The massive proliferation of Internet of Thing (IoT) devices in recent years has created demand for distributed computing architectures capable of processing data and making decisions closer to the network edge. This paper proposes a meta-operating system architecture that manages distributed applications and heterogeneous resources in a unified manner, akin to how traditional operating systems manage local resources. The proposed architecture emphasises efficient allocation and dynamic scaling of computation capacity across the Cloud Continuum, as well as minimization of data transfer to meet application requirements, whilst adhering to privacy and security constraints. Key architectural building blocks, quality assurance, and application control loops are explored. This work advances the design of distributed platforms to address the scientific challenges of computing, caching, and communication in the Cloud Continuum.