Ubiquitous Computing and the Need for a New Operating System Architecture

Traditional operating system architectures are not able to cope with the demands of ubiquitous computing. These demands include mobility of code and running applications, precise resource control, robustness, and user-friendly failure handling. Furthermore, traditional operating systems were designed for desktop or server use and contain functionality that is ballast for a ubiquitous system. One example for such ballast is the file system. We describe JX, our own operating system architecture, that has the desired properties, follows a microkernel approach, and structures the operating system as a set of components.