Os8088: Um poderoso sistema operacional parecido com o Mac para os IBM XT, 286, 386

In August 2026, a Macintosh System 1-style desktop for Intel 8086 computers was brought to life by a hobby project called os8088. Written in real-mode assembly and booted from a floppy or live USB/CD, os8088 boasted features such as overlapping windows, pull-down menus, a serial mouse, loadable programs, and pre-emptive multitasking -- capabilities that the original Macintosh lacked in 1984.

Upon booting, os8088 loaded a 40KB kernel into memory, which then determined the display adapter present and switched it into graphics mode. Borrowing the character set from the video card, os8088 displayed a menu bar, windows that could be dragged by the title bar, pull-down menus, close and minimize boxes, icons for each floppy drive, and a dock at the bottom of the screen with one tile per running program.

Programs were loaded from a second floppy and could be run as first-class applications, with multiple programs running simultaneously.

The entire os8088 system fit comfortably within 256KB of RAM on an Intel 8086 or 8088 processor, which were the processors found in the original IBM PC and PC/XT. os8088 was developed as a hobby project and is available on GitHub, where the real-mode NASM assembly code is available for those interested in exploring its inner workings.

To provide a visual demonstration of os8088's capabilities, a video log was created, capturing the system's development from the first boot into a desktop to the loading of loadable packages. These videos are all available on the project's video log. In addition, the project recorded the entire process on a browser demo, which boots the floppy image in an emulated PC, displaying the same bytes written to a real disk.

To run os8088 yourself, the project provides 360KB images for period hardware and both 86Box and QEMU configurations for virtualization. These images can be found in the project's releases, allowing anyone with an interest in experiencing a Mac-like OS for the IBM XT, 286, or 386 to do so.