Abstract The Flux OSKiti A Substrate for Kernel and Language Research

Implementing new operating systems is tedious, costly, and often impractical except for large projects. The Flux OSKit addresses this problem in a novel way by providing clean, well-documented OS components designed to be reused in a wide variety of other envi-ronments, rather than defining a new OS structure. The OSKit uses unconventional techniques to maximize its usefulness, such as in-tentionally exposing implementation details and platform-specific facilities. Further, the OSKit demonstrates a technique that allows unmodified code from existing mature operating systems to be in-corporated quickly and updated regularly, by wrapping it with a small amount of carefully designed “glue ” code to isolate its de-pendencies and export wellrdefined interfaces. The OSKit uses this technique to incorporate over 230,000 lines of stable code includ-ing device drivers, file systems, and network protocols. Our experi-ence demonstrates that this approach to component software struc-ture and reuse has a surprisingly large impact in the OS implemen-tation domain. Four real-world examples show how the OSKit is catalyzing research and development in operating systems and pro-gramming languages.