Let's make a nice workbench

Hey guys, I've always used classicwb but recently have played with other custom workbench packs and have really enjoyed the experience. That said, I haven't actually learned anything and would like to build a nice workbench from scratch, based off feedback from all of you. I'll document the process and take screenshots and videos.

I'll be honest, my main inspiration right now comes from user "AMIGASYSTEM" - [ Show youtube player ] is a great example even though that may be a bit intense for my plans, the videos he shares are pretty neat and have shown me that I've consistently underestimated the capabilities of workbench.

So here's the plan:
- Emulate an A4000
- Use PFS3 file system
- OS 3.9 basic installation with BB 1&2
- Only install sane patches, nothing "bleeding edge", but would like advice on patching and custom libs!
- Picasso96

Any advice where to go from there? What's low lift, small performance hit, but a good way to beautify workbench, and increase usability?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

[utri007]

Visual Prefs
http://aminet.net/package/util/wb/VisualPrefs
MCP
http://mcp.a1k.org/

[AMIGASYSTEM]

Thank you esc For mentioning my Operating System. AFA OS In my opinion it is the best solution OS3, my system 060 is composed by OS3.9 BB-1/2/3/4 + AFA OS Which can be disabled in boot system by simply holding down the Mouse SX key. If you want to install AFA OS, HERE a HardFile already pre-installed where you only have to add OS3. If you are not familiar with the first start disables WBStartup (rename) then update to AFA OS 4.8, if you have to emulate an A4000 / 060 you also have to add the appropriate 060 libraries.

If you do not like it AFA OS you can opt for one OS3.9 BB1/2/3/4 RTG Like my old man A4000/060
[ Show youtube player ]


You can also install Amikit, this is my Amikit 8 060
[ Show youtube player ]

[AMIGASYSTEM]

Quick Installation Tutorial OS3.9 + AFA OS (Simple copying)

[ Show youtube player ]

[idrougge]

Originally Posted by utri007

Visual Prefs
http://aminet.net/package/util/wb/VisualPrefs
MCP
http://mcp.a1k.org/

Wait a minute, aren't those two of the most well-known instability makers?

[ptyerman]

There's also http://www.amiga-look.org/.
Quite a few themes, icons, backdrops etc.

[Dunny]

Magic Workbench for starters. NewIcons looks awful.

[Jope]

MultiCX instead of MCP.

The latest visualprefs fully regged is here: http://www.amigafuture.de/downloads....ail&df_id=2217 - use with care. I don't run it myself.

I spent most of the day installing AfA and was impressed by the look but was unimpressed by the performance.

I think I will skip picasso96 for now and focus on just making a nice aga workbench, starting with os3.9. I'll follow up more during the week as I work on this more but for now I don't plan to share my results, since they are so slow.


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[AMIGASYSTEM]

AFA OS is not slow, but it is fast, you have to set a system to its height, i attach my config WinUAE, but first install THESE libraries.


AfA OS 68060 FPU JIT
[ Show youtube player ]

[idrougge]

Picasso96 is in fact the best way to improve performance.

[Jope]

P96 with AGA? Or what did you have in mind?

[Locutus]

i remember running AFA OS on my 3000/060@66 + CV64 setup back when Bernd was still actively developing it.. (2007?)

It was usable but the antialiased fonts definitely were sluggish.

Beware when looking at these setups demo'd on UAE, its usually not going to be fun on real hardware.

[Mr-Z]

I only used afaOS for skinning on my A4000 csppc 060/60 setup, runs quite fast.
Like Locutus said the anti-aliased fonts makes it slow.
Also watch out with those nice hi-color icons often used in UAE config's, they slow the system down a lot, i only use those for the disk icons.
Amistart i have never been a fan of, runs sluggish on real Amiga's.
I rather use good old tools daemon and magic menu combination, much faster and cleaner and more Amiga like in my opinion.

Normally i use:
AfaOS or Birdie for skinning windows
Visual prefs
Magic Menu
Tools daemon (needs patch to work on 3.9 bb2)
MUI 3.8
Req attack (for better looking requesters)
Peterk's icon lib (much much faster and support for OS4 Style icons)
A whole bunch of stuff i forgot.

This is my Vampire 2 A600 config below, i used a similar config on A4000 CSPPC 060/60+CVPPC back in the day also ran very smooth.
The used colors/skins could be better, but after 15 years it kinda grew on me

[Locutus]

Yup PNG icons are nice and cool, and i did have a PowerIcons setup back then. (thinking of this...some follies of 'elite desktop' there....)

But in all honesty opening SYS: and seeing icons pop up one after another slowly on a 060 just aint fun, keep them for drives and maybe stuff in your AmiDock if you use that.

[idrougge]

Originally Posted by Jope

P96 with AGA? Or what did you have in mind?

P96 on a graphics card, of course.

[honx]

Originally Posted by Jope

The latest visualprefs fully regged is here: http://www.amigafuture.de/downloads....ail&df_id=2217 - use with care. I don't run it myself.

never had a fully registered version installed. where do i put the key?
//edit: nevermind. obviously it belongs to s: as many other keyfiles...

Ok, thanks @AMIGASYSTEM, with the mmulib, 68060, and JIT, I now have a usable workbench with AfA OS. It looks nice - lots of eye candy, nice fonts, icons, etc., but it's not something I'd be able to use in a real Amiga, especially if I wanted to use things like AmiStart (for example).

I think I'm going to step back and readdress what my goals are:
- Something that looks great
- Something that includes excellent out-of-the-box Workbench functionality
- Something that will work well on an unexpanded A4000 (potentially A1200 depending how much we can performance tune Workbench)
- Something based on Amiga OS 3.9

So, circling back to square one, I think my goals, in order, are:
- Tune workbench 3.9 as much as possible without causing stability problems
- Increase workbench usability and functionality
- Improve workbench decorations, skinning, icons, etc
- Further tune for performance and address stability issues

Following all of this, I'll document my process from start to finish, and (depending how difficult) I may try releasing a preconfigured workbench pack. We'll see how it goes doing all of this first.

So, pointers for sane performance tuning without compromising stability, to start. Suggestions? I'm thinking:
- PFS3 file system
- Boing Bag 1&2
- Fblit - never installed this, concerned about stability, thoughts?
- FText - never installed this, concerned about stability, thoughts?
- PeterK icon.library
- SystemPatch - allegedly a big perf boost for aga chipset - nervous about stability, thoughts?
- Executive - better mutlitask scheduling, nervous about stability, thoughts?

[AMIGASYSTEM]

WinUAE 060/JIT Ultrafast

AFA OS
Magic Menu
Tools daemon
MUI 5
ReqAttack
AppMenuCx
THE
AmiStart v0.70
RAWBinfo
AssignWedge
RememberOpenDrawers
NiceBar
WindowsToFront
ClickToFront
And much more

[PeterK]

Originally Posted by esc

So, circling back to square one, I think my goals, in order, are:
- Tune workbench 3.9 as much as possible without causing stability problems
- Increase workbench usability and functionality
- Improve workbench decorations, skinning, icons, etc
- Further tune for performance and address stability issues

Following all of this, I'll document my process from start to finish, and (depending how difficult) I may try releasing a preconfigured workbench pack. We'll see how it goes doing all of this first.

So, pointers for sane performance tuning without compromising stability, to start. Suggestions? I'm thinking:
....
- Executive - better mutlitask scheduling, nervous about stability, thoughts?

Are you sure? In my opinion, Executive is only recommended for multiuser systems, like the good old BBS in the 1990s. I would expect that it brings no advantages on a typical single user system. It might just cause more overhead for the multitasking.

@RCK
Was there an update to the forum software recently?
I just had some problems in the message editor to scroll down to the bottom. The lower part of the window contents seemed to be distorted. I never had that before. It happened after I removed the first part of a quoted message, then the remaining text got messed up. Or is this a new Windows 15063.483 bug?