Collapse OS

Project Goals and Scope

• CollapseOS is framed not as “save computing” but “save electronics”: preserving ability to program simple controllers using scavenged parts (Z80/6502/8086 etc.), mostly in through‑hole form.
• Author also has DuskOS, aimed at the intermediate phase where modern PCs still exist but advanced fabs/supply chains don’t.
• Many commenters like the emphasis on simplicity, self‑hosting, and low‑level control as an antidote to modern software bloat, regardless of apocalypse concerns.

Value of Computing After Collapse

• Some argue computers are LARP in a world where food, water, medicine, and basic tools dominate; you’d want paper farming manuals, not cyberdecks.
• Others list concrete uses even at very low power and bandwidth: weather prediction, irrigation control, local process control, low‑bit‑rate radio comms, encryption, distributed price signals, basic data logging, and timekeeping.
• Debate over whether computing helps individuals/small groups more than centralized states; some envision “government in a box” as a power amplifier for whoever keeps electronics working.

Old CPUs vs Modern Microcontrollers

• Long, detailed back‑and‑forth on whether targeting Z80/6502 is wise versus ARM, AVR, ESP32, etc.
• Pro‑old‑CPU points: simpler, documented in widely distributed paper books, many DIP packages, easier for low‑skill scavengers, clear buses and external memory.
• Pro‑modern‑MCU points: orders‑of‑magnitude lower power (μW vs W), vastly more abundant in e‑waste (chargers, vapes, appliances), integrated RAM/flash/clock, easier programming (C/MicroPython), and standardized debug interfaces.
• Consensus: for real resilience, being able to reprogram whatever MCU you can find (often ARM‑based) matters more than instruction‑set nostalgia.

Power, Batteries, and Hardware Scavenging

• Power is repeatedly called the hard problem, not the computer itself: batteries wear out, improvised generation is noisy and intermittent.
• Thought experiments show 5 W 8‑bit systems are often untenable compared to μW‑scale MCUs when running off tiny batteries, hand cranks, or remote solar.
• Suggestions: universal buck/boost converters that accept “any trash electricity,” scavenging motors and generators from appliances, and potentially solar‑powered radios and e‑readers.

Collapse Plausibility and Psychology

• Several criticize CollapseOS’s civilizational‑collapse timeline (peak oil, “cultural bankruptcy”) as weak or outdated, expecting balkanization and network disruption rather than total global failure.
• Others note collapse is typically gradual and fuzzy, not a single event, and we might already be in a “long emergency.”
• There’s meta‑discussion about doom as an evolved, sometimes overactive survival emotion; some enjoy contemplating collapse, others see it as generational angst.

Paper vs Digital Knowledge Preservation

• Strong disagreement over whether post‑collapse knowledge should be primarily digital or on paper.
• Paper advocates: printed manuals are device‑independent, more resilient to EMP, hardware failure, and missing chargers; printing a curated survival library now is recommended.
• Digital advocates: a solar‑powered device with a large offline library (Wikipedia snapshot, manuals) vastly outperforms a small bookshelf, if you can keep it powered and intact.
• Some propose hybrid strategies: pre‑printed “top 20” critical books plus offline digital archives.

Usefulness Beyond Apocalypse and Related Work

• Even skeptics of collapse see value: learning Forth, building self‑hosting minimal OSes, and practicing salvage‑oriented design is intrinsically educational and fun.
• Related ideas mentioned: clay PCBs for low‑tech circuit fabrication, homebrew CPUs like Magic‑1, scavenger guides for identifying chips in e‑waste, and tools that “delink” binaries into reusable object files.
• Some suggest targeting smartphones as post‑collapse platforms (ubiquitous, many peripherals built‑in) and note that, practically, billions of modern MCUs (ARM, RISC‑V, ESP32) will likely be the real salvage base.