YouOS to offer Web operating system; Ektasis answers with VC backing

YouOS is a start-up that wants to let you bypass your PC’s operating system, and instead gives you an operating system online.

Basically, it offers a software platform where you interact via a web browser, freeing you of dependence on any operating system.

It is being developed by a Palo Alto start-up, called Webshaka, which began as a Y Combinator-funded company four months ago and which has since taken an additional round of angel investment. (We last mentioned YCombinator here.)

It is just the latest in a number of companies trying to tackle the emerging Web OS concept, and there is a short review of these efforts by Richard MacManus at ZDnet. We mention YouOS because it is in Silicon Valley and MacManus cites reader feedback suggesting YouOS has emerged as a leader in the pack. He notes that there is a long history of the Web OS concept, and provides the appropriate dose of skepticism. An OS requires heavy use of DHTML and Javascript, which have their drawbacks. Speculation emerged last year that Google was working on a Web OS, but we haven’t seen much.

Indeed, talk of the Web OS comes even as other companies move to rely more on the PC. Redwood city start-up Ektasis emerged from secrecy today, and announced new platform for developing applications along these lines. VentureWire (subscription required) reports it has gotten an undisclosed amount of financial backing from Diamondhead Ventures.

Instead of placing more importance on the application server, which is the way many industry experts expect software development to evolve, Ektasis is founded on the principal that applications will actually rely on a new architecture with client devices like personal computers.

Using the Ektasis framework, “the application is hosted on the server, but it actually runs on the client,” Elgamal said. This approach to application development removes some of the flaws of programming for the Internet, the Ektasis CEO said.

Problems of identity management and security are mostly due to the ways in which the Web was created, according to [Chief Executive Officer, Taher] Elgamal. “The stateless nature of the Web forces applications to communicate the same information over and over,” he said. “So you are forced to expose information that you shouldn’t have to expose.”