/apache-iggy-top-level-project-tlp-graduation/
73•spetz•2h ago•16 comments

Rakuten Kobo returns to U.S. retail as sales double

https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/digital/content-and-e-books/article/101053-rakuten-k...
75•seam_carver•2h ago•62 comments

“I just chose words carefully”

https://unsung.aresluna.org/i-just-chose-words-carefully/
1130•zdw•18h ago•323 comments

Transfer files over an Ethernet patch cable

https://maurycyz.com/misc/etherfiles/
137•jllyhill•14h ago•147 comments

P99 0 ms* autocomplete for 240M domain names

https://ruurtjan.com/articles/p99-0ms-autocomplete-for-240-million-domain-names
205•dbalatero•14h ago•76 comments

Wildfire Survivors Push Back Against Newsom-Led Utility Bailout

https://prospect.org/2026/08/28/wildfire-survivors-push-back-against-newsom-led-utility-bailout/
15•hn_acker•1h ago•4 comments

My Experience Has Nuance, Yours Is a Data Point

https://blog.jim-nielsen.com/2026/nuance-for-me-none-for-you/
47•Brajeshwar•2h ago•38 comments

Hit anything. Discover how it rings

https://fraware.github.io/EVERYTHING-RINGS/
36•MADEinPARIS•4d ago•23 comments

How to build a diffusion language model

https://kuleshov-group.github.io/blog/blog/2026/how-to-build-a-diffusion-language-model/
162•volodia•17h ago•19 comments