I aplolgize for the spelling. I never was any good at english. The muncher project is the implmentation of wine into a very very unique distro of linux and used as a true windows clone.
I know, it's not a good name for a project, but it's the best I could come up with after spinning around in a desk chair for five minutes. I also know that this isn't the first time anyone has come up with the idea either, but this is differnt. I have an implentation scheme.
I came up with the idea while working on an mp3 player for my car (which also runs linux) There are two HDs in my car stereo. The first is a small 512M drive running linux with all the core compents to make xmms work. The second drive is the mp3 drive, an 8GB removable with FAT32 on it so I can swap it into a windows box too. The mall Linux drive does all the work.
It struck me one day that wouldn't it be cool at have a real windows interface for wine. I mean, you can hack the system as much as you can, but when it comes to it, the explorer start bar and all of the activeX do-hickies like control panel and My computer are owned by microsoft. So I devised a plan to make Linux look, run, smell, feel, and act like windows. The goal is to fool my mom by swapping the OS and seeing if she notices.
The system works muck like the mp3 player in my car. Two partitons, one is the linux "Macrokenrel" which does all the behind the scenes stuff and the a fat32 partition, which holds the windows files and that the user only sees.
The Macrokenel will be a linux partition that has the ability to boot, starts the devices, and then run the neccary core files. The big ones are X, FVWM95, the gnome desktop (Just the desktop, no icons, or panels, no virtual displays, nothing crazy... yet), and wine.
Using glade, I will write little replacements for the ActiveX compents that are missing, (My computer, Control panel, etc) GTK will handle the windows "theme" as far as widgets go and fvwm95 is small, sleek, and gives you the right window dressings and a start button.
I have here a compiled list of what I plan to add.
CORE: Main Kernel -> Linux 2.4.1, USB and harware support big plus/framebuffer for startup screen http://www.kernel.org/
Dos support -> DosEMU 1.0.1 with FreeDOS .98, depending on dos support under wine http://www.dosemu.org/ http://www.freedos.org/
Windows support -> Wine, the latest http://www.winehq.org/
Graphic Display -> Xfree86 4.0.2 more graphics cards, the better font server http://www.xfree86.org
DirectX -> Transgameing
Explorer(GUI) -> modded FVWM95/Gnome desktop combo
ftp://mitac11.uia.ac.be/html-test/fvwm95.html http://www.gnome.org
Explorer(filelister) -> gmc (was Midnight Commander, swallowed by Gnome) http://www.gnome.org
Explorer(Browser) -> Mozilla (activeX compent, full browser) http://www.iol.ie/~locka/mozilla/mozilla.htm http://www.mozilla.org/
DO-HICKIES & THINGAMABOBS: These are small apps that are written in gtk (possably quick glide apps) that mimic the function of native windows apps.
My Computer -> GTK do-hickie that looks like My Computer Launches gmc and the contol panel do-hiokie.
System -> GTK do-hickie that will list devices that are valid in /dev in a windows format, intermixed with kernal modules and stuff from kudzu.
Network Neighborhood -> LinNeighborhood/Samba http://www.bnro.de/~schmidjo/
Trash -> Gnome's trash
Display Properties -> GTK do-hickie that edits xf86config, xscreensaver, and fvwmrc is a windows fimilar way
Dial-up Networking -> working for an ISP, I know this thing foreward and backwards do-hickie that writes chat/pppd scripts, easy!
Control Panel -> Ugh! Do what WinME does. Make it simple unless you want complex. Start with date/time, internet options, display, printers, and totaly ignore add/remove programs for now. Complex will have date/time, display, fonts, internet options keyboard, modems, mouse, network, passwords, printers regonal settings, scedualed tasks, system
Date/Time -> simple GTK app
internet options -> working for an ISP know this foreward amd backwards too edits chat/pppd scripts
Printers -> Wrapper for redhat's printtool w/ tweaks
add/remove programs -> not gonna touch this with a 10 foot pole. maybe later
fonts -> links to the font dirs in X
keyboard -> edits keyboard properties and Xkeyboard settings who's config file escapes me for the moment.
modems -> chat script tweaking
mouse -> gtk app that pays with mouse bindings
network -> know this back and foreward too, grabbs info from the loaded kernel modules
passwords -> password wrapper for xdm, gdm, *dm password thingies
regonal settings -> sets loocale varible
sceduled tasks -> wrapper for editing the chrontab
It's a big task, but I have faith in myself. I'm going to be build a "base system" tomarrow (Ceryix 133, 40M ram, Sound Blaster, Matrox graphics card, and a 814M HD) Feel free to comment. I have no web page on the porject yet, I don't want to call attention to myself in case it turns out to be a bigger project that I intended. Maybe we can use a form of this as a DirectX-compatible only OS that can just run games. Look out X-box ^_^
-Halkun
-
Josh Walker