I Built a Simulated Kernel Driven Operating System in the Browser

Most “web OS” projects are just draggable windows with local state. I wanted to see what would happen if the browser had to obey real operating system rules. So I built WebOS — a fully simulated operating system inside the browser with: A modular kernel architecture Queue based process management Round Robin CPU scheduling First-Fit memory allocation (with fragmentation) Block-based virtual disk A Unix-inspired inode file system Strict Kernel → Store → UI control flow Built using React, Vanilla JavaScript, Zustand, GSAP, and react-rnd . This isn’t just a UI skin. It’s a constraint-driven system model running entirely inside a browser runtime. What It Looks Like Multiple apps running simultaneously Independent PIDs Per-process CPU and memory tracking The UI reflects system state. It never invents it. System Architecture: Kernel → Store → UI Most web apps follow this pattern: UI → State → Render WebOS enforces: Kernel → Store → UI The UI has zero authority over system resources. 1. The K