What is PonyOS?

PonyOS is a hobby Unix-like operating system, designed for ponies like you!

Is PonyOS a Linux distribution?

No! PonyOS uses its own kernel, built from scratch.

Screenshots

What's New in 6.0?

PonyOS 6.0 really leads the pack!

Complete Rebuilt - Everything has been reimplemented in C, so it's faster!
Tons of New Features! - From universal context menus to text selection and a clipboard!
100% Homegrown! - All software in the standard installation is built from scratch by our team!

Downloads

25MB Standard ISO (for emulators)

13MB GRUB ISO (if the above doesn't work)

Using the CD

The CD should boot in QEMU, VirtualBox, VMWare, or even on real hardware if you're a brave pony!

For all VMs, 1GB of RAM is recommended. When using VirtualBox, select "Other/Unknown" for the OS type. For VMware, use a 64-bit guest configuration (PonyOS is not 64-bit, but this configuration provides optimal hardware). For QEMU, qemu-system-i386 -m 1G -enable-kvm -soundhw ac97 -cdrom ponyos.iso should suffice.

The CD will automatically log in the user local. If you are asked for a password for this user, that password is also local.

Building from Scratch

To build PonyOS from scratch, please use an Ubuntu or Debian-derived host.

Clone from our git repository and then run make. Note that we do not support building PonyOS from scratch and this process may not work. Complete builds may take anywhere from thirty minutes to many hours, depending on your hardware.

Git Repository

PonyOS is developed through Github. You can find our repository at klange/ponyos.

FAQ

Does PonyOS work on real hardware?

Yes! PonyOS works on many different machines. Hardware driver support is limited, though, so for the best PonyOS experience you should use one of the supported virtual machines listed above. If you're feeling brave, you'll need a PS/2 keyboard and mouse (or legacy compatibility support in your motherboard).

Is this really not a Linux distro?

Four years later and people still don't believe us! PonyOS is not a Linux distribution - it's also not a BSD, or a Hurd, or a Minix, or a Solaris!

Does PonyOS come with a compiler?

PonyOS 6.0 does not include a compiler on the CD, as significantly increases the size of disc image. You can use the package manager to install the build-essential package and get a full GCC toolchain.

Can I put this on a bootable USB drive?

Probably, but see "Does PonyOS work on real hardware?" above. Directly copying the GRUB ISO to a USB stick should work (eg., using dd).

How do I move windows?

You can drag them by their title bars or hold Alt and then click and drag anywhere.

How do I change the display resolution?

In VirtualBox, the display should automatically resize to fit the host window. In QEMU and VMWare, you can use sudo kdebug in a terminal to launch a kernel debug shell and then set_mode 1280 720 or similar to set the resolution.

I'm trying to play Quake and the mouse isn't working!

In virtual machines where absolute cursor positioning is available, click the mouse cursor icon in the panel to switch to relative mouse mode before running Quake.

Does PonyOS support networking?

Yes! While the network stack in PonyOS 5.0 is far from mature, it should provide functioning Internet access on supported configurations.

I started an application and it doesn't have a title bar, how do I exit it?

Alt+F4.

How do I install PonyOS?

At the moment, PonyOS is only offered as a live CD with no installation option, for your safety. Experienced users can manually install PonyOS to a system with an existing GRUB installation and room for an Ext2 filesystem partition in the first 4GB of an available PATA or emulated PATA hard disk.

Can I upgrade from an earlier release of PonyOS?

No. Please use the latest live CD of PonyOS 6.0.

PonyOS 6.0