Versions
Four screens, one system.
From the original TempleOS prompt to a retina desktop with a shell. Pick a version.
The starting point
TempleOS V5.03
The system as Terry A. Davis left it. A text-style shell in a bordered window, 16 colours and a prompt.
- Screen
- 640x480, 16 colours
- Text
- The built-in 8x8 bitmap font
- Shell
- DolDoc terminal and command line
- Apps
- The Demo and Apps folders
- Still there
- Press T on the splash, or F12 any time, to see it
26 October 2026 · commit 3314f23
Custom-drawn desktop
The first port of the themes. One full-screen window draws a menubar, rounded windows and a floating dock, entirely from a HolyC callback.
- Screen
- Still 640x480, 16 colours
- Themes
- Five styles that reprogram the 16-colour palette: Longformer light and dark, macOS, Windows 11, Kosmica glass
- Apps
- Projects, Viewport, Palette, Scene
- Loading
- About four minutes, sent over the serial port
27 October 2026 · commit 003cf7d
Desktop 2
The same ideas at full colour. The desktop switches the QEMU display to a 1440x900, 32-bit framebuffer and draws everything itself.
- Screen
- 1440x900, 32-bit colour, no kernel patch
- Look
- Inter text, anti-aliased rounded windows, soft shadows, a blurred wallpaper under a translucent menubar
- Motion
- Open and close animations, a magnifying dock, a crossfade between styles
- Speed
- 30 to 40 ms a frame, about 25 to 30 frames a second
27 October 2026 · commit e0f2489 and after
Desktop 3
Retina rendering and a proper shell. Everything is drawn in logical units, so the same code runs at 1x and 2x.
- Screen
- 2880x1800 at 2x, or 1440x900 at 1x, switchable in Settings
- Renderer
- Dirty rectangles; dragging a large window fell from 72.1 ms to 9.5 ms
- Shell
- Settings, Files, Notes, Calculator, Monitor, Clock, Calendar, Browser, fonts and more; a boot splash and a translucent dock
- Icons
- Lucide, drawn as anti-aliased strokes at any size
Side by side
| Original | First themes | Desk2 | Retina and shell | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Resolution | 640x480 | 640x480 | 1440x900 | 2880x1800 (2x) |
| Colour | 16 | 16 palette | 32-bit | 32-bit |
| Text | 8x8 bitmap | 8x8 bitmap | Inter, anti-aliased | Six families, v2 engine |
| Styles | None | 5 | 5 | 5, plus editors |
| Windows | TempleOS windows | Drawn, rounded | Shadows, animation | Dirty rectangles, minimise |
Run any of them.
The older files are still in the repository: KsDesk.HC, KsDesk2.HC and the desk3 folder.