Book Preface:
This book presents the results of Project Oberon, namely an entire software environment for a modern workstation. The project was undertaken by the authors in the years 1986-89, and its primary goal was to design and implement an entire system from scratch, and to structure it in such a way that it can be described, explained, and understood as a whole. In order to become confronted with all aspects, problems, design decisions and details, the authors not only conceived but also programmed the entire system described in this book, and more.
Although there exist numerous books explaining principles and structures of operating systems, there is a lack of descriptions of systems actually implemented and used. We wished not only to give advice on how a system might be built, but to demonstrate how one was built. Program listings therefore play a key role in this text, because they alone contain the ultimate explanations. The choice of a suitable formalism therefore assumed great importance, and we designed the language Oberon as not only an effective vehicle for implementation, but also as a publication medium for algorithms in the spirit in which Algol 60 had been created three decades ago. Because of its structure, the language Oberon is equally well suited to exhibit global, modular structures of programmed systems.
In spite of the small number of man-years spent on realizing the Oberon System, and in spite of its compactness letting its description fit a single book, it is not an academic toy, but rather a versatile workstation system that has found many satisfied and even enthusiastic users in academia and industry.
Book Link:
http://www-old.oberon.ethz.ch/WirthPubl/ProjectOberon.pdf