Show HN: Look Ma, No Linux: Shell, App Installer, Vi, Cc on ESP32-S3 / BreezyBox
github.com113 points by isitcontent 4 hours ago
113 points by isitcontent 4 hours ago
Example repo: https://github.com/valdanylchuk/breezydemo
The underlying ESP-IDF component: https://github.com/valdanylchuk/breezybox
It is something like Raspberry Pi, but without the overhead of a full server-grade OS.
It captures a lot of the old school DOS era coding experience. I created a custom fast text mode driver, plan to add VGA-like graphics next. ANSI text demos run smooth, as you can see in the demo video featured in the Readme.
App installs also work smoothly. The first time it installed 6 apps from my git repo with one command, felt like, "OMG, I got homebrew to run on a toaster!" And best of all, it can install from any repo, no approvals or waiting, you just publish a compatible ELF file in your release.
Coverage:
Hackaday: https://hackaday.com/2026/02/06/breezybox-a-busybox-like-she...
Hackster.io: https://www.hackster.io/news/valentyn-danylchuk-s-breezybox-...
Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/esp32/comments/1qq503c/i_made_an_in...
Well, I know what I'm doing next weekend.. I was already gonna pick up an esp32-s3 for another project, now I need two... Being instant-on is so, so cool. I really like seeing projects like this and Adafruit's Fruit Jam as they really show "Yeah, by having all this junk in the way, we do lose some things" Absolutely would give something like this to a kid as a first computer. Doesn't the lack of a flat memory model make a genral os difficult? The amiga1000 had far less processing power and about the same memory, with no mmu, but that memory model was flat. Did you have to do weird things to work around it? The memory model is flat enough. The problem with the memory is, you only have about 200kB traditional RAM. But then, you have 8MB of PSRAM. But it requires strict 4-byte alignment, and is noticeably slower. What makes traditional OSs difficult on this platform, is the lack of memory protection. But I am a simple man, I am not writing an OS, all I wanted was a usable shell and an apps installer, so I made that work. Hey you're the xcc700 guy! Very cool stuff. I've been interested lately in using MCUs for general purpose compute. I wonder how far you could push it. Right, people were asking about the shell used in the xcc700 demo, so that is released now too, and I tried to make it convenient to reuse as a component. Esp32-s3 can do so much more, we are just scratching the surface. You might remember FabGL, that ran some nice demos in the realm of games and DOS emulation. Unfortunately, seems to be hard to update for modern versions of ESP-IDF. I am trying to build something more modular, with hope that some parts of it will survive longer. I think someone also ran an old version of MacOS simulated on it, too, that is also an indication of the general capability. Would it be possible to port it to run on the rp2350? Some parts of it, very likely. The shell is just linenoise with some glue code. How are things with ELF loading on rp2350, I did not check. May be possible, the question is, how much effort. In ESP-IDF that is a standard component now. rp2350 supports freertos, so a similar port should be fairly trivial. The io DMA code is a little special on the Pico. Very capable little chip. =3
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