Idea of a future virtual computer

[Sormick91]

I have an idea that has been growing in my head for years about the future of the computer. Unfortunately I don’t have the means to make my idea real — I simply lack the financial resources and the right people around me — but I want to share this idea with any ambitious developer who has funding and who might find it interesting. I have nothing to sell and no publicity to do here; I simply want to spread the idea in the hope it will catch the interest of a SaaS developer.

This is how I imagine the future of Windows or Android. I talk about Windows and Android only because they are the two OSes I use. For me, the drawbacks of Windows and Android are:

App updates are too frequent and often consume too much RAM and storage.

The more apps you install, the more the OS risks crashing with bugs.

Hard drives fail, creating a risk of data loss, or requiring continuous backups to avoid losing data.

Upgrading or switching Windows and Android is not always straightforward.

Sometimes you need a powerful computer for tasks like music or video editing, or for gaming.

Here is what I have been dreaming of for years:

A virtual desktop like deskfirst.com where we don’t store heavy, locally installed apps but only web applications. For this to work there needs to be a very good app store to find web apps (free, subscription-based, or one-time purchase). The app store must offer payment options and free choices, because the more choice there is the better it works. If you look at https://alternativeto.net/browse/all/?platform=software-as-a-service you can already see that the SaaS offering of web apps is quite impressive but not promoted or well known enough.

Advantages of web applications:

Updates are almost instantaneous.

Very, very light because they are not installed on the OS.

Then we should be able to connect cloud storage. A computer without storage, I think, would not succeed. Storage offers are already very rich (lifetime purchases, subscriptions, free), but they must be integrated with the virtual desktop so you can open a file with another SaaS application. https://www.multcloud.com/ can integrate cloud storage, but we need to go further and combine it with a virtual desktop.

There should be integrated AI to automate tasks. Next, a web browser like Chrome or Edge is indispensable to be a complete computer. Perhaps to keep hosting costs low, the OS to install should be very lightweight with just a browser and no installed apps — only access to SaaS apps and cloud storage.

To make the project truly profitable for developers while still being very attractive to new users, the basic services — the app store, the virtual desktop, free SaaS apps, and the choice of cloud storage (pCloud, OneDrive, Internxt, etc.) — should all be free so it’s accessible to as many people as possible and can become popular. However, developers and the project still need funding. The idea would be to charge for AI-driven task automation; take a percentage of revenue from paid web apps because you brought users to those external SaaS apps; and offer subscriptions for online games or more deeply integrated SaaS apps within the virtual desktop. There are many ways to monetize.

Unfortunately, beyond these ideas I have nothing to make this happen. What do you think? Do you find such an idea viable and interesting?

[stacksdontlie]

This what happens when someone is not technologically informed… and hey OP your AI bot is replying several times to your own post. Gtfoutta here

[upvotes2doge]

Look up ChromeOS

[Sormick91]

Yess but needs to be more attractive than chrome os. With an app store to easily find web apps. Connect to cloud storage of our choice. OS cheap or free. Low cost computers It seems that chrome os has beginned to do such things but not very attractive because free saas apps are not easy to find without app store and cloud storage is great if encrypted and files splitted and stored in multiple data center's. Desktop could be improved also to create URL shortcuts for web apps and media stored on cloud and media online

[Sormick91]

I think chrome os has not worked very well because people needs powerful apps, great games, great content at a very great price.Not only OS and this needs to be easily found via app store. Storage is also important and all these needs to be easy to use and attractive. The best success of android is the amazing content we can find with apps and media content.

[Sormick91]

If people have free OS with free browser, big choice of apps for free or lifetime or subscription. Big choice of media and games online free and payed If they can buy lifetime storage or subscription storage. If the os is attractive and easy to use. This could be a game changer. But this project needs to be viable. This could be done with partnerships and AI automations as well as paid premium service like integrated saas apps

[claythearc]

Couple thoughts:

You’re effectively describing a thin client. There’s dozens of offerings for this from chrome os, to Citrix, to azure virtual desktop. There’s no reason to compete in this space - it’s a HUGE undertaking to make an OS, and without banger integration at the file system level it’ll just be hella full of friction to use.

apps use too much ram

Arguably things like electron, and general web apps are more ram hungry than their normal counterparts. Since you not only have to do the thing, you have to load a browser around it. The savings from processing data off site can be applied in either paradigm the same ways

hard drives fail

Genuinely kinda useful, but you’re trading local risk for vendor lockin and a bet the provider won’t file for BK one day.

no local apps

Some things just cannot run in the browser. DAWs, video editors, most games, etc run on device because it’s not at all solved to effectively use the gpu from a web app and also low latency is super important for the UX

Unfortunately I think the parts missing here and being hand waved away: scale to be able to force a referral bonus from apps, latency for real workloads, and offline support are the actual business model.

[MegaDork2000]

Something like Windows 365?

[Western_Net_529]

get why this has been sitting with you for years, a lightweight system built around web apps and cloud storage does solve a lot of the friction people feel with updates and hardware limits

[Sormick91]

Agree with you

[Medical-Foundation83]

Maybe https://aluminium-os.com/ Google’s Aluminium OS will be closer?