ReactOS "Open-Source Windows" Improving UEFI Boot, DirectX Work & NT6+ API Prep

[ClosedSource]

If Windows XP were ever released as open source, Windows XP would probably be the desktop operating system of choice by many users.

Windows XP was a pleasure to use after the third service pack. The UI was gorgeous. Things felt very well put together. The experience was wonderful.

[lejeczek]

I get, probably everyone else too, that people involved in such enterprises are passionate about it, about the idea but... imagine all that manpower & man-hours, that devotion & dedication put into... something practical & useful (there is no shortage of open source which could use help)

[oiaohm]

no it required both HDMI/DP and USB to perform the firmware update (and it cannot be done from the OSD) and GPU passthrough does not give you control of the HDMI/DP ports, it only gives you direct access to the 3d functionality for performance reasons.

https://dividebyzer0.gitlab.io/GPUpassthrough.html

Full GPU passthough as in where you give a full GPU card to a virtual machine it does have full control over HDMI/DP ports. Having linux have the Igpu/apu

The OSD application uses CEC over HDMI/Display port to control same setting as you can control by remote but updates are pure USB from all the LG monitors I software I have handled.

Yes the WIndows OSD software starts up without LG monitor plugged by HDMI/DVI.

I have worked with others LG45G family monitors. The documentation suggests to on those suggest you need HDMI/DVI and USB plugged in but the documentation is clear firmware update cannot work without USB connection but does not mention if HDMI/DVI is in fact required so I tried without and it worked. When you have a deployment of 30 odd that all need firmware updates anything that reduces the plug ins.

Maybe the one you have is a more annoying bit of works.

setting up the USB and GPU passthoughs would be a pain.

[Volta]

A couple of years ago I had weird glitches all over the screen instead of underwater scenery when I made the protagonist dive. Is it the same now btw?

No, at least not with Special Edition and AMD drivers. May also depend on Proton version.

[Eirikr1848]

As lots of people have pointed out there is a lot of common work shared between Wine and ReactOS: most of the user API support is the same.

The difference is what this front end sits atop of:
- Wine has these user API talk balk to Linux equivalent userland API and thus runs windows apps along other applications on a normal Linux distro and uses the kernel and drivers of that Linux.
- ReactOS also implements its own WinNT-compatible kernel and is compatible with Windows drivers.



Indeed specifically for running games:

In practice there's a lot more effort poured in the Linux stack and a lot of more polishing effort by, e.g., Valve, so inpractice you'll probably have a much better performance running a game on the SteamDeck, because a large group of employees at several companies (Valve, AMD, etc.) made sure the whole stack is polished and Goes Brrr...

But...



Outside the purely academic interest of implementing a full WinNT compatible stack, having something modernish to run legacy blobs might come useful (don't fix it if it's not broken. specially if you don't have the sources anymore to it. but you need to connect it to the network so you can't keep it running on Windows XP).
Specially for the parts that aren't user application:
if you need some scientific device that relies on custom drivers. Wine and the Linux kernel usually don't run those. (RNDIS used to be an exception before getting removed from the Linux kernel. Another exception was some very limited and very experimental support for USB drivers by falling back on libusb on linux).

A very specific scientific or medical equipment (which are extremely expensive, much more than the computer they are attached to), that talks using some custom ISA or PCI board, for which there aren't any Linux drivers (e.g. because it's a very low production very custom board of which there are very few and no Linux hacker with an interest in reverse engineering got it hands on and tried to make Linux drivers).

If you can use it in a scenario where you can keep the computer offline, you might want to keep an old period-appropriate computer with Win95, WinNT 4, or whatever this shit uses.

If your device needs to be exposed on the network for various reasons, using some more modern ReactOS that can load and run those board's drivers becomes an interesting alternative.

If your institution is insanely rich, they might decide to fork the 100k bucks necessary to buy a more modern replacement device and ditch the old one and the decrepit computer it's been attached to.

(Been literary in the first "offline, keep an outdated Windows version" situation above with some insanely expensive lab equipment, the uni couldn't realistically afford the money to go the 3rd "just replace it" route).

Yeah, same: medical laboratory equipment. XP to 7 and 7 to 10 it sat on 2000 and NT3.51 and Windows... CE (portable lab equipment).

Don't wanna ever deal with that crap again. But clearly neither do they.

The desktop OS pieces at least ReactOS should handle. If I were still at that company I would find this progress welcome news.

[Berniyh]

Pleased enlighten me how I somehow got a license for Windows when I bought my LG45GR95QE-B that requires a Windows only app to connect via HDMI or DisplayPort to update the firmware. Virtual Machine is of no use since that doesn't allow direct control of the hdmi/dp port from the host.

Well, that's not nice. But I would never use ReactOS to update the firmware on some device. That just screams failure and device bricked.

Edit: also note that in theory it might be doable via wine at least for some devices. There is now proper hidraw support in Wine, which allows you to bypass Wine's USB driver for devices and in principle it should also work for firmware updates.
Would you dare try that? I have multiple of those devices and won't even try, because even though in that case Wine shouldn't matter anymore, are we 100% sure that it won't get in the way and result in a bricked device?
Same with ReactOS. At some point it might be quite close to Windows (XP or 7 or whatever), but it will never be exactly it. So either way you'd still try a scenario that was not tested properly and may fail horribly, maybe even at random.

[NotMine999]

I wonder what happens first - WINE got merged inside Linux kernel or ReactOS will be released compatible with Windows 7 at least.

And then some mega-corp makes the ReactOS folks an offer they better not refuse

[r_a_trip]

I get, probably everyone else too, that people involved in such enterprises are passionate about it, about the idea but... imagine all that manpower & man-hours, that devotion & dedication put into... something practical & useful (there is no shortage of open source which could use help)

I get what you're saying, but that isn't how the world works. People are free to spend their time on whatever they like (within the confines of the law). The man hours spent on ReactOS aren't lost to Linux. ReactOS developers have no affinity with Linux, otherwise they would be working on the Linux kernel.

Imagine what would happen if a hypothetical dictator would say, "All those hours spent on gaming are a waste of time. Everybody needs to start weaving baskets. Can you imagine what a boost to the basket market that would give?!" I don't think that would go over well.

Also, we DO have an NT-like OS right now that is on an alpha WinXP level of functionality. That in itself is quite a feat. From basically zilch to an OS that holds promise. If they can reach a comparable level of compatibility that e.g. FreeDOS has with MS-DOS, then this will be the OS that could be used to drive hardware without Linux drivers. Or as the OS for those pesky Windows GUI firmware updaters. Also a good chance to keep legacy gaming alive. Or be the haven that Windows users need when MS goes full Cloud OS.

[werfu]

If Windows XP were ever released as open source, Windows XP would probably be the desktop operating system of choice by many users.

The only problem is that by now, XP is a swiss cheese of security holes. Running XP and XP era web browser would get you infected in no time.

[F.Ultra]

https://dividebyzer0.gitlab.io/GPUpassthrough.html

Full GPU passthough as in where you give a full GPU card to a virtual machine it does have full control over HDMI/DP ports. Having linux have the Igpu/apu

The OSD application uses CEC over HDMI/Display port to control same setting as you can control by remote but updates are pure USB from all the LG monitors I software I have handled.

Yes the WIndows OSD software starts up without LG monitor plugged by HDMI/DVI.

I have worked with others LG45G family monitors. The documentation suggests to on those suggest you need HDMI/DVI and USB plugged in but the documentation is clear firmware update cannot work without USB connection but does not mention if HDMI/DVI is in fact required so I tried without and it worked. When you have a deployment of 30 odd that all need firmware updates anything that reduces the plug ins.

Maybe the one you have is a more annoying bit of works.

setting up the USB and GPU passthoughs would be a pain.

Ok yes it can be that the documentation is wrong, tested their application in WINE and it didn't work at all. Have no igpu/apu (on a 5800x3d) so that is also out of the option. Tried to run a Windows 11 live cd but that bluescreened during boot so that was also no go . Tried to yell at LG for not being able to update via the monitor OSD (it's not even possible to see which firmware you are running without the windows app) like one can for basically every other monitor out there but they didn't understand the problem at all. As a monitor it is amazing though.