BoltOS: a from-scratch 64-bit operating system
I built BoltOS as a 64-bit operating system in C and x86-64 assembly, starting with the boot chain rather than an existing kernel or bootloader. It supports both legacy BIOS and UEFI boot paths—no GRUB, no Multiboot, and no external OS libraries.
This is an active project with roughly 41,000 lines of first-party code. I am sharing it to get feedback from people interested in operating systems, systems programming, and bare-metal development.
What is implemented
- A custom BIOS MBR and UEFI boot chain that enters a 64-bit higher-half kernel
- ACPI, APIC, SMP, preemptive scheduling, ring-3 userland, ELF loading, and syscalls
- Physical and virtual memory management, ASLR, SMAP/SMEP, swap, and stack canaries
- A graphical desktop with a compositor, window manager, TrueType rendering, clipboard, file manager, IDE, task manager, and 24 apps
- Persistent storage through a VFS and block layer, with ATA, AHCI SATA, NVMe, EXT2, and FAT32 support
- An in-kernel network stack with DHCP, TCP/UDP, DNS, HTTP, TLS 1.2/1.3, and X.509 verification
- A browser engine with a DOM, CSS cascade, box/flex/grid layout, and a from-scratch JavaScript interpreter
- A playable DOOM port, audio support, USB HID, and a PE32+ loader for Windows x86-64 console executables
Try it
The first source release is available at BoltOS v0.1.0 — Initial Public Preview.
git clone https://github.com/adriantips/boltossource.git
cd boltossource
bash build.sh
bash run.sh
The repository includes QEMU launchers and a separate UEFI path:
bash run-uefi.sh
I would love feedback on
- The boot and kernel architecture
- Drivers and hardware coverage
- The browser, networking, and userland design
- Build reproducibility and documentation
Source and screenshots: https://github.com/adriantips/boltossource
