Starting basic OS Development

[MyndFyre]

Well I use FASM or NASM to compile my assembly (Sometimes I'll code inline assembly with intel syntax turned on) and DJGPP to compile (DJGPP isn't recommended since it has some limitations but I got over most of them), however I plan to build a GCC cross compiler when the need arises. When my OS is mature enough to execute programs and I have most GCC dependancies ported then I'll build the compiler on my OS and be self hosted.

OSDev is around 60% research and 40% implementation. There are plenty of examples of good (and bad) implementations floating around. I usually follow what most do adding my own twists here and there.

One of the biggest annoyances is lack of hardware support so even if you do get to VESA in a good reso with like 32 or 24 bpp it still will be painfully slow even with MTRR enabled.

I keep trying to tell you man, hack ntdll and hal.dll.  Reproduce *that* and go for native Windows driver compatibility. 

[Warrior]

Well if anything, I'd port some of the 2D Accelerants for VBE in Open BeOS or in Linux. Of course until now no one has documented, maybe I should be the first! Most of the things that worry me are reversng some NIC's and such but my NIC fortunately was made open source by VIA (Go them).

Of course my OS is no where near that mature. Right now I'm implementing Kernel->User communication via Call Gates (Messier but faster than plain int xx) and taking into account possible errors that could acompany "cpuid".