What's the deal with NG Amiga OS's?

[gulliver]

Originally Posted by Korodny

OS4 is dead, AROS was never really alive and MorphOS is making some impressive progress (there are lots of hints they're working on a x86/x64 port), but software development for it died down years ago as well.

That indeed is the harsh state of affairs.

My 2 cents: Either develop something for 3.1 which will automatically make it compatible with all NG Amiga-like OSes, or go the open source AROS route in the hope that it will gain some traction in some distant utopical future.

[Minuous]

@gulliver:

If I understand you, you are suggesting that Amiga application developers abstain from making use of any of the improvements in OS3.5/3.9/4.0/4.1/MOS/AROS?

That doesn't seem very viable, Amiga development will be effectively stuck in 1994. Also it gives no motivation for OS developers to improve the OSes, if all the improvements will go unused.

It doesn't seem reasonable to expect Amiga application developers to cripple their apps just because one or more clone OSes exist which lack proper support for the API. That's like expecting Windows developers to limit their coding according to what works with ReactOS/WINE. Proper solution would be for ReactOS/WINE to support all Windows functions properly. If someone develops an AmigaOS clone which only supports up to OS1.3 would that mean all Amiga app developers should limit themselves to the OS1.3 API?

I'm not sure what you mean by the second part of your sentence, you are suggesting developers open source their software? I agree, if that was your meaning. Perhaps you can clarify.

[MartinW]

I think in the last part he is just suggesting to pick Aros because given it's open there is the hope that at some point in the future it will improve? But I may be wrong

As for the other bit, I don't overly see the different enhancements to the 3.1 level really being too much of a problem. Not that I've actually done this mind! It's not like we have never had software that targets multiple software environments from a single code-base.

in theory you put all your common code (probably the 3.1 system friendly stuff) in common areas and then you have OS specific files or parts of files that are called in by makefiles or compiler directives. Obviously you do come unstuck if you want to use a feature that is available on one OS but not another. But that's when users of that OS have to just accept that a feature may not be available or may suck a bit more.

Clearly I've not actually done any of this but it's where my understanding is.

Right now, after spending a few evenings with both MOS and Aros, I admit I'm leaning more towards MOS. I should probably dig out my AOS4.1FE VM and disc for a fair comparison but I don't remember it having a 'ready-to-go-and-just-get-on-with-it' development IDE!

I think when I'm next paid this G4 Mac mini will probably get registered. Hopefully if I want to upgrade to a more powerful machine then someone will be interested in the G4.

[Minuous]

>I think in the last part he is just suggesting to pick Aros because given it's open there is the hope that at some point in the future it will improve? But I may be wrong

Well, hopefully OS4/MOS/AROS will all improve, development has not stopped on any of them, officially at least...

>in theory you put all your common code (probably the 3.1 system friendly stuff) in common areas and then you have OS specific files or parts of files that are called in by makefiles or compiler directives. Obviously you do come unstuck if you want to use a feature that is available on one OS but not another. But that's when users of that OS have to just accept that a feature may not be available or may suck a bit more.

Yeah, I do this for certain OS4/MOS-specific stuff like the new menu.class, force feedback etc. It's not a workable solution when the entire GUI is completely missing from one platform though.

>Right now, after spending a few evenings with both MOS and Aros, I admit I'm leaning more towards MOS. I should probably dig out my AOS4.1FE VM and disc for a fair comparison but I don't remember it having a 'ready-to-go-and-just-get-on-with-it' development IDE!

There's a C compiler (GCC) as part of the OS4.1FE SDK. No IDE but it's pretty straightforward to call it from the command line.

[gulliver]

I am suggesting exactly what MartinW interpreted. Nothing more, nothing less.

[betajaen]

If it helps, I've started to get into the AmigaNG scene. Specifically MorphOS. It's cheaper to get into than OS4 (unless you go emulation). Powerbooks are so cheap on eBay, so the MorphOS license is the expensive of them all.

I program a lot, and I've got into programming on MorphOS. It's actually really fun, a lot of the documentation from the Amiga 3.x APIs still apply, and in some cases it's easier than Windows/OSX programming. I very much like the cross-platformness of it all, so anything I write should work on Amiga 3.x/4.1 providing I compile on that particular hardware.

The web-browser OWB works great for me. Youtube is a little funky, and some websites don't behave correctly. But I can use Github for the most part, and any research for programming (like on stackoverflow) works. I haven't tried out any email browsers, so I can't common on that.

It was a bank holiday weekend in the UK, so I decided to start on a little learning project on MorphOS. It's just a simple GUI for Git done in MUI, still working on it now. I literally, didn't turn on my PC until Monday afternoon.

I would say, with a little effort and knowing the limits - MorphOS (and I suppose OS4) are great little OSs, and can be used day to day.

[MartinW]

Thats really interesting. When I tried a bit of code on 3.9 (68k) I found it, how can i put this!, like going back to the dark ages. Which I guess is not an at all unreasonable thing for it to be because at the end of the day it is a 90's API. I remember some time between 1995 and 2000 going and buying Borland C of some description. It was a LOT of money for me then (nearly £200 of my own money) and having to deal with message queues and the like for someone that was just learning C was enough to blow my mind. I never got that far with it but for some reason around 1998 I really managed to get into Java and RMI.

I'm really starting to dig into Aros a bit at the moment but my initial experience is that it is pretty buggy. I like the fact that the code is open though and I can see how it works. I assume MorphOS doesn't have that given it's commercial but the flip side is that you can just get on with it a lot more.

I've bought a cheap £35 netbook for Aros. I'm tempted to look into the Powerbook for MorphOS. I quite like the idea of a portable even if it's big by todays standards. I'm not sure if it would really be much of an advantage over the Mac Mini though really.

[betajaen]

I would say it still feels a bit like the dark ages. There isn't any modern stuff such as GUI Designers like in Visual Studio or code refactorers/inspectors like Resharper. But the main IDE Flow Studio - Has auto-complete, and look up declarations, and an Amiga Guide of the main API.

MorphOS is pretty much closed source, apart from Ambient (the Workbench-like clone), and a couple of applications and some libraries. It doesn't really matter though, if you stick to MUI and use the favourite classes - it's open source anyway, and/or it's compiled for the three Amiga OSs. Even if you stray from the path, the 68k stuff still works - and still is relevant.

The Powerbooks are a bit heavy by todays standards. I have a 3 now, they are so cheap - I can use them for spare parts. My goto one is a 17" Powerbook G4, at 1.67Ghz with 2 gigs of RAM - even a 128Mb Radeon GPU. I've even put a SSD in it! They are slow by modern standards, slow by modern PPC standards too. But it doesn't matter. Amiga-like operating systems are small and nippy. But I usually use them as desktops, hook them up to a monitor and keyboard/mouse, then hide the thing behind a desk or something.

All in all, it's an alternate to Linux.

Edit:

I had a quick look on Ebay; There are a few 15" Power Books for around £30-40, I mean that's the price of a good takeaway!

[MartinW]

I just wish eBay sellers would list the damn GPU!! 99 times out of 100, be it a G5 tower or a G4 laptop they fixate on the hard drive and battery and don't even think to show what GPU it has. It's pretty much a given the thing will need to be plugged into the mains and let's face it, replacing the hard drive was trivial back then.

[EDIT] Obviously the G5 towers don't have batteries

[swinkamor12]

Amiga OS 3.1 API was outdated even before Commodore bankruptcy.
Very little from Amiga OS 3.1 API is still worth use today.
Except BOOPSI and datatypes almost nothing.
If You have OS that is binary and source compatible and You want to use 68k code in Your new software it may still make sense to use 3.1 API but it not work for x86 AROS.
Forget about AROS on x86 it is not worth of use crap, it is not binary compatible and it has not memory protection, it has not support for multi cores, drivers are many times slover than win/osx/linux.
Use Amiga Os in uae instead, it will be only little slower but binary compatible.
On Amiga Os 4.1, MOS, Amiga OS 3.x in uae You can use API form 3.5,3.9 and other like MUI, Reaction.

[wawa]

Originally Posted by betajaen

apart from Ambient

the open version of ambient is pretty dated and has a lot of missing dependencies so that makes it rather worthless for any practical reason imho. i have started a work on this just to see how far i get, but given up on it and now it simply lays around in my aros local source folder.

[wawa]

Originally Posted by swinkamor12

Use Amiga Os in uae instead, it will be only little slower but binary compatible.
On Amiga Os 4.1, MOS, Amiga OS 3.x in uae You can use API form 3.5,3.9 and other like MUI, Reaction.

you could refrain from bashing aros on every opportunity once in a while. certainly it has its handicaps, but complaining about lacking support for multicore, while it actualy has experimental implementation on x86_64, contrary to any other wannabe amiga ng system, same as for memory protection is quite ridiculous, as you must realize.

aros is the only system that is open and runs on multiple platforms inclusive amiga hardware or uae, and has much lower footprint/demands than, say, os4. besides most of the aros source is common/platform independent, so that fixing one target may fix the others. just one or two changes this night i expect to improve booting it in vmware as well as on my a1200.

from the perspective of someone who is interested in programming and/or wants to contribute, there is no better choice than aros, since all alternatives are closed and except on application level you are usually left waiting at mercy of their respective development teams, who also do not communicate very well.

different people find different things rewarding. certainly there are some who enjoy frustrations. in the end its everybodys own choice.

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by swinkamor12

Very little from Amiga OS 3.1 API is still worth use today....

ok, go on and use Windows than

Forget about AROS on x86 it is not worth of use crap, it is not binary compatible

AOS4.x binaries are not 68k compatible
MOS binaries are not 68k compatible
Linux ARM binaries are not x86 compatible
...

and it has not memory protection,

like AmigaOS (including 4.x and MOS), RiscOS, TOS, Mac System 9.x, ...
At least AROS has partial MP on x64

it has not support for multi cores,

Wrong - in contrast to all the AOS-flavors it does support multicore.

drivers are many times slover than win/osx/linux.

Wrong again!
(some are slower and less polished but not "many times" - on hosted you don't have this problem at all)


As unfinished/unpolished AROS may be: your bashing is unreasonable.

[betajaen]

Originally Posted by MartinW

I just wish eBay sellers would list the damn GPU!! 99 times out of 100, be it a G5 tower or a G4 laptop they fixate on the hard drive and battery and don't even think to show what GPU it has. It's pretty much a given the thing will need to be plugged into the mains and let's face it, replacing the hard drive was trivial back then.

[EDIT] Obviously the G5 towers don't have batteries

Agreed. It's the no-open source drivers from Nvidia problem. Fortunately, if the Mac hasn't been changed inside, and they show you the About My Mac screen, you can look up the number, and it'll tell you. But all the Powerbooks are AMD GPUs which work great!

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Minuous

It doesn't seem reasonable to expect Amiga application developers to cripple their apps just because one or more clone OSes exist which lack proper support for the API. That's like expecting Windows developers to limit their coding according to what works with ReactOS/WINE. Proper solution would be for ReactOS/WINE to support all Windows functions properly.

If developers want their applications to run on multiple platforms then they have to accept the limitations of those platforms. But of course that is unacceptble for NG Amiga, which must include every API ever invented (plus those that haven't even been thought of yet) or it's not worth having!

Or perhaps developers could treat the OS as a minimal base on which to build applications that don't require a specific API? Nah, too much hard work - might have to do some actual coding!

[MartinW]

Originally Posted by betajaen

But all the Powerbooks are AMD GPUs which work great!

Ahh, that's worth knowing. I've looked a few up and it says stuff like "other options were available to configure" (or words to that effect) but it doesn't tell you what those options were so I've been assuming NVidia might have been an option.


In that case then...

[MartinW]

I have to agree with what Wawa and Gorf are saying here. Sure Aros is without doubt, on the surface the most lacking or buggy or whatever you want to call it. But I've taken the time to check it out and build it and not only do I find it interesting but only by the team getting feedback on people doing so will they ever stand a chance to know about the problems and fix them.

I guess the problem is in knowing which problems are the user and which genuinely need fixing / attention - but that's the case with most things.

After that it's just down to if / when / how well things get fixed which I cannot comment on as I have no experience there.

[indigolemon]

Originally Posted by betajaen

But all the Powerbooks are AMD GPUs which work great!

Sadly not the 12", much to my dismay. It has an Nvidia graphics chip in it

Had one from new and it would have been a cracking MorphOS m machine.

[swinkamor12]

Gorf think that if he lie nobody check.
Of course Amiga Os 4 and MOS ar binary compatible with 68k Amiga Os 3.x software.
It is obvious for any sane member of Amiga community that,
thirst thing what should be done after breaking binary compatybility with 68k should be adding memory protection.
AROS x86 should have memory protection.
AROS x86 is not binary compatible with 68k and has not memory protection thats why AROS x86 is crap.
It is also easy check that nouveau used in AROS x86 is many times slower than closed NVidia drivers.

[swinkamor12]

AROS x86 is not good enough to use standalone.
By not support AROS x86 You loose none, but You can gain still very good GUI libraries - MUI and Reaction.