{
  "id": 11621443,
  "title": "Make Tmux the OS",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/02/make-tmux-the-os",
  "topic": "tech",
  "section": "Tech",
  "published": "2026-10-02T19:29:07.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Hacker News",
    "slug": "hacker-news",
    "url": "https://matduggan.com/what-does-my-dream-os-ui-look-like/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "The talk by Scott Jenson, titled \"Are we really going to use the same Desktop UX forever?\" explores the idea that Apple and Microsoft may not innovate further in the desktop operating system space, leaving the future design of the desktop up to the community. Jenson argues that much of what we consider the standard way computers operate was a workaround for outdated hardware, and thus, it's time to question these tradeoffs. He emphasizes that it's not his intention to be a UI/UX designer, but rather to provoke thought on the subject.\n\nThe primary goal for Jenson is to create a version of tmux, the terminal multiplexer, that is accessible to the average user. He highlights how tmux offers a scrollable, session-persistent, detachable, and task-oriented system that could potentially be adapted for normal users. To address the issue, Jenson breaks down the problem into several components:\n\n1. Screen real estate constantly changes as users move from their laptop to desktop monitor and back multiple times throughout the day.\n2. People have distinct ways of using windows, making it challenging for modern operating systems to cater to everyone's needs.\n3. In 2026, it is anticipated that most software will run in browser tabs, with web applications covering a wide range of use cases historically handled by local applications.\n4. The concept of a filesystem is becoming less relevant, as applications like Apple Notes, iMessage, Teams, Slack, and Firefox store their content in separate databases or applications.\n5. Previous solutions have addressed some of these issues but have not been designed with the needs of average users in mind.\n\nJenson cites Robert Henderson, Austin D. Austin, and Stuart K. Card's work on \"Rooms,\" which proposes using virtual workspaces to minimize space contention in a window-based graphical user interface. Their design focuses on preloading the next set of windows before the user requests them, reducing the time and effort spent switching between tasks. This concept of managing screen real estate and maximizing productivity has been around since the 1980s but has yet to be fully realized in modern operating systems.\n\nOne of the challenges Jenson identifies is the way modern operating systems treat windows as if they were part of a single, monolithic system. He argues that modern systems focus too heavily on single-task usage, which doesn't align with how people naturally work. Instead, he suggests a more task-oriented approach to window management, akin to the ideas presented in the Rooms design. By adopting a tiling window manager and adapting it to better suit the needs of average users, it may be possible to create a version of tmux that functions as the OS, providing an optimized desktop experience tailored to individual workflows.",
  "summary": null,
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}