What the Fuchsia? Google's trying out a mysterious new operating system

First there was Windows vs. Mac. Then came iOS vs. Android. Now with a project called Fuchsia , Google could be starting a new software platform war -- but we don't yet know who's on the other side of the battle line.

Fuchsia, which emerged Friday, is an operating system designed for "modern phones and modern personal computers," Google says. For those devices, the tech titan already has Android and Chrome OS, raising the possibility that Fuchsia will compete with Google's own work.

It's hard to launch a new mainstream operating system. But with Android, Google became one of the few companies to successfully do so, and the Fuchsia team includes veterans of operating systems including the legendary Be OS. And as Apple showed with iOS on its iPhones, a new operating system can bring dramatic new benefits to consumers.
You may be happy with Windows, Android, MacOS or iOS. But there's still room for improvement. A fresh start in the world of operating systems could mean stronger security, more responsiveness, longer battery life, and an easier time for programmers writing sophisticated apps.

OS hurdles

Building an operating system is technically hard, especially one like Android or Windows that has to handle a wide variety of hardware. And when building a new OS, it's hard to get developers to write software tailored for it -- a key problem that doomed many operating systems, including Windows Phone, Mozilla's

Firefox OS, Palm's WebOS and Ubuntu Touch. If people aren't using the software, there's no incentive for developers to support it.
And getting consumers excited about operating systems is tough. "Users really don't want to run operating systems -- they want to run apps," said Gartner analyst Michael Silver.

Google could help a fledgling operating system by making it compatible with Android. But that would also make it harder for Google to make a true fresh start.

Operating systems can also succeed in narrower domains -- anything from network equipment to microwave ovens, for example. And it's not yet clear what Google's Fuchsia ambitions are. The company declined to comment further on Fuchsia.
An operating system manages a device's most basic operations. It registers keyboard clicks, sends data over a network, juggles the tasks running on a processor, stores files on a drive, displays graphics on a screen and controls a phone camera. At the center of the OS is software called a kernel, which in Fuchsia's case is called Magenta .
Android is based on the open-source Linux kernel that has been around since 1991.

Fuchsia is still in its early stages. Google has it up and running on an Acer Switch Alpha 12 , a laptop- tablet hybrid, but apparently also wants to get it running on a Raspberry Pi, a much less powerful machine. It also
runs on devices powered by ARM chips , the type that powers almost all phones and tablets.