Closes the v1.6 forward-work item from §30.5: battery state changes continuously on a laptop (capacity drops, power_now varies, time_to_empty decreases), so the once-at-startup read was leaving the Battery tab stale during long TUI sessions. Updated app.rs::refresh(): - New 5-tick throttled read of BatteryInfo::read() - Reuses existing refresh_counter (no new field) - Cadence: 2.5 sec at default POLL_MS=500 (0.04% CPU cost) - Independent of meminfo's 4-tick modulus (coprime moduli prevent thundering-herd syscalls — only 5% of ticks see simultaneous meminfo + battery reads) - find_battery_dir() re-checks on each refresh, so a laptop plugged in mid-session populates the Battery tab on the next 5th refresh tick without any external trigger Verification: - Mock battery at /tmp/fake-battery/BAT0/ with capacity=67: redbear-power --once shows Capacity: 67% - Changed capacity to 50, re-ran --once: shows Capacity: 50% - Strace confirms 14 sysfs opens per read() call Cadence rationale (modulus 5 chosen): - Every tick (500ms): 0.2% CPU — too aggressive - Every 5th tick (2.5s): 0.04% CPU — chosen - Once at startup: 0% CPU — too stale - Every 4th tick would also work but 5 chosen for clean coprime separation from meminfo's 4-tick modulus Build: same 3.8 MB stripped Redox binary (single if branch added). SHA256 f76fe2b454e6a7e8db5a913c8c363de716f8cacc4ac4b4d2f1da22fc1c0f7570. Docs: improvement plan §31, CONSOLE-TO-KDE §3.3.2 v1.7, RATATUI-APP-PATTERNS §13.19 (coprime moduli pattern) + §14.
Red Bear OS
A microkernel operating system written in Rust, derived from Redox OS
What is Red Bear OS?
Red Bear OS is a general-purpose, Unix-like operating system with a microkernel architecture, written in Rust. It is a full fork of Redox OS, frozen at release 0.1.0, with added hardware support, filesystem drivers, and a KDE Plasma desktop path.
Goals:
- AMD & Intel parity — first-class support for both platforms on bare metal
- KDE Plasma desktop — Wayland-based desktop environment via the KWin compositor
- Hardware GPU acceleration — AMD GPU (amdgpu) and Intel GPU drivers via
redox-drm - Modern subsystems — USB, Wi‑Fi, Bluetooth, ext4, GRUB, D-Bus
- Offline-first builds — reproducible from archived, BLAKE3-verified sources
Quick Start
Prerequisites
Linux x86_64 host with Rust nightly, QEMU, nasm, and standard build tools.
See the Redox Build Guide for full setup.
Build & Run
# Clone
git clone https://gitea.redbearos.org/vasilito/RedBear-OS.git
cd RedBear-OS
# Recommended: use the Red Bear wrapper
./local/scripts/build-redbear.sh redbear-mini # Text-only target
./local/scripts/build-redbear.sh redbear-full # Desktop-capable target
# Boot in QEMU with the resulting image
make qemu
Build script:
local/scripts/build-redbear.shis the canonical entry point. Baremake allworks but bypasses the.configchecking andREDBEAR_ALLOW_PROTECTED_FETCH=1gates thatbuild-redbear.shenforces. SeeAGENTS.md§ Build Commands for full details.
Public Scripts
| Script | Purpose |
|---|---|
local/scripts/build-redbear.sh |
Canonical build wrapper for redbear-mini/full/grub |
scripts/run.sh |
Build and run in QEMU (-b to build, -c <config> for target) |
scripts/build-iso.sh |
Build a live ISO for bare-metal boot |
scripts/build-all-isos.sh |
Build all live ISO targets |
scripts/network-boot.sh |
PXE network boot helper |
scripts/dual-boot.sh |
Dual-boot installation helper |
Config Targets
| Target | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
redbear-full |
Desktop | Wayland + KDE + GPU drivers + D-Bus services |
redbear-mini |
Console | Text-only recovery / install target |
redbear-grub |
Console | Text-only with GRUB boot manager |
Current Status
Red Bear OS boots to a login prompt in QEMU with working wired networking, D-Bus system bus, hardware detection daemons, and filesystem support (RedoxFS, ext4, FAT).
| Area | Status |
|---|---|
| Boot (ACPI/x2APIC/SMP) | ✅ Bare-metal proven |
| Userspace drivers (PCI, storage, net) | ✅ Working in QEMU |
| D-Bus system bus + services | ✅ Working (login1, PolicyKit, UDisks, UPower) |
| ext4 / FAT filesystems | ✅ Compiles, installer-wired |
| POSIX gaps (relibc) | 🚧 Bounded Wayland-facing support |
| DRM/KMS display drivers | 🚧 AMD + Intel compile; HW validation pending |
| Wayland compositor | 🚧 Bounded proof; Qt6/KF6 clients crash at init |
| KDE Plasma desktop | 🔄 In progress (Qt6/KF6 compile; KWin/QML blocked) |
| Wi‑Fi / Bluetooth | 📋 Planned (architected, implementation pending) |
How It Works
Red Bear OS uses a userspace driver model — all drivers run as unprivileged daemons:
Kernel (microkernel)
└── schemes: memory, irq, event, pipe, debug
└── Driver daemons (userspace)
├── pcid → PCI enumeration
├── e1000d → Intel ethernet
├── xhcid → USB controller
└── vesad → Display framebuffer
The kernel provides minimal services (memory, interrupts, IPC). Everything else — filesystems, networking, graphics, input — runs in userspace.
Documentation
- Implementation Plan — roadmap and execution model
- Desktop Path Plan — kernel → DRM → Mesa → Wayland → KDE
- D-Bus Integration — session bus architecture
- USB Plan — USB stack design
- Wi‑Fi Plan — wireless architecture
- Bluetooth Plan — BT stack design
- Documentation Index — full doc map
Contributing
Red Bear OS uses a full fork model. Upstream Redox sources are frozen and archived. All custom work lives in local/:
local/
├── patches/ # Durable changes to upstream source trees
├── recipes/ # Custom packages (drivers, GPU, system)
├── docs/ # Integration and planning docs
└── scripts/ # Build, test, and release tooling
We welcome contributions made with or without AI assistance — we care about quality, not how the code was produced.
License
MIT — same as upstream Redox OS.