Release Notes for HelenOS mainline

Note: This document is a draft describing a future HelenOS release and is subject to change. The software described here has not been released yet. To get these latest and greatest features now, check out our ​Git master. (But you will also get the latest bugs).

HelenOS version (codename) was released on date.

This document contains a summary of changes made to HelenOS since release previous release.

Special Notes for this Release

Features Introduced in This Release

General

• Updated toolchain used to build the OS
  • GCC 13.2 (from 8.2)
  • Binutils 2.41 (from 2.31.1)

Kernel

• On ia32/amd64 and when supported, use write-combining memory to speed up kernel frame buffer

User Interface

• Added a Start menu to the taskbar
• Windows can now be minimized (and unminimized)
• Active window is now highlighted in the taskbar
• Added system menu to make WM functions accessible via keyboard (use F10, arrow keys)
• Added generic list control (in addition to file list)
• Menu entries can now be disabled
• Menus will pop up above the menu bar if they do not fit below
• Menus will not be obscured by taskbar
• Support for multiple seats (i.e. multi-seat)
• Fixed menu accelerator keys not working when Caps Lock is enabled

Services and Drivers

• In addition to Ctrl-key and Shift-key, serial console now supports Alt-key combinations
  • Useful e.g. for opening menus
• USB HID driver
  • Fixed HID report bit extraction - fixes Lenovo USB wireless mouse
• Better RGB downconversion in EGA text mode
  • Output server's EGA driver renders RGB using eight EGA colors (instead of just back/white)

File Systems

Networking

Applications

• New Taskbar Configuration utility (taskbar-cfg)
  • Allows editing the start menu
• New UI and command-line display configuration utilities (display-cfg and disp) for configuring seats
• New ofw command-line utility for printing the OpenFirmware device tree (only on ppc32 and sparc64)
• Taskbar no longer requires window management service to start (i.e. you can use it when system is running in console mode)
• GFX Demo improvements
  • Quit more promptly
  • Only quit on Ctl-Q or Escape, not just on any key (e.g. Alt)
  • Handle keyboard events in console mode (gfxdemo console)
  • Detect screen size in console mode (instead of assuming 80x25)
  • Downsize window when running with text UI (gfxdemo -d cons@ ui)
• Tester
  • Added IPC read/write test
• Hbench benchmark tool
  • Fixed bug in default test time computation (it was too short)
  • Added IPC read/write benchmarks (read1k/write1k)
  • Added task_get_id system call benchmark
• New About HelenOS application
• Launcher removed
  • Use Start menu to launch applications
  • HelenOS logo is now shown in About HelenOS
• Barber Pole now fully supports text mode
• Image viewer not supports text mode

Libraries

• loc_server_register() can be called more than once
  • So that more components in one task can independently register services
  • Added complementary function loc_server_unregister()
• New library libofw for enumerating the OpenFirmware device tree
• A number of IPC protocol and I/O related stuff moved out of libc into separate libraries
  • ipctest
  • corecfg
  • clipboard
  • console (client + server code)
  • input (kbd_event, pos_event, KBDEV, MOUSEEV)
  • output (charfield, chargrid, color, concaps)

Miscellaneous

Regressions in This Release

• For the list of regressions since the previous release, see this report.
• Notable regressions

Fixed Logged Bugs & Enhancements

• For the list of all logged defects fixed in this release, see this report.
• For the list of all logged enhancements integrated in this release, see this report.

Known Bugs

• For the list of known bugs still not fixed in this release, see this report.
• For the list of all open tickets, see this report.