When it comes to open-source operating systems, most people think exclusively of Linux and OpenBSD. But there’s another open-source OS whose architecture may be more secure than either of them.

The Extremely Reliable Operating System - EROS is a new operating system being implemented at the University of Pennsylvania. The system merges some very old ideas in operating systems with some newer ideas about performance and resource management. The result is a small, secure, real-time operating system that provides orthogonal persistence.