For the past couple of weeks, I've been building a custom 32-bit hobby OS called Asteri OS (a name my subconscious accidentally stole from recent space headlines). Instead of building a standard Unix clone with a bash shell, I decided to make the kernel strictly a platform and use Lua as the entire application layer. My goal is to build a desktop-first, power-user environment where the whole UI and widget ecosystem is scriptable on the fly.

Right now, a freestanding version of Lua 5.4 runs entirely on bare metal, utilizing a custom memory allocator. I've ported LVGL 8.3 into the kernel, so subprocess Lua VMs are handed a global UI module to script buttons, bars, and labels directly into their own isolated window buffers. The OS mounts a FAT32 USB stick or SATA drive to execute scripts directly from mass storage, and the main terminal acts as a native Lua REPL where you can evaluate expressions, interact with the filesystem, or spawn new GUI windows directly from the command line.

Honestly, I originally started this just to build a personal playground for myself. But I’ve been having so much fun tinkering with it that I really want to share it, and I'm planning to drop a GitHub repo soon once I clean up some of the prototyping spaghetti (its bad). I want it to feel less like a rigid operating system and more like a giant, scriptable sandbox (almost like Pico-8 or Garry's Mod), but for an entire desktop.

I'm hoping to open-source it in the next few weeks once the repo isn't quite so embarrassing. Until then, I'd love to hear any thoughts, feedback, or ideas!

(And yes, it's 32-bit simply because I'm relatively new to OS dev and value my sanity. 64-bit is planned! Oh, and yes, I'm working on a DOOM port!)

Asteri OS: Using Lua as the core shell and app engine for a custom 32-bit OS