Alternative Operating Systems for the Pi

[Spid]

Whilst I appreciate we have have forums for various operating systems, thought it would be a good idea to produce a list of what I have found is available apart from Debian, Arch and RiscOS

piCore http://www.tinycorelinux.net/arm.html

Fedora Remix http://zenit.senecac.on.ca/wiki/index.p ... dora_Remix

Slitaz Linux http://www.cnx-software.com/2012/12/15/ ... pberry-pi/

Gentoo Linux http://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi

NetBSD http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/3145

FreeBSD http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/3094

OpenSuse http://zq1.de/~bernhard/linux/opensuse

Slackware 14.0 http://stanleygarvey.com/Slackberry/index.php

Slackware 13.37 http://slackware.spit-ct.ro/raspberrypi

Slackware create yourself http://rpi.fatdog.eu and http://www.daves-collective.co.uk/raspi

[Unhban]

There's also:

Bodhi Linux http://www.bodhilinux.com/

Based on Ubuntu, it has the Enlightenment desktop and many cool desktop themes. Runs Chromium well.

[Spid]

There's also:

Bodhi Linux http://www.bodhilinux.com/

Based on Ubuntu, it has the Enlightenment desktop and many cool desktop themes. Runs Chromium well.

I thought Bhodi was Raspbian Wheezy with E17 ?, hence why not listed !

Maybe Bhodi should request there own forum space ?

[jamesh]

By alternate OS's I thought you might be listing non-*nix OS's....

You've missed Plan9, and RISCOS.

[Spid]

By alternate OS's I thought you might be listing non-*nix OS's....

You've missed Plan9, and RISCOS.

Yes I should of listed Plan9 and RiscOS

I did not mention

OpenElec http://openelec.tv/get-openelec/viewcat ... -pi-builds

[Muzer]

IMHO listing OSes not based on the standard GNU/Linux/(option of Xorg) would be the best plan. In which case, I can count:

Completely free from Linux:
* RISC OS (not Unix-based at all)
* Plan9 ("More Unix than Unix")
* NetBSD (Unix but not Linux. Very slow because of the debug options currently enabled in public images)
* FreeBSD (Unix but not Linux. I haven't tried it.)

Linux-based but not a standard desktop/command-line distribution:
* Android (The popular Linux-based smartphone OS. So slow it's almost unusable)
* BerryTerminal (thin client, haven't tried)
* OpenWRT (router, haven't tried)
* OpenELEC (XBMC, haven't tried)
* XBian (XBMC, haven't tried)
* Raspbmc (XBMC, haven't tried)
* AROS (Amiga-compatible APIs running on a host Linux system. Looks very interesting, but I haven't tried)




Let me know if there are any mistakes or if I have missed anything.

[drgeoff]

... should of ...

Sets my teeth on edge every time I see it. (Which, regrettably, is becoming more frequent.)

[Unhban]

My take on OSs that some haven't tried:

OpenElec (it's a media centre) - great, it works without problems. iPlayer and YouTube easily added as add-ons and they run without glitches. Stick with the default desktop though. Autoupgrades on bootup.

Raspbmc (it too is a media centre) - much work needed when I tried it. Freezing and kludgy.

FreeBSD - seemed like a professional OS to me, just seemed to work, whatever. However, the reason I stopped using it was it seemed difficult to expand the OS to the size of my 16Gb SD card.

RISC OS - worth a try as it's a drag and drop OS. However, seriously lacking printer and USB drivers, and Youtube and iPlayer totally out of it.

But horses for courses - if you want to control things then Raspbian is it....

These views from a noob

[randrade]

My take on OSs that some haven't tried:

OpenElec (it's a media centre) - great, it works without problems. iPlayer and YouTube easily added as add-ons and they run without glitches. Stick with the default desktop though. Autoupgrades on bootup.

Raspbmc (it too is a media centre) - much work needed when I tried it. Freezing and kludgy.

FreeBSD - seemed like a professional OS to me, just seemed to work, whatever. However, the reason I stopped using it was it seemed difficult to expand the OS to the size of my 16Gb SD card.

RISC OS - worth a try as it's a drag and drop OS. However, seriously lacking printer and USB drivers, and Youtube and iPlayer totally out of it.

But horses for courses - if you want to control things then Raspbian is it....

These views from a noob

From my experience, Raspbmc works so much better than OpenELEC.

[pygmy_giant]

+

ChibiOS

and

FreeRTOS

[Spid]

... should of ...

Sets my teeth on edge every time I see it. (Which, regrettably, is becoming more frequent.)

Senior Moment, we all have them, and nobody, even you, are perfect 100% of the time............................

[Castle_Romeo]

Red Sleeve Linux is an ARM port to the Fedora/Red Hat Linux Distro. It works very well on the Pi.

Also, Since HP's WebOS is now open source, has anyone attempted to port it to the Pi (or to ARM in general)???

[Cloudcentric]

++

piBang http://pibanglinux.org

[DavidS]

As far as I know the oly OSes that we have for the RPi so far are:

• Linux
  RISC OS
  Plan 9
  FreeRTOS
  NetBSD
  FreeBSD
  AROS (NOT the linux hosted version).
  ChibiOS
  Windows CE 7
  DexOS

Of these Linux is not an alternative OS, And I would say hat neither is RISC OS, as Linux and RISC OS are the primary OSes for the RPi.

[Cloudcentric]

I meant alternative to what the RPF list on their web site..........................................

[uns3r]

As far as I know the oly OSes that we have for the RPi so far are:

• Linux
  RISC OS
  Plan 9
  FreeRTOS
  NetBSD
  FreeBSD
  AROS (NOT the linux hosted version).
  ChibiOS
  Windows CE 7
  DexOS

Of these Linux is not an alternative OS, And I would say hat neither is RISC OS, as Linux and RISC OS are the primary OSes for the RPi.

Where can I get Windows CE 7 from? It's one I would like to play with

[Cloudcentric]

Undertake a forum search for Windows CE !

[Muzer]

As far as I know the oly OSes that we have for the RPi so far are:

• Linux
  RISC OS
  Plan 9
  FreeRTOS
  NetBSD
  FreeBSD
  AROS (NOT the linux hosted version).
  ChibiOS
  Windows CE 7
  DexOS

Of these Linux is not an alternative OS, And I would say hat neither is RISC OS, as Linux and RISC OS are the primary OSes for the RPi.

But not all of these are released, even in testing form (I don't see anyone who's released a Windows CE build, for instance. But thanks for the list, some of these I didn't realise had experimental pi builds.

[Spid]

Red Sleeve Linux (Fedora based) http://www.redsleeve.org/about

Kali Limix http://www.kali.org/downloads

[duberry]

Where can I get Windows CE 7 from? It's one I would like to play with

sounds like an amasing title for another topic . ..

Whilst I appreciate we have have forums for various operating systems, thought it would be a good idea to produce a list

nice one !

i have often thought
somthing like the * "GNU/Linux Distribution Timeline" from futurist.se/gldt/
ploting distros with pi ports ( gldt-pip )
would be a good thing.


*img eg -- > gldt1210.svg

http://futurist.se/gldt/

[DavidS]

Why are some people just repeating Linux, Linux, Linux?

As much as I dislike repeating myself:
Of these Linux is not an alternative OS, And I would say hat neither is RISC OS, as Linux and RISC OS are the primary OSes for the RPi.


As far as I know the oly OSes that we have for the RPi so far are:

So let us look at some of these:

Linux
A MINIX clone that grew.
Linux has gotten so out of hand that even Linus sais that it is unreasonably bloated (Multix all over again?).
Though for a resource hog it makes a good N*X.


RISC OS
A small fast modular OS written for ARM based computers.
RISC OS was designed by the same people that designed the ARM. It is a complete Modern OS despite its age (it is younger than Windoze though).


Plan 9
An os designed to be superior to UNIX, having a unique design


FreeRTOS
http://sourceforge.net/projects/freertos/
A simple Real Time Operating system.


FreeBSD
An evolution of BSD UNIX.
One of the last true "UNIXens". Evolved from UNIX 7.


AROS (the RPi native version [NOT the Linux Hosted])
http://aros.sourceforge.net/nightly.php
A well done clone of Amiga OS. It is complete with many features never envisioned by Amiga OS.


ChibiOS
http://www.chibios.org/dokuwiki/doku.php
A super compact Real Time Operating System

DexOS
http://www.dex-os.com/DexBasic/DexBasic.htm
Super small single tasking system.
Actually all I could find is DexBASIC, this is a programming enviroment for Bare Metal.
So it is an OS creation tool in a way, though I can not find the oft mentioned DexOS for the Raspberry Pi.

[duberry]

Why are some people just repeating Linux, Linux, Linux?

its just restoring some balance / clearing the air after
decades of windows (3.11) windows(95) windows(nt) windows(xp) ect geting all up in you home / office , space / face

cheers for the list/links ,
all though imho it might be a little simpler to test/evaluate alternatives if some basic-minimal form of boot menu was more widely available
&

FreeRTOS
http://sourceforge.net/projects/freertos/
A simple Real Time Operating system.

that link didnt seem to be specific to raspi ,.. this looks more like it is
https://github.com/jameswalmsley/RaspberryPi-FreeRTOS

[mahjongg]

from wikipedia:

This is a list of operating system s that have been, or are being, Porting|ported to Raspberry Pi.
* '''Full OS:'''
** AROS
** GEORGE (operating system)#GEORGE 3 .26 4|GEORGE 3 - within an [http://sw.ccs.bcs.org/CCs/g3/g3pi.htm emulator].
** Haiku (operating system)|Haiku {{cite web|title=Haiku Raspberry Pi commits|url=http://cgit.haiku-os.org/haiku/log/?qt=grep&q=rpi}}
** Linux
*** Android (operating system)|Android
**** Android 2.3 (Gingerbread)<ref name="Android 2.3 on the Raspberry Pi">[http://androidpi.wikia.com/wiki/Android_Pi_Wiki Android 2.3 on the Raspberry Pi]
**** Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich)
*** Arch Linux ARM
*** Bodhi Linux#R Pi Bodhi Linux|R_Pi Bodhi Linux {{cite web|title=Bodhi Linux for Raspberry Pi!|url=http://bodhilinux.com/downloads_mobile.php}}
*** Debian ARM architecture ports, but not the Debian ARMhf architecture ports (introduced with Debian 7 Wheezy), since these are compiled for ARMv7 and the Raspberry Pi CPU is ARMv6
**** Raspbian {{cite web|title=Raspbian – Debian optimized for the Raspberry Pi hardware|url=http://www.raspbian.org/}} (Debian 7 Wheezy ARMhf backported for ARMv6)
*** Firefox OS
*** Puppy Linux {{cite web|url=http://puppylinux.org/wikka/ARM |title=ARM |publisher=PuppyLinux |date=2013-05-29 |accessdate=2013-08-12}}
*** Gentoo Linux {{cite web|title=Gentoo for the Raspberry Pi!|url=http://intelminer.com/blog/?p=18}}
*** Google Chromium OS
*** PiBang Linux{{cite web|title=Inspired by CrunchBang Linux, and based on Raspbian. Features the Openbox desktop environment|url=http://www.pibanglinux.org/}}
*** Raspberry Pi Fedora (operating system)|Fedora Remix
*** Slackware ARM (formerly ARMedslack)
*** QtonPi a cross-platform application framework based Linux distribution based on the Qt (framework)|Qt framework
*** Open webOS|WebOS
**** Open webOS {{cite web|title=Open WebOS on a Raspberry Pi!|url= http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/tag/open-webos}}
** Plan 9 from Bell Labs {{cite web|title=9pi |url=http://9fans.net/archive/2012/08/129 |publisher=9fans.net mail archive |author=Richard Miller |date=Auguest 18, 2012}} {{cite web |url=http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/2665 Plan 9 announcement |title=Wednesday grab bag |at=See the "Plan 9" section |author=Liz |publisher=Raspberry Pi Foundation |date=December 5, 2012}}
** RISC OS
** Unix
*** FreeBSD {{cite web|title=FreeBSD – Raspberry Pi|url=http://kernelnomicon.org/?p=275}}
*** NetBSD title=NetBSD – Raspberry Pi|url=http://mail-index.netbsd.org/port-arm/2 ... 01367.html}} {{cite news|title=NetBSD 6.0 released with initial Raspberry Pi support|url=http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/ ... essdate=18 October 2012|newspaper=The H|date=18 October 2012}}

* '''Multi-purpose light distributions:'''
** Moebius operating system, a light ARM HF distribution based on Debian. It uses Raspbian repository, but it fits in a 1&nbsp;GB SD card. It has just minimal services and its memory usage is optimized to keep a small footprint.
** Minibian, another light ARM HF distribution based on Raspbian repository.
** OpenWrt|OpenWrt "Attitude Adjustment" 12.09
** Squeezed Arm Puppy, a version of Puppy Linux (Puppi) for the ARMv6 (sap6) specifically for the Raspberry Pi.{{cite web|url=http://puppylinux.org/wikka/Puppi |title=squeezed ARM puppi |publisher=Puppylinux.org |date=2012-09-24 |accessdate=2012-10-15}}

* '''Single-purpose light distributions:'''
** IPFire
** OpenELEC
** Raspbmc
** Raspbian#XBian|XBian
** RasPlex
** Raspberry Digital signage, former Instant WebKiosk for Raspberry Pi, a browser-only distribution based on Raspbian for digital signage purposes.

[DavidS]

@mahjongg
So you give us a long list that sais:

• Linux
  GEORGE
  Haiku OS
  AROS
  Plan 9
  RISC OS
  FreeBSD
  NetBSD

To which I add:

• Commodore Pi
  Dex OS
  FreeRTOS
  ChibiOS

Did I miss anything?

Also thank you for pointing out how far the RPi port of Haiku OS is comming, I had not realized that they had gotten anywere usable with it yet.

[jamesh]

@mahjongg
So you give us a long list that sais:

• Linux
  GEORGE
  Haiku OS
  AROS
  Plan 9
  RISC OS
  FreeBSD
  NetBSD

To which I add:

• Commodore Pi
  Dex OS
  FreeRTOS
  ChibiOS

Did I miss anything?

Also thank you for pointing out how far the RPi port of Haiku OS is comming, I had not realized that they had gotten anywere usable with it yet.

If you have more to add, then add them to the Wikipedia page so they don't get lost.