Cosmopolitan
C library for building single executables that run natively on many operating systems.
Liked for building single binaries that run across Linux, Mac, Windows and BSDs123, and seen as a fascinating portable C library behind redbean.456 The main caveat raised is expired TLS certificates on related project sites78, with redbean reportedly scrubbed from GitHub.9
Why people recommend it
Cross-platform binaries · 3
One build produces binaries that run natively on Linux, Mac, Windows and several BSDs.
“There is also the APE/Cosmopolitan cross platform binaries, which includes a python.”
“Cosmopolitan Libc has since integrated the bits to make OpenGL work in cross-platform binaries and it's awesome.”
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“it would be cool to see something like this which uses Cosmopolitan Libc + redbean”
Pairs with redbean · 3
Commenters point to it as the library behind redbean and suggest using the two together.
“the portable C library used to create it, which is also fascinating”
“it would be cool to see something like this which uses Cosmopolitan Libc + redbean”
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“It may be time to revisit cosmopolitan (https://github.com/jart/cosmopolitan) and redbean”
Fascinating project · 2
Commenters call the portable C library fascinating and admire its tenacity.
“the portable C library used to create it, which is also fascinating”
“This reminds me of projects like asahi and cosmopolitan c.”
Bundled Python · 1
It ships a cross-platform Python binary that can reportedly run zipped .py files.
“There is also the APE/Cosmopolitan cross platform binaries, which includes a python.”
OpenGL support · 1
It has integrated support for OpenGL in cross-platform binaries.
“Cosmopolitan Libc has since integrated the bits to make OpenGL work in cross-platform binaries and it's awesome.”
Caveats and dissent
Expired certificates · 2
TLS certificates for redbean.dev and the author's website had expired.
“It may be time to revisit cosmopolitan (https://github.com/jart/cosmopolitan) and redbean”
“it would be cool to see something like this which uses Cosmopolitan Libc + redbean”
Redbean availability · 1
One commenter says redbean seems to have been scrubbed from GitHub.
“It may be time to revisit cosmopolitan (https://github.com/jart/cosmopolitan) and redbean”
Often compared with
Threads where it came up
- Unikernels were hard. key word: were 1 mention
- Self-contained highly-portable Python distributions 1 mention
- MicroUI – A tiny, portable, immediate-mode UI library written in ANSI C 1 mention
- Show HN: Kage – Shadow any website to a single binary for offline viewing 1 mention
- Zeroserve: A zero-config web server you can script with eBPF 1 mention
- Win32 is the stable Linux ABI 1 mention
Also written as Cosmopolitan Libc. Data: cosmopolitan.json. Quotes are verbatim; the verdict and theme labels are written by a model from these comments, and every clause links to its sources.
All comments 6
“It may be time to revisit cosmopolitan (https://github.com/jart/cosmopolitan) and redbean”
“There is also the APE/Cosmopolitan cross platform binaries, which includes a python.”
“Cosmopolitan Libc has since integrated the bits to make OpenGL work in cross-platform binaries and it's awesome.”
“it would be cool to see something like this which uses Cosmopolitan Libc + redbean”
“the portable C library used to create it, which is also fascinating”
“This reminds me of projects like asahi and cosmopolitan c.”