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Not NetBSD per se but apart from MirageOS there is nothing as promising than the "Rumpkernel" NetBSD spin-off in the Unikernel space.

It's a direct outcome of the clean and highly modular codebase that has made NetBSD run "on your toaster" for so many years:

http://rumpkernel.org

2 comments

Is the rumpkernel truly a spin-off? It originated in NetBSD master and my understanding is that they'll continue maintaining it going forward. It's part of their system design.

Contrast that with rump Linux kernels: maintained completely out-of-tree and, AFAIK, very little interest in merging and maintaining a complete rump environment in mainline. Rump kernels are easier in NetBSD, anyhow, because of their very carefully designed and maintained device subsystems.

Rumpkernel is even used in the GNU Hurd, because it is relatively easy to run it in userspace. This is how Hurd got audio drivers.