Decades ago a relative showed me his Amiga. Before putting in the disk (these were on 3.5 inch floppies iirc) with the game I wanted to play on it, he put in another disk.
I asked him with the first disk was, and I remember distinctly he said it was an operating system. I asked him what an operating system was, and he said it was like a program, it was a program technically, that makes it easier to run other programs, just it was a program that didn't do much on its own and you wouldn't use it without another program right afterward. I said it didn't seem easier if you had to load a different disk than the one you wanted to use, and you still had to load the one you wanted afterward. He looked at me disdainfully and patiently explained that all or almost all the software in the future would use operating systems and they whole process would get easier or even invisible but there would always be an operating system in there somewhere at some point in the very near future. I was skeptical, but I nodded along.
I imagined an operating system as a dressed up software library, which was more intuitive to me as a concept.
I asked him with the first disk was, and I remember distinctly he said it was an operating system. I asked him what an operating system was, and he said it was like a program, it was a program technically, that makes it easier to run other programs, just it was a program that didn't do much on its own and you wouldn't use it without another program right afterward. I said it didn't seem easier if you had to load a different disk than the one you wanted to use, and you still had to load the one you wanted afterward. He looked at me disdainfully and patiently explained that all or almost all the software in the future would use operating systems and they whole process would get easier or even invisible but there would always be an operating system in there somewhere at some point in the very near future. I was skeptical, but I nodded along.
I imagined an operating system as a dressed up software library, which was more intuitive to me as a concept.