No? Well, some people do. A few years back, there was a great operating system called BeOS that began to make waves in the multimedia set. A small number of geeks just loved it. And a project to recreate the defunct operating system is getting close to releasing a fully functional, free version of BeOS.
It was originally designed as a hopeful successor to MacOS on the Macintosh, but when that didn't work out (Apple chose NeXT instead) it was developed as an operating system in its own right. Those who loved it appreciated its simplicity and great design, as well as features including a very fast boot time and a bash shell for the hardcore geeks.
BeOS eventually all but died, but many of its followers tried to keep the operating system alive through different projects--some to recreate the BeOS features they liked on Linux or Windows; others to completely recreate BeOS from scratch. One of these efforts has become a project called Haiku OS.
At the same time, Linux was gaining popularity and the idea of "alternate" operating systems (meaning neither Windows nor MacOS) was attracting a lot of attention. Another operating system project that began development around that time is still going strong: ReactOS.
Either project could eventually be like Firefox. Netscape basically died when they decided to rewrite Navigator from scratch: the new browser, Mozilla, was clunky and people didn't like it. But after basically disappearing from the public eye and spending many years getting their code base strong and finally creating a great browser, the Mozilla group finally reappeared with a really solid product - Firefox.
I'd still like to see Firefox get more widespread acceptance, but that's another story.
Anyhow, there are two interesting stories. Both are efforts that have been around for a number of years, and the positive sign is that they're plodding along, not just being supported in one quick spurt by a few enthusiastic developers and then abandoned.
Haiku OS - After BeOS became briefly the new big thing and then died, a lot of BeOS lovers wanted to somehow keep it alive. It looks like after all these years one of the efforts is still going strong. Haiku OS aims to recreate BeOS as an Open Source operating system with a completely new code base, and this summer the project even has EIGHT interns provided through the Google Summer of Code program. Revision 1 of the new operating system is designed to be fully binary-compatible with BeOS. Revision 2 will head in new directions that aren't necessarily backwards-compatible with the old BeOS.
I think it could be very interesting in 1-2 years once the operating system is fully stable. BeOS is very much in the spirit of the Mac but more spartan and simple while keeping similarly intense standards for design. They're aiming to have a solid end-user version ready by the end of 2007. Even if it takes longer, that first end-user version could be pretty interesting.
React OS - A project that has also been around for many years now, aiming to create a full Windows clone. While I think it's fully legitimate to ask, "why do we need ANOTHER windows?" I think that we could see some great benefits in a few years if it keeps going:
An OS that can run all Windows apps but without some of the customer-unfriendly things that MS occasionally does (essentially restricting users' rights to benefit MS and its partners).
Possibly a windows version that's free and perhaps somewhat more efficient, for running in VMWare or another virtual machine, on top of Linux or the Mac.
Of the two, I think that Haiku OS is the more promising project, but you might want to keep an eye out for both of them.
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