WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.320 Windows, macOS, or Linux. If you use a desktop or laptop computer, you're probably using 00:00:05.320 --> 00:00:10.000 one of these three operating systems. But did you know that they don't have the market 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:17.280 completely cornered? There are, in fact, alternatives you can use on your PC right now. 00:00:17.280 --> 00:00:21.320 React OS is a good place to start if you're a Windows user and don't want to dive into 00:00:21.320 --> 00:00:26.880 something completely unfamiliar. It started all the way back in 1996 and was intended 00:00:26.880 --> 00:00:32.680 to be a clone of Windows 95 with React referring to how the project was meant to be a reaction 00:00:32.680 --> 00:00:38.560 to Microsoft's market dominance. React OS looks and feels a lot like Windows and has 00:00:38.560 --> 00:00:43.240 much of the same functionality. Many Windows applications run on it without needing extra 00:00:43.240 --> 00:00:48.080 layers of emulation. Hold on a minute, if it's so much like Windows, wouldn't Microsoft 00:00:48.080 --> 00:00:52.640 try and shut it down due to copyright infringement? Well, the folks behind React OS avoided running 00:00:52.640 --> 00:00:57.640 a foul of the law using a technique called clean room reverse engineering. Basically, 00:00:57.640 --> 00:01:02.160 they're taking the code apart, looking at it, and then writing their own code, which 00:01:02.160 --> 00:01:08.240 is based on it, but not the same. One unintended side effect of this approach is that React 00:01:08.240 --> 00:01:13.600 OS exists in a perpetual alpha state with features several generations behind the current 00:01:13.600 --> 00:01:19.440 version of Windows, along with very shaky hardware support. But it's free, so if you 00:01:19.440 --> 00:01:24.320 only needed it for some basic tasks and you have a deathly allergy to Linux, it might 00:01:24.320 --> 00:01:31.520 be worth checking out. Or maybe not. I think Microsoft hasn't gone after it because they 00:01:31.520 --> 00:01:36.800 just don't see it as a serious threat. Up next, let's talk about Haikou. Free and 00:01:36.800 --> 00:01:43.000 open source. It's not a Japanese poem based on BOS. BOS was an operating system initially 00:01:43.000 --> 00:01:49.400 designed for power PC CPUs, the same ones Apple used before 2005. The idea was to have 00:01:49.400 --> 00:01:55.120 a media editing optimized OS intended to run on the Mac. One small problem though, Apple 00:01:55.120 --> 00:02:00.200 decided not to buy BOS' parent company, so instead the project was modified to work on 00:02:00.200 --> 00:02:06.440 Intel and AMD x86 processors instead. By this point though, they had a much bigger problem. 00:02:06.440 --> 00:02:11.320 Windows had already dominated the x86 space. BOS was ultimately bought by the same people 00:02:11.320 --> 00:02:18.120 who brought you the Palm Pilot who also did not do much with it. So Haikou was born, yay! 00:02:18.120 --> 00:02:23.880 An open source re-implementation of BOS that's still being updated to this day. Haikou is 00:02:23.880 --> 00:02:28.400 currently in beta and might not be a bad option if you're looking to accomplish simpler tasks 00:02:28.400 --> 00:02:31.880 with it. There are a number of apps written specifically for it you can download from 00:02:31.880 --> 00:02:36.800 a dedicated package manager, similar to desktop distributions of Linux. Despite its circa 00:02:36.800 --> 00:02:42.160 2000 retro look, it can render modern webpages properly if you're looking just to browse 00:02:42.240 --> 00:02:48.200 the web. Hardware support is hit or miss, but it runs on even low spec systems, so it's 00:02:48.200 --> 00:02:52.200 quite lightweight, just like a real Haikou. To wrap up today's episode, we've got free 00:02:52.200 --> 00:02:57.320 BSD. Based on the Berkeley software distribution, that is where they got the BSD from and also 00:02:57.320 --> 00:03:02.560 the name of my new hippie rock band. The original BSD was based on Unix, a famous OS developed 00:03:02.560 --> 00:03:07.600 in the early 70s that gained popularity due to its portability, meaning it could be used 00:03:07.600 --> 00:03:12.640 on different types of hardware configurations, which was uncommon at the time. BSD ended 00:03:12.640 --> 00:03:17.360 up becoming common in workstations, and later free BSD became a popular open source descendant 00:03:17.360 --> 00:03:23.800 that's much more than just an alternative desktop operating system. In fact, iOS, macOS, 00:03:23.800 --> 00:03:27.880 and the software for the newer versions of the PlayStation all incorporate large amount 00:03:27.880 --> 00:03:32.400 of free BSD's codebase. There are a couple of other places you might have seen free BSD 00:03:32.400 --> 00:03:37.320 or even used it before without knowing it. Both FreeNAS, a free network storage operating 00:03:37.320 --> 00:03:42.040 system with ZFS support, and PF Sense, which you can use to transform your commodity computer 00:03:42.040 --> 00:03:47.960 hardware into your own network router, are based off free BSD. And although free BSD has 00:03:47.960 --> 00:03:52.640 tons of other applications, you can still use it as a desktop operating system, and 00:03:52.640 --> 00:03:57.520 it's a lot more refined than Haikou and ReactOS, for whatever that's worth. Now, your NAND 00:03:57.520 --> 00:04:01.280 isn't going to be installing it anytime soon, it doesn't even come with a graphical 00:04:01.280 --> 00:04:05.080 interface by default, but that doesn't mean that you're completely out of luck if you're 00:04:05.080 --> 00:04:10.360 a novice. There are free BSD based solutions such as Furry BSD, name of your sex tape, 00:04:10.360 --> 00:04:15.600 and Ghost BSD that come with their own GUIs. Is there another alternative OS that you're 00:04:15.600 --> 00:04:18.800 interested in? Let us know in the comments and we'll see if we can cover it in a future 00:04:18.800 --> 00:04:23.720 episode. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got an urge to dig out my HDDVDs and Betamax tapes. 00:04:23.720 --> 00:04:28.760 Well thanks for watching guys, get subscribed, and I'm off to apparently get HDDVDs.