A few months back, I started to read about the new AmigaDE environment, AmigaOne, and the new technology Amiga is using. After Tao released their Intent/AmigaDE ADK on a cover CD bundled with Digital Magazine (and being an old Amigaen), I wanted to dig a little deeper and find out what all the fuss is about. During my search on the web, I couldn’t help being a little disappointed.
One thing that made the Amiga stand out from the rest when it was released back in the Eighties (which applies to any new format) was that it made a difference. It was possible to fulfill almost every need one could want met with a computer. I could efficiently: Play action and strategy games, DTP (introducing WYSIWYG – What You See Is What You Get), do all sorts of graphic editing in high resolution and many colors, compose music in 8 bit 4 channel stereo, use word processors and spreadsheets (at the same time), perform 3D rendering, explore the huge amount of freeware/shareware, and lots more!!!
Most importantly the eXPerience was superb. AmigaDOS was a joy to use and Workbench (the window environment) did make computing fun. I have never used an OS that made its use more simple and joyful this way. And even compared to modern OS’s, it was a powerful way to get work done. Today we know that
the competitors at that time had a long way to go before we had todays WindowsXP.
True, the Amiga lacked some of the modern features of an operating system (mainly virtual and protected memory). I suppose that is to be expected from a system that started its days on a 68000 CPU.
So my question (and the point of my web search) is: What does the new Amiga have to offer, and what will once again make it stand out? Given the result of my search, not much!!!
Visiting Amiga.com didn’t reveal much. No screen shots of promising AmigaDE software. No animated films showing how the environment is used. No words about when the next Quake3 will be running on the platform.
There is no information about the Amiga SDK (except of course that you can buy it). I read many evaluations of the new SDK, and people seem to enjoy it. But, there is no information or documentation about the SDK, the IDE used for programming, and what power it has to offer.
Information on the new AmigaOS 4.0 is also lacking. I saw some release dates and a list of buzz words describing the OS, but again, no pictures. And will Amiga redefine the use of a GUI environment, for example by using skins or having a new type of taskbar or whatever?
The only thing that have been in the PR mill on Amiga, it how nice it is to have “Planet Zed” running on Windows and on a PockedPC (and properly on the Nokia set top box). This is truly great, but the code once run anywhere is already present in Java, .Net, and the new “Java game thing.” And given the amount of new game consoles, powerful cheap PC windows running WinXP (or any other OS), Planet Zed on a Nokia isn’t enough.
Amiga has done a lot of good things to promote upcoming of Amiga. Releasing a player (now called Amiga anywhere) on Windows and Linux is a good way to push the platform. Having an SDK ready will give a lot of new software.
I am looking forward to see the result of Amiga’s work, but given the information available at the moment, it is very confusing what the target is and what to expect. If I bought an AmigaOne (or installed the AmigaDE player), will I be able to say I have a system that is remarkable and at least a little better that the rest? Personally I hope so, but I doubt it.
About the Author
Vandre Pind lives in Denmark and he is educated as bachelor in mathematics and computer science. For the past 4 years he has been working as a software developer. On top of that, he has spent a lot of time on computers. From his first C64, his lovely Amiga, to various PC’s. For the last year or two, he has been trying to find an OS that in his mind would “make his day” both experience-wise and as a software development platform. This means that he tried Win95, WinXP, Linux (a few distributions), and Mac OS X…
At first I thought you were the guy who wanted to write an OSNews article about the free intent ADK release with Digital Magazine, because of being so much impressed by it. Guess not, have you bought the magazine? (as intent is the foundation of the AmigaDE?)
If you want to know some of stuff Amiga has been developing, you simply need to sign a NDA or SDA with Amiga Inc for now. You will be amazed by what the Amiga community has in store though. (Ami2D, Ami3D, SHEEP and loads of other stuff). For a preview be sure to take a look at http://amiga.medicinareberget.studenthem.gu.se:8080/amiga/index.htm… by Bill McEwen for TechTV. You will see how the AmigaDE differs from other platform idependent technologies. The main differences are incredible performance, flexibiliy and memory footprint. The video gives a somewhat good idea for this. The translator software is just a few kilobytes on any of these devices (compare that to ordinary JVMs. Note you can use Java2 ME as a development language. Also there is loads of information available here on OSNews, just search through the archives, you will find links to many screenshots of 2D and 3D AmigaDE games/a SHEEP interview/screenshot and loads of other stuff).
Also there is loads of information available about AmigaOS4. It looks that only screenshots would please you?? Eyecandy is easy to be achieved, but is just that. Take a look at http://www.stormloader.com/amiga/aiab.htm“>this taken from customized workbench 3.0/3.1 (released 1992/93), would it impress you if AmigaOS4 looks similar to this? I guess why though, eyecandy solely doesn`t make a great OS. Be sure though that AmigaOS4 will have a very modern look, but its functionality is much more important.
Finally with regard to Shareware/Freeware and Open Source software note that over 400 titles are available over at AmigaDev.net Thousands of developers are working on commercial software though, have a little more patience.
Hey Mike, let me step in here as well. I’m a bit of an OS junkie, I’ve tried just about every *nix, be, and windows flavor out there, but I never got my hands on an amiga box-yet.
I did a quick Google search on Amiga, and personally I was impressed. There are many vendors with Amiga software and legacy hardware ready to go, as well as a rather large (seeming) development community. And, it is all UNDERGROUND-a bunch of zealots keeping the OS alive, devil may care.
You gotta love that.
So, I await the release of the new Amiga systems/boards/OSes. The Tao technology seems interesting, and should make for a good alternative OS paltform.
Hi,
I have to ask such question, as the article is a little bit inconsistent? Why are you asking about skins? Have you ever seen MUI? Each window could have it’s own design, gadgets. I am not too much skilled in AmigaOS knowledge, but still nowadays OSes lack few interesting AmigaOS concepts.
As for UI, you can look at Workbench Gallery here: http://www.trotta.de/club/wb-txt/index.php
And, if you ask what is the purpose of Tao, if there is Java and .Net already, you DEFINITELY choose wrong order – you should ask – why .NET, if there were already Java and Tao?
As for access to more info – you would have to sign NDA with AmigaInc, as Mike pointed out already ….
Cheers,
-pekr-
Actually, you’ve got the order wrong too. You all should be asking, why Tao, .NET and Java when we have had Smalltalk for 25 years?
Actually, Tao and .NET each do things that are new and interesting, whereas Java doesn’t. Tao is a fast portable assembly->native CPU translator. .NET allows seamless interop between the languages that target it. Java doesn’t make any inroads in the world of computer science, it’s just takes Smalltalk and makes it more C++-like. Nothing new.
Hi Vandre,
AmigaDE isn’t the only way forward for the Amiga, in fact, it’s probably the least important and least relevant to Amiga-technologies. Many of us in the Amiga community believe it to be Amiga by-name-only, and is not much of interest to us.
The fact is that the Amiga community is hopelessly divided about the future – a great chasm seems to exist that divides the community into about 3 camps.
If you’re interested in the Amiga brandname or the “official” way then AmigaOS 4 and AmigaDE is for you, however there are alternatives that many people outside the community will never have heard of
There is MorphOS – an AmigaOS-like operating system specifcally for PPC hardware, and there is AROS (Amiga Research Operating System), an open-source reverse-engineered AmigaOS that is nearing completion, and contains some very interesting new technologies.
Many of us believe that to bind AmigaOS to non-mainstream hardware, effectively shutting out millions of ex and potential users will kill AmigaOS off, so we support AROS. Other people have deep, negative feelings about Amiga Inc., and support MorphOS.
MorphOS and AROS have co-operated, even agreeing on new APIs for future features, however AmigaOS 4 seems to stand alone.
AmigaDE and AmigaOne isn’t the only way forward for AmigaOS-like technologies.
Just wanted to throw my two cents in here.
You mentined a lack of software, well one of the things you
must consider is that the AmigaDE will run it’s own software,
any JAVA software, and any TAO non-specific OS software out there
as well. Well that currently gives you about a 1,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000 differnet sotware titles already. The commercial ones
are waiting for everything to get finished for release.
In addition to that, most of the current Amiga developers are currently
porting their software over to DE as well. That’s a few thousand as well.
The main point of the new OS is that you can take a disk with a program
on it and stick it into ANY computer with ANY OS on it and it will run. No
need to do anything complicated, just run it. They still have bugs
they are woring on, and they are adding new CPUs every week. If you wish to
upgrade later on to a new computer, just copy your files over and everything
still works exactly as before. I would say that is a pretty neat and
exciting trick to get pumped about!
Lack of screenshots and such doesn’t surprise me. It’s not finished and
until it is, the non-disclosure-agreement will keep it that way. Lots of
tid-bits have leaked out though and things seem impressive. The number
and names of the partners arepretty exciting as well!
Dave
You miss the point, David. Portable software has been around for years in the form of Java, it’s not new or revolutionary anymore. What makes you think that AmigaDE is going to be more successful than Java?
I don’t care about Amiga-branded products. I am interested in AmigaOS and AmigaOS-like systems. DE is not an operating system. DE is not AmigaOS.
As for “most” AmigaOS developers porting their stuff? Exactly how much new development has been going on recently? How many developers is “most”? Where do you get your “thousands” figure from?
Dont get me wrong, the DE is having a big part in the future, infact, without the DE, i believe there is the chance of NO future. That is, the Amiga needed some revolutionary, something new… The concept certainly isnt new, however if done properly (as i believe it has been done) it’s certainly revolutionary.
However, AmigaDE will only be there to help. The big winner in all this will be the AmigaOS, and there for the community. The OS is getting the largest overhaul of its life, with the introduction of many modern operating system components such as Virtual Memory, Memory Protection and a Modern Look!
The most awaited introduction that not many OSes cant boast about these days is a Hardware Abstraction Layer. The AmigaOS will not only (i feel) be an OS the community can be proud of, but one the DE developer community will flock too. That is, i have a feeling Amiga Inc may announce AmigaOS as the official development enevironment of the DE. Once the DE takes for, there for, so will AmigaOS. The DE should be much much faster on AmigaOS than either Windows or Linux, because of its seemless integration.
This will boost the Amiga Community and will keep it moving onto OS5 where Amiga Inc will probably release its largest marketing companie ever!!!
Well, i hope so anyway!
From the screenshots it sort of looks like the basic widgets resemble the last release of PC/GEOS Geoworks Ensemble 2 before NewDeal took it over, except in 16bit color running at a higher resolution. Not crying foul, just excited by a surge of nostalga.
http://www.safelink.net/danrose/aw-geos-01.html
Ahh brings back memories.. first computer my family got and it was a DrDOS/Geoworks system. I remember going through all the DOS commands in the big huge red book. I still have it to this day. Tried to migrate to oswarp but couldn’t ever get it to boot, ah well, ALTOS4LIFE. =P
-lee
> AmigaDE isn’t the only way forward for the Amiga, in
> fact, it’s probably the least important and least
> relevant to Amiga-technologies.
Actually the AmigaDE is the most important technology worked on by the Amiga developer community. It will surely get the Amiga community noticed again. The AmigaDE/intent user community will surely expand with millions in a short time. For the Amiga developer who would like to make some money, this is your breeding ground. The Amiga community is trying and has done an excellent job implementing alot what has been learnt from AmigaOS development to make the AmigaDE a very efficient and compelling solution.
> Many of us in the Amiga community believe it to be Amiga
> by-name-only, and is not much of interest to us.
The foundation surely isn`t based on AmigaOS source code, but is based on a platform independent technology developed in the early nineties by an Amiga games developer. The only new OS based on AmigaOS source code is AmigaOS4.
> Other people have deep, negative feelings about Amiga
> Inc., and support MorphOS.
There isn`t really that much negatism feelings to Amiga Inc personally, as many such people will agree that the people working for Amiga Inc are very competent and very respected within the Amiga community. However the problem is that many developers started projects before Amiga’s independence day. They have invested alot of time and money only to see that Amiga Inc will come out with a real new AmigaOS and something far more revolutionary than most could have ever imagined (AmigaDE). In effect many are afraid, join and kill your own projects? Not a chance. There is no need to dispear however, the Amiga community would like everyone to succeed. The more OSes available for Amiga hardware and the more platforms the AmigaDE/AmigaOS runs on top of, the better.
> MorphOS and AROS have co-operated, even agreeing on new
> APIs for future features, however AmigaOS 4 seems to
> stand alone.
Note that the AROS team would like to work with just about anyone. Amiga Inc can take anything they want, as the AROS team offered, if they feel a need for it. Note however that AROS is not based on AmigaOS source code in any way, as the source was locked up at PC companies for endless years. The AmigaOS4 team has the choice to use AROS or own initiatives where ever they seem fit.
I lost interest when he said that the processor had something do do w/ whether an os had vm and protected mem. I’m not an expert, but I think that linux has those and it runs on the 68k line like the amiga. Also, I was taken aback at the thought that an amiga user can say that XP is the pinnacle of OSes. I haven’t dealt w/ it much, but usually MS doesn’t revolutionize as they do integrate. So I’m guessing it’s a bunch of features from other OSes (aqua anyone) bundled together, and foisted on the desktops of unsophisticated consumers everywhere.
“I lost interest when he said that the processor had something do do w/ whether an os had vm and protected mem. I’m not an
expert, but I think that linux has those and it runs on the 68k line
like the amiga.
”
The 68000, first in the 68k line, did not have any memory management.
This only became practical with later models, which arrived after the
basic structure of AmigaOS (and MacOS) was established. Nobody has
found a way to retrofit memory management to AmigaOS without breaking
all the existing software.
I never owned an Amiga, but have always been impressed with them. The company had everthing go wrong, but the Amiga survives becuase it is a good computer.
I know many Amiga owners want the existing Amiga OS continued as is, with improvements… but in the past 5 years Mac and Windows have gone a long way – Mac OS X and Windows 2000/XP. I think the Amiga DE is needed to get any kind of place in the market. Extending the old Amiga OS would be a problem, as Apple found out when trying to extend the orginal Mac OS.
I think Amiga is doing it the best way, extending the old OS via ver 4.0 while working on the Amiga DE.
As good as the old Amiga OS is, it is difficlt to extend it too much more.
> Portable software has been around for years in the form
> of Java, it’s not new or revolutionary anymore. What
> makes you think that AmigaDE is going to be more
> successful than Java?
There is only one thing I like about the Amiga Inc. initiatives over the other offers I’ve seen and that’s the DE and what it offers with TAO. If MorphOS and AROS had some sort of option for using a similar sandbox like that mentioned in the plans for AmigaOS4.5 I would probably like MorphOS, AROS and other alternatives a bit more. Many Amiga users have cried out for a JVM even to go as far as offering hundreds of dollars for it. With MorphOS using MUI as a core part of the OS (Similar to ScalOS) they’ve locked themselves in from Java application development unless a Java/MUI genius can create a “wrapper” technology for the developers essentially breaking the whole idea of write once run anywhere with Java.
What will make AmigaDE more successful than Java? That’s a simple question, the one component lacking in all of Java is a “dock” OS, sure there is Sun’s own Solaris but that’s a limited OS on processor standings. With the path put on the horizon by Amiga Inc. detailing how the DE is going to eventually intertwine seemlessly with AmigaOS, there’s no question in my mind about it, especially if the DE itself gains even more momentum than it already has both inside and outside of the Amiga developers community.
—– back to the topic at hand Re: the article…
severe lack of research. I’d grade it a D- just for the effort of writing it but then again the author didn’t analyze both standings and left questions wide open when they were definately not rhetorical.
I love this quote about the author : “For the last year or two, he has been trying to find an OS that in his mind would ‘make his day'” and yet he is attempting to review the AmigaDE? Just reading a few of the whitepapers on TAOs web site should give him enough information that AmigaDE would not be a full OS like what he is looking for. In all, the article was a waste of time and effort with no clincher and an exhausted introduction with little to no meat inbetween. Call me a troll if you want, I’m just calling it like I see it.
>Many Amiga users have cried out for a JVM even to go as
>far as offering hundreds of dollars for it. With MorphOS >using MUI as a core part of the OS (Similar to ScalOS)
>they’ve locked themselves in from Java application
>development unless a Java/MUI genius can create
>a “wrapper” technology for the developers essentially >breaking the whole idea of write once run anywhere with >Java.
What rubbish is this? Java’s GUI, underneath USES the host operating system’s GUI system, whether it be KDE, MUI or Windows’.
“So my question (and the point of my web search) is: What does the new Amiga have to offer, and what will once again make it stand out? Given the result of my search, not much!!!”
Most of what I’ve come across regarding the new AmigaOS just lists features that other operating systems have had for a while, but that AmigaOS has been missing, since it hasn’t been developed much for quite a long time. I’m also wondering how Amiga will create something unique, not just satisfying the diehard fans with modern OS features and hardware, but providing special features that will be able to attract users from other, established platforms.
AmigaAnywhere (formerly AmigaDE) may or may not turn out to be interesting and successful. I’m not sure yet what influence Amiga Anywhere will have on the desktop OS. Amiga Anywhere is for PDAs, settop boxes, phones and so on. Beyond providing improved sync features, and being able to run PDA apps on the desktop, I don’t know what the advantages of the portability are, from the perspective of the desktop computer user (not that people haven’t tried to explain it to me, but it still doesn’t seem to me like a big selling point for the OS). I think if the Amiga Anywhere apps could not only run on the desktop, but sort of “expand” there to take advantages of the resources, not only scaling the display appropriately, but exposing new features that are constrained by smaller devices, then you’d have something special. This would be great for Amiga Anywhere, but since Windows, Linux, etc. will also be host platforms, I don’t see any special advantage for AmigaOS itself. Some say that it will be “tuned” to work better with the PDA apps, but on the other hand, the new Amiga hardware is relatively, uh, slow, so any OS advantages are likely to be rendered null by the hardware.
So in my view, AmigaOS will have to survive on its own merits; Amiga Anywhere’s portability itself more or less insures there’s no “hometown advantage.” And I haven’t yet seen any kind of feature list for AmigaOS 5 — where AmigaOS and Amiga Anywhere are supposed to “merge” — that shows how Amiga is going to push the envelope in OS design. Maybe there is a list, but what I’ve seen so far just shows how the platform is being brought up to date, not how it’s jumping ahead of anyone else. Not to say that the Amiga guys can’t think outside the box; Fleecy Moss, for instance, (formerly(?) active in KOSH http://kosh.convergence.org/index.html) has been known to get visionary — to the extreme), but can this get implemented in real life?
— gary_c
Anyone who has used a Java language program, or even just run across a web page that loads a Java applet, knows how sloooooow Java is. I recall having read how fast Tao’s JVM implementation is. That alone would be an accomplishment, if they come through with the speed.
> What rubbish is this? Java’s GUI, underneath USES the
> host operating system’s GUI system, whether it be KDE,
> MUI or Windows’.
Spoken like a true Java programmer who doesn’t have a clue. Go have a look at the core for AWT and the API for the MFCs. Then have a look at some of the advanced elements in Swing. Compare your findings with the redundant API components of MUI and you will have a better understanding of why using MUI as the OS component of Java would be very lacking at best for some of the better features in Java Application development. I could write a song about MUI… “how many strings must a gui have, before it becomes a gui”. One developer wrote two completely different kinds of List objects that are not even close to the way the other List objects are handled, iirc neither of the List objects are “a type of” another just adding to the confusion of the API. I’d want to know how an MUI window would handle a JInternalFrame of all the simple things to do. Don’t even get me started on the wonderful implementation of MUIs API on layers, good god what a joke. To build a JVM to use MUI is possible, only if MUI was overhauled to include a standard set of API rules with many of the gui components reworked and grounded only to offer extensions of the base functionality. Multiple strings, lists, trees, and many others is only inviting problems. Core components should be extended to add functionality to, not have to rewrite and duplicate the functionality in a seperate component. MUI was good in its prime, now it’s time for something better to come along. Go pick up a book on programming, a Java VM will not happen overnight for MorphOS, AROS, or AmigaOS. With the AmigaDE and TAO in place, AmigaOS already has a leg up.
Java being slow is just MS bs. They (MS) has a mediocre product that will only win through FUD and them doing their best to close off distribution channels for Java. If Microsoft ever had to play on a level playing field they would lose. Oh wait. X-Box. It’s running third on every continent behind the PS2 and GameCube.
As for AmigaDE (AmigaEverywhere). This is finally going to be what Java and every other cross platform strategy every wanted to be.
Here’s how it works. You will actually be able to buy, in a computer store or on-line, lots of different games and applications. No matter what processor and OS you have you just run the same install program and *it* figures out which kernel needs to be installed and installs that and the game. Be it Windows or Linux or Mac or Sun or … desktkop or handheld, the exact same game in the exact box will install and run on your computer. You won’t have to worry about “do I have the right version of …” because it will all be in the same box with the game. You won’t even realize (except for marking splash screens) that it even runs on top of AmigaDE. But there you will be playing it on your computer by yourself or on-line with others depending on the game. The same can be true for WordProcessors, spreadsheets, graphic manipulation programs. The sky is the limit.
But then if you don’t want something like that it sucks. The world is not better when game companies have to make a different version of their game for every OS. This way they only have to make one and it will truly run on any major OS and CPU.
I had an Amiga 500 with several very expensive upgrades, and I was a very vocal Amiga proponent when it was still new and pertinent.
However the Amiga went bust after Commodore did, so-to-speak, and while I’ve more or less kept up with the happenings of the Amiga community (which until recently weren’t much more than posting diatribe about how the Amiga ruled, and Windows sucked), I have to admit that I fear the price of these new offerings, largely due to Amiga having chosen to not utilize the ever-present x86 architecture.
Would I pay for an updated, modern Amiga OS if it could run on my existing hardware? Hell yes! I’m a big OS junkie (as most readers here are likely to be), and I would be damn proud to have an Amiga as one of the options on my bootscreen (right there along with a Linux, BeOS, QNX, and a few Windows distributions).
Will I be as likely to go buy an entirely new hardware setup in order to run the desktop OS at it’s peak performance levels? Not likely… Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to do so, but based on the performance of past promises from Amiga, why would I sink a grand into a box which will only run one OS (Well… It could run Linux, or perhaps BeOS, but you get the idea)??
I mean, I’m sure it’ll be cool, and I get “itchy” just thinking about what Amiga can do these days, but they’re really shutting themselves out from a very large portion of their potential market.
And please don’t flame me with all the crap about custom chipsets and such (Remember the “Copper”, and I think it was the “Blitter”, or something obscure like that??). It’s already been proven that the x86 architecture can handle the Amiga OS… Why shut all of us out, or require us to invest a lot of money, which is tight in todays economy, in a technology that’s already failed before?
It’s a similar question to the oft-asked one of why Apple doesn’t release OS/X for the x86 architecture. They’ve made what’s arguably the best front-end for a -nix OS, but they’ve again made it impossible to use unless you buy their hardware. While this is working at the moment for Apply (I feel it will fail in the long run unless they offer an X86 version myself, but still they are picking up some diehard anti-MS people who don’t have the skills to pick up Linux right now), I see it being much more of a hindrance for the Amiga -Again, this is referring only to the desktop OS. It appears that AmigaDE executables will be similar to Java and run on any enabled box.
Apple at least can get current users to upgrade in order to continue using their existing software… Can anyone honestly say that someone’s sitting there with an A1200, 16MB of Ram, and a 40MB drive just waiting to upgrade to something better still?
Anyone have any ideas? Can someone convince people like myself, who already sank a ton into Amiga and BeOS, just to get shit on, that there’s a legit reason to dump more of our hard earned cash into this technology? To me the thought should be “How do we get our technology into the greatest number of users hands”, as opposed to “Let’s make them buy a completely new system in order to run this”.
The main reason why the Amiga Inc web site is so confusing is that
they have two totally different and unrelated OS products.
AmigaOS is the old desktop OS (now considerably updated by third
parties) and DE (aka Amiga Anywhere) is the portable one based on
Tao’s Intent.
They try to give the impression that these are both “Amiga”, so half
the time you don’t know which they are talking about. There is also
the suggestion that they will in some way be “merged” in the future,
which is rather like saying you are going to merge BeOS and Symbian.
Apart from using good ideas from one OS in the other, there is no way
they can be merged. The only thing they have in common is that neither
has memory protection.
>Spoken like a true Java programmer who doesn’t have a
>clue. Go have a look at the core for AWT and the API for
>the MFCs. Then have a look at some of the advanced
>elements in Swing. Compare your findings with the
>redundant API components of MUI and you will have a better
>understanding of why using MUI as the OS component of Java
>would be very lacking at best for some of the better
>features in Java Application development.
As you are being a little vague, I have no idea what exactly you are referring to. But ReAction isn’t ideally suited to Swing – it executes the gadget’s processing on Intuition’s context. What about the more complex Swing objects like JTable? It means the system is locked up computing user code on a system task, with a system priority. This is dangerous.
>a Java VM will not happen overnight for MorphOS, AROS, or
>AmigaOS. With the AmigaDE and TAO in place, AmigaOS
>already has a leg up.
And where is the version of AmigaDE for AmigaOS then? Besides, doesn’t the Intent JTE only support Java 1.2? How old is that again?
> As you are being a little vague, I have no idea what
> exactly you are referring to.
You wouldn’t have to tell me twice that you didn’t understand simple logic. I could already tell you’ve never touched a line of code in Java from your first response.
> But ReAction isn’t ideally suited to Swing
I completely agree with you there. Reaction and MUI are both archiac and desperately need a complete rewrite to make either of them barely suitable (Reaction needs it more than MUI imho). As for the JTable goes, the information gathered inside of the JTable can be used and passed around to other objects as needed, look at the DefaultListModel an advanced form of the JTable that will work with a standard JList as well. Using boopsi or a hack there of to handle that can be bad in both respects.
> And where is the version of AmigaDE for AmigaOS then?
> Besides, doesn’t the Intent JTE only support Java 1.2?
> How old is that again?
You’re about on top of the situation with the DE as much as the reviewer was. I swear that boy was about two fries short of a super value meal. Sign the NDA after you get the SDK and I’ll tell you all about where the current DE is for the AmigaOS. The JVM found inside of TAOs Intent is up to 1.2 with some components of 1.3 as requirements by the standards for the Java2 MicroEdition (sun.java.com/j2me); However, a good majority of professional developers write Java web applications using the 1.1.1.8 release of the Java SDK. Companies like Cerner, H&RBlock, Sony, and many other big names haven’t made the switch over to anything higher than 1.2. Calling the Java1.2 MicroEdition old is like saying the AmigaOS 1.3 is young in comparison.
Amiga !IS! a harware machine. The only thing i love about OS4 that i did read is that memory protection is optional
They are going to do another computer based with a 3d video card! That is stupid. It can’t do other thing that cause a bottleneck. No amiga should require 3D accelaration, they should only require faster CPU and more of them.
The amiga was just that a very good distributed computing (internaly) computer.
An amiga is not an amiga in an emulator (even if the emulator can be faster on today PC) because the same in real hardware equal to the PC would be even better.
You then might say that not upgradable computer was the amiga demise. I think it’s not. It was commodore lack of commitment to R&D that took too long before releasing new machine and they were to little too late.
I don’t want to update my PC it cost less to wait 4 year and buy a new 1.
It remove lot of driver problem and having the same speed on LOT on computer was something i never saw again (not even with apple).
The if the original desinger of the amiga were to make it today they would not choose PPC or X86 or not even the rumored alfa from the after commodore days. They would use FPGA and put lot of them in the box. They would also cross-matrix all of them with all the peripheral and Bus.
That they are trying to sell me is a cheap PC with a cool little OS. I already have that and it’s a x86 BeOS station (my main computer btw).
How many hardware guru are at amiga inc???
I see a lot of amiga zealots here! They defend every decision of Commodore oops! Amiga!
I own an Amiga too, I have an amiga 500 now 2 meters from me! I liked it not because I am a zealot but because it was the BEST combination of hardware and software, ahead of any other.
Now what I say? Taos? AmigaOS 4.0? Personally I like taos, I have seen it for the first time a lot of years ago on Byte magazine. But the hardware???? A g3 powerpc with sdram and matrox??? I suggest to try to build something new! Because taos supports multiprocessing WITHOUT shared memory they should try to build an 8 way mips machine with amd hypertransport and 16mb to each cpu. Remember: amiga without special hardware is not an amiga!
The reason the Amiga was so cool was the people who developed it. If none of those people are involved in the current amiga projects then I see no reason to take any interest.
“How many hardware guru are at amiga inc??? ”
Dean Brown at least. But Amiga Inc aren’t going to make hardware –
they don’t have the capital, for one thing.
If anyone approaches them with a good proposal to make Amiga-branded
hardware and license one of the OSes, Amiga Inc will happily
cooperate.
But hardware as revolutionary as the A1000 would need a budget of at
least $100 million. What was the development budget for the
Playstation 2, for instance?
QUOTE::Apart from using good ideas from one OS in the other, there is no way
they can be merged. The only thing they have in common is that neither
has memory protection.
You dont understand! The merger is just makeing the DE run on AmigaOS. How is this different to a windows or linux version you ask? In AmigaOS5, the DE will not RUN (as a process)… I know this cause Fleecy told me a long time ago and i posted this on Amiga.org. How will it be impliemnted? I dont know, Fleecy didnt say, but i guess it would be sometype of API. Allowing seemless integration. Maybe the AmigaOS and DE API’s will be merged in 5? Allowing a consistant interface inbetween both systems?
Anyway, i dont know, but what i do know is AmigaDE will be seemless integrated into AmigaOS by version 5, and it will NOT run as a process as it does in the SDK!
I have to agree with the article. I’ve spent hours crawling around the Amiga website looking for information on DE but I can’t find anything useful. I’ve learnt more about it from reading these posts than from anywhere else.
It’s strange that the Tao website, which doesn’t even sell packaged software, has so much more useful info about Intent than the Amiga website has about Intent and the DE put together. A lot of people seem to be salivating over what DE does, but I can’t even find an API description in the developers section, or even a technical description of the product.
Does anyone know a good source of information about what is actually going on at Amiga Inc.? I would really like to know about it, but cryptic hints dropped in interviews seem to be the only way to find out anything. Amiga really need to sort this out if they want to sell their product. Please post some links, someone…
> Please post some links, someone…
Here’s a good one that’s not hard to find, for most of the good stuff you’ll need to sign an NDA, go fig.
<a href=”http://www.amigadev.net“>http://www.amigadev.net
If you don’t want to sign an NDA you’ll just have to wait until the DE is closer to complete while they (Amiga Inc and TAO) release further information about it. Kind of reminds me of Transmeta where many people ridiculed them for not having anything worth value.
There is plenty of information out there on the DE, you just have to jump through some hoops to get it. Amiga are protecting their further developments for a reason, why try to position themselves to be snatched up by the next corporate bloodhound wanting to turn Amiga into something it isn’t (pun not intended).
“Yankee Doodle stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni but I’ll be damned if I’m going to stick the DE on some cell phone and call it an Amiga” – author unknown. My favorite quote. I am not against the DE, I just can’t wait until the DE runs seemlessly on the AmigaOS. It will be a while, but I can’t wait.