Tunix

Tunix is a small Unix-like operating system for x86_64, built from scratch: a custom bootloader, a custom kernel, a full GNU userland, and a XFCE desktop.

Features

• Custom kernel and bootloader: VFS, ext2, devfs, procfs, signals, epoll, ptys, preemptive scheduler
• Linux x86_64 syscall ABI — musl-built binaries run without a translation layer
• Persistent ext2 root filesystem (Linux-mountable)
• TCP/IP networking: ARP, IPv4, ICMP, UDP, TCP, raw and netlink sockets — enough for git clone https://...
• XFCE desktop: XFCE running with Xorg
• Self-hosting: gcc, binutils, and make run inside Tunix

Ported software

bash, coreutils, gcc, binutils, make, git, curl, nano, grep, sed, gawk, findutils, tar, gzip, htop, iproute2, lua, tinycc, ncurses, weston, wayland, mesa, libdrm, freetype, fontconfig, cairo, musl, mbedtls

Try it

git clone https://github.com/tunixos/tunix
cd tunix
git submodule update --init --recursive
make all   # build the disk image
make run   # boot it in QEMU

Blog

• July 22, 2026 — Hello, Tunix
• July 25, 2026 — Weston on the real screen
• August 17, 2026 — How to donate to Tunix Project
• July 27, 2026 — A real Xfce desktop

All posts