[surajrmal]

There is still a lot of research and innovation, but it doesn't always come in the way of completely new software projects. The cost of trying to build a new OS is simply massive. You need to be compatible with existing useful software if you want to do anything other than an appliance. Anything that provides a new paradigm shift that requires changing existing software has a huge slog ahead of it to make it successful. That said, there is tons of incremental progress in the operating systems.

I think a lot of folks have thought about the idea of a truly distributed operating system. I'm pretty sure existing operating systems will eventually evolve in that direction. You already see bits and pieces of it popping up.