Ok. Vysion 2 looks amazing and I cant wait to see what it will turn into!

Thanks, I can't either! I hope that it will meet your expectations once it's released.

I noticed someone vaguely alluded to the fact that Vysion 2 (maybe stylize it as Vysion ][ after Apple?) could theoretically be a fully-functioning OS proper. I know that Vysion already uses a lot of TI-OS functionality. I’m just wondering how much work would it take to turn this into a calculator operating system proper? Like BOS -- a fully-fledged OS, independent of TI.

If this is going to seriously be considered, here are some actual points to think about:
Will there be an abstraction layer? That is, is there an underlying system (much like TI-OS’s TI-BASIC) upon which the graphics rely? This would greatly ease the creation of Vys][OS (ngl I really like the way that looks) programs and scripts.
What about a terminal? If there is an underlying language, would the user be able to directly interact using it?
Package manager? Much like Vapor… (obviously this would require full USB support and some external device)
If there is a package manager, will DEs be packageable? Or even just simply offloadable?
What about some sort of interpreter for TI-BASIC? A TI-OS graph screen emulator?
Will the CLibs be shipped by default or actually built into Vys][OS? Obviously, if they’re integrated directly, that would require a modified version of the toolchain.
But Vysion 2 (such as it is) already relies on C libraries. Will the CLibs be part of the kernel, so to speak?
Perhaps the basic kernel would be machine code and the DE would require certain CLibs (distributed as packages) to operate on top of the kernel? This would require the kernel to have a built-in terminal or USB interface (heck, it’d already need its own basic USB receiving protocol...).

For the record, it’s super late at night and I’ve had waaaay too much coffee today, so these ideas probably don’t sound entirely sane. Continuing...

Would the file system be properly improved (so the filesystem on the flash chip actually is FAT)?
What about migration? There would need to be some way of migrating your stuff from one calculator to another. Or at least from TI-OS to Vys][OS... Which would likely require an external device.
Would you be able to get Vys][OS to work with the 5.5.0+ bootcode? Would you be able to (at some point) revert back to TI-OS (though I can’t imagine why)?
Would there be a way to modify the bootcode without permabricking the calc?
Would this be built into Vys][OS? Or a package?

Alright, I think that’s all the spitballing I can think of
For now.

An interesting question that arises from that is since the user needs the TI-OS to even run the program to start with, I'm not entirely sure that it can be considered an OS.

What I was spitballing were various problems that would have to be considered were this to evolve into a proper OS (without needing to depend on TI-OS)

As it is, it’s a shell, not an OS.

EDIT:
I just thought of a really really great way to re-stylize the title:
VYS][ON
(Obviously, the Y, S, O, and N are in small caps)

The Apple ][ (wait I’m just now realizing that might be a one... ig we’ll call it a two) had a seriously underappreciated stylization.

I don't currently have any plans to evolve this into an OS, as (a) some of the underlying code relies on TI-OS and (b) it would ruin the actual functionality of the calc and probably only appeal to a fairly small percentage of users (at least compared to a shell).

That stylization idea is neat though, I'm going to try mocking up some logos using it.

Thanks for all the feedback! Even though this (probably) won't be something that I do, I'm always happy to get feature requests and suggestions. Stay tuned for some new updates, I should have something for all of you sometime in the not-so-distant future.

0.1.28

Introduction
Most of this period of this period of VYSION 2 has been dedicated to reworking many of the internal OPTIX systems to support some neat new features, the most noteworthy of which are drag and drop and desktop layouts. While I still have some more work to do to get the shell back to its former level of functionality and polish things up (resizing windows and getting the context menu to work again are a few of the most important ones), I've mostly finished this process now. Let's go over the new features!

Drag and drop
Instead of copying files from one location to another, which can get very tedious, you can now simply drag and drop them into a new location. This also comes with a shortcut, [alpha] currently, to copy the file instead of cutting and pasting it to the new location.


Desktop layouts
The desktop layouts of VYSION 2--or basically everything that appears on the desktop besides the windows and the background, which includes the taskbar, super menu, clock, etc.--are now completely dynamic, allowing this one shell to take on many different forms of functionality based on what is desired by the user. I've only made a few so far, but more will be coming depending on what you all want. Also, these are stored in appvars, so no need to worry about the program becoming too big to store all of them.


Conclusion
I know that there aren't a ton of new features in this update, but I'd like to keep you all up to date on the development process and felt like this was a good place to do so. Feel free to share any feature requests, suggestions, or feedback below!

Changelog
[added] basic desktop layout structure
[added] basic GUI layers structure
[added] basic desktop element configuration structure
[added] support for battery icons in desktop layouts
[added] support for clock text in desktop layouts
[added] support for file menus in desktop layouts
[added] support for buttons in desktop layouts
[added] any desktop element can now have children, rather than just panels
[added] references for desktop layout elements
[added] support for file search boxes in desktop layouts
[added] support for super action menus in desktop layouts
[added] virtual layers
[added] backend for saving/applying desktop layouts to/from appvars
[added] drag and drop
[added] new dragging system
[added] key shortcut to copy instead of move file when drag and dropping
[improved] functions for desktop layout now use defines rather than absolute pointers
[improved] windows now work again
[improved] desktop layout now freed on program exit
[improved] virtual layers now properly resolved on switching layouts
[improved] OPTIX widget organization
[fixed] settings menu offset overwritten when selecting appvars

0.1.29

In an attempt to do more regular progress updates like is done with CEaShell and used to be done here, here's a new change that I've made!

The start menu has been restored to its former glory, which involved adding scrollbars and menu-mirroring sprites to the desktop layout system, as well as making a good deal of changes under the hood to improve the way that elements within the desktop layout reference each other.


This is all dynamically generated now and can be applied through an appvar, as was detailed in my previous post.

Please feel free to post any feature requests or feedback here, and keep an eye on the Discord for the latest updates.

Changelog
[added] scrollbars to desktop layout system
[added] menu mirroring icons to desktop layout system
[fixed] desktop elements could not reference elements after them in config

Any updates on this shell?

If there were any updates worth mentioning, epsilon5 would've mentioned it my now.
Note to admins: Feel free to delete this if you are deleting the previous comment.

Yes, there have been updates, it looks like I just haven't bothered to post about them. I will do so in due time.

EDIT: Man, it really has been a while...

I guess the message was a good reminder, eh?

Somewhat--I'd still been working on it, just not posting about it much, and progress was pretty slow as I was very busy over the summer. Anyway, as always stay tuned for more updates (and it's great to see that people are still interested in them after all this time).

Vysion 2 looks really cool. I definitely like the dithering to achieve the transparency effect on the start menu. Is there any chance I could get my hands on it now (even if it's in a super-unstable version currently)?

agreed. I would love a release of it even if it's still beta. I've heard theirs a version download link somewhere on Discord

There is--here's the link to the Discord. The build there is pretty old though (released in July 2022), so it won't have all of the newest features yet.

I am not allowed on discord, sadly. Is there another way to get it?

lol, same.

Not currently, unfortunately--remind me when I release the next test build to put a copy on Google Drive for both of you.

This is crazy can't wait to test it out man great job!