Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => General chat about Amiga topics => Topic started by: a-pex on April 09, 2008, 07:22:54 PM
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ADMINS: I know this post is a provocation, but please read the full post, before deleting it...
Hello Amiga-Community,
now we have the same situation like with MiamiDX. On the one side we have a very, very good product, on the other side the programmers are no more interested in selling it. :-(
Now it is more than 1 year gone and it is still not possible to buy IBrowse 2.4 anywhere!!!!!!!!!!!!
I am writing this post because in my german amiga-forum more than 30 users are willing to buy it, but no reaction from the programmers.
Andreas Magerl (AmigaFuture) and many other people tried to get in touch with the IBrowse programmers, to sell IBrowse 2.4 again with no result :-(
I am really asking me whats going on in the brain from the programmers? There are so many people willing to buy this product without any possibility.
That is the reason why I asked this provocation question about cracking IBrowse 2.4. It seems they are no more interested in a legal product.
Maybe someone from the IBrowse team can comment this? Why are you not answering the emails? Why are you no more interested to sell IBrowse 2.4????
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And if they are no more interested in selling their product, why they do not release a key for the community! :-(
If someone from the IBrowse team is reading, please contact me, I will buy many keyfiles for my community in germany!!!
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Errr, no.
Use the time limited version or the demo for now, continue to be patient and continue trying to contact the developers.
Otherwise, chances are, there will be no Ibrowse v3.
Why kill off development of the best Amiga Browser, and the only native one still in development?
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This is more a provocation than a real intensions!
But how long can we patient? Writing emails and getting no answer? At the moment you can sell it to the community, they still want to buy 2.4 for 68k. But waiting one or two years more make this impossible...
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All this talk of Cracking software will just cause the original developers of IBrowse to withdraw completely from the community.
If the IBrowse developers do not wish to sell the software any more, that is their right.
I think instead of threatening to crack the software if they do not re-release it, perhaps you should ask them instead of release the source for IBrowse under an open source license. That way other people can pick up the code and keep working on it, and the original IBrowse developers will still retain credit for the work they've done so far.
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I think instead of threatening to crack the software if they do not re-release it, perhaps you should ask them instead of release the source for IBrowse under an open source licens
How are you going to do that if they dont answer any emails or any attempt to contact them?
I dont think anyone should crack it either but what is up with people not even willing to take money for their product?
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Hello,
I wouldn't only focus on IBrowse...
I would like to register Prayer 2 (I figured it's open source now but I can't find a "key"...), no answer from author.
The same with MUI3.8, IBrowse no answer.
I understand that there is not so many of US, but there are people who are ready to PAY for software. How many?... enought to sell OS4.0 with nice box and CD ;). I don't need box and CD? Can be download version.
People buying a hardware for $2000 and there is nobody to write a software for it?
BTW. When you look for auctions on ebay there is like 30 or more people willing to pay this money... (I also would like to buy ORIGINAL software and pay for Shark or SAM440 this $700)
BTW2 ;). How many people is using a UAE and could buy SAM440 (with OS4.0) and... I'm tired of that (I always was ;) )
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I would like to register Prayer 2 (I figured it's open source now but I can't find a "key"...), no answer from author.
Yes, Prayer 2 is open source if you want the full version pick up the source code and compile it
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Don't even think about it. Despite the embarrassingly slow pace of development, it's still an active product. Cracking it would not only be illegal (as obtaining the full version of Miami technically still is), but extremely unethical.
The website says "Temporarily unavailable for purchase". They lost their distributor when IOSpirit withdrew from the market, and as much as the developers may deserve some blame for not taking more interest in finding a new one - for a commercial product that people want to buy, no less - cracking the product is not warranted. A keyfile leaked today will have profound (negative) repercussions on the future of the program. A market this hostile to developers shouldn't expect to hold onto them. Frankly, it's a miracle we have any left. Remember that, legally, there's no such thing as abandonware.
Be polite when contacting the developers. A message threatening to pirate the program is not a good way to draw attention to the problem that it's unavailable. Try asking for a development update on the mailing list. Oliver Roberts, author of the Warp#? datatypes and a member of the IBrowse team, seems to be more forthcoming with information, so try to connect with him.
What are your other options?
-Put up with the demo limitations.
-Use AWeb
-Buy OS4 and use the less-restricted OEM version.
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In my view, this is a completely different situation to Miami(Dx). In that case, Holger kinda disappeared completely and wouldn't respond to e-mails, etc, let alone accept registrations. And, IIRC, he was handling his own registrations so it was his choice to stop.
IBrowse on the other hand is still in active development, and in the past a third party has always handled distribution. It was unfortunate that IOSPIRIT pulled out when they did (i.e. a couple of months after 2.4 was released) because if I had known that in advance, we may have been better off switching to another distributor to tie in the 2.4 release. On the flipside, Amiga users have had years to buy IBrowse 2.x, so I don't think all the blame can be pushed in our direction. I remember buying IBrowse 1.x in 1996 and 2.0 in 1999 - that's over 8 years in which people were able to buy IBrowse and those keys from 8 years ago are valid for 2.4 also.
I also refute the claim that we do not answer e-mails - I do, and I know Dave does too. Most people will know we also post on the mailing list, and on various other Amiga forums, like this one.
Anyway, enough of that stuff. What matters is the future... A number of distributors have been in touch with us, and apologies if we haven't replied to some of the smaller (or work-in-progress) ones because we have pretty much decided on who will be distributing IBrowse in the future. The sticking point is that Stefan has been very busy lately and not involved much in IBrowse, and it is he who needs to sort out the distribution stuff. Not that this really affects development considering Stefan was involved all that much in the development of IBrowse 2.4 compared to the rest of us (as the history log shows - so, no disrespect to Stefan intended there :)).
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Do you believe that anybody who us turning Amiga on and off now how to "compile" anything? Do you know how your body/organism respond for a virus infections? O, I forget you are not a doctor of medicine? :-o
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@ futaura
Thanks for the info update - always appreciated.
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On the flipside, Amiga users have had years to buy IBrowse 2.x, so I don't think all the blame can be pushed in our direction. I remember buying IBrowse 1.x in 1996 and 2.0 in 1999 - that's over 8 years in which people were able to buy IBrowse and those keys from 8 years ago are valid for 2.4 also.
Good so I bought couple months ago used Ibrowse so I will try to use a key :).
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kreciu wrote:
Good so I bought couple months ago used Ibrowse so I will try to use a key :).
...so why are you compain for?
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kreciu wrote:
Do you believe that anybody who us turning Amiga on and off now how to "compile" anything?
No, obviously.I just gave you a concrete solution about the problem of Prayer 2 :-)
Do you know how your body/organism respond for a virus infections? O, I forget you are not a doctor of medicine? :-o
Yes, i know.Not a doctor of medicine but a Degree in biology :-P ;-)
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So in this case can you compile this "think" for me? :D
Thanks :-D
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futaura
I remember buying IBrowse 1.x in 1996 and 2.0 in 1999 - that's over 8 years in which people were able to buy IBrowse and those keys from 8 years ago are valid for 2.4 also.
Yes but some people want to buy it NOW, and maybe did not get the chance to buy it when it was available, and they are right that the lack of availability to buy a registered keyfile has been dragging on for far too long.
I have a registered keyfile, but I could imagine how it feels for others who cannot get one, and it would be enough to put people off using the Amiga, especially thesedays when so much is done on the WEB.
Stephan ought to have more pride in keeping his product available for any new customers he can get, as there cannot be that many in any case, so to let them slip by, and walk away is not doing any of us any good. Get it sorted out ASAP.
After all, when IBrowse 3 comes along I would imagine a new keyfile will be required, and an upgrade for even the IB2.x keyfile holders will be required, to get full access to the IB3.x program.
By the way, seeing as there has been little news on the release of IB3.x, what is the progress on that software?
Also, are we likely to see it this side of 2009, or not, just a simple yes or no will do?
A breakdown of where the program is up to would be greatly appreciated, as silence is no longer golden, it's monotonous, and I feel like an old mushroom, kept in the dark and fed on $$it.
Seeing as you do not update the IBrowse pages with any information as to the development with IB3 it is like being a miner expected to hew coal out of the mine with no light to work with, an unworkable situation.
I know you reply to questions about general IBrowse 2.x questions on forums, but we all want to know about the future, IB3.x and where it is up to also.
The last update I can find on the IBrowse website was in January 2007. That is way over a year ago, with NOTHING else reported.
Frankly everyone with the complaint about the IB2.x keyfiles no longer being available, almost pales into insignificance, when you realise there is no official news on the future of what could otherwise thesedays be deemed a doomed/dead browser, though I would hate to think of IBrowse this way.
Get some news out about IB3.x, and get the availability of IB2.x keyfiles sorted out as a matter of urgency, can you afford to lose the few interested new users that you might get that would migrate to IB3.x if they were able to come on board? I think not.
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Though your points might be right I would suggest you all use a friendlier tone.
Maybe mails starting with appreciation for what has been done so far, or expressing the strong wish to purchase the software without using harsh words have a better chance of beeing answered.
I'm not talking about kissing someones ass, I'm talking about realizeing who wants something from whome.
No matter how frustrating the situation might be, never forget that here in Amigaland the users are hardly in a position to demand anything from anyone be it software or hardware.
Be happy about the things that get released when they get released and get over the things that do not get released (BoXeR anyone ?). If you can not live with that better turn your back on the Amiga hobby.
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@Nearly-right
I've still got a warm fuzzy feeling about having the upgradae from 2.3 > 2.4 :-D
Ibrowse3 will be a bonus, but based on the time gap between 2.3 > 2.4, I'm not holding my breath.
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@Nearly-Right
I had hoped the distribution situation would have been sorted by now, and I agree it has gone on for too long. Not that IBrowse hasn't been in this situation before - the HiSoft->IOSPIRIT transition/uncertainty period (the doomsayers were preaching that IBrowse was dead back then too). I'm sure the matter will be resolved sooner or later. It would have been solved months ago had it been our main source of income, but given the state of the Amiga market we all have other priorities too.
Development is ongoing, and my "plan" would be to release a new version this year, but this perhaps hinges on when the distribution situation is sorted out. I won't lie though - I think it will be some time before IBrowse has proper CSS-rendering support which OWB already has - maybe we'll lose our motivation before then also (personally speaking, the distribution problems haven't exactly helped with my motivation, so it's not just users who are suffering).
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@futuara
Perhaps a bounty would increase your motivation?
Ontop of the ongoing gratitude of the entire Amiga community and the kudos of being one of the authors of the best Amiga browser too, of course!
Whatever happens, I'm happy to have paid out for the software - money well spent.
Regards
Rich
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Boot_WB wrote:
@futuara
Perhaps a bounty would increase your motivation?
It might help :-D. But, seriously, developing IBrowse has never been about money - it's mainly about the fun we have writing the code and something interesting to do in our spare time. I've never really liked the idea of bounties - in IBrowse's case it would be added pressure (i.e. what happens to the bounty money if we don't end up delivering for whatever reason, etc) and not motivation. Personally, I still find developing IBrowse fun, but don't have quite as much time to spend on it as I used to, at the moment.
All I can suggest to people is to bear with us, and we will sort things out soon, and hopefully bring some good news too.
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I'll love the idea of a real up-to-date Amiga 68k browser, and hope I can afford it (my conscience = wife don't allow me to spend more $$$ in Amiga nowadays).
And I can assure: Ibrowse 2.4 still is the best browser for classic Amigas! Keep the good job!:cheers:
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@ Nearly-Right
I think you're right on about the lack of news being problematic.
It's a weird dynamic we have in the Amiga market. We have a long history of vaporware announcments, culminating, I think, with Amiga, Inc.'s Executetive Updates in the 2000-2001 period. Eventually even they said that they wouldn't announce anything until it was ready to ship. They've been essentially silent ever since (apart from additional vapor announcements), and I think that others, consciously or not, don't want to be perceived as another Amiga, Inc. (or similar non-delivering entity).
The pendulum's gone too far in the opposite direction, though. We've gone from vapor to nothing and I think that's hurting the "market" just as badly. With no news, it looks like there's no activity and users are ready to throw in the towel, whether that be leaving the platform (as seems to have happened with a lot of Pegasos/MOS users), or declaring a product dead and asking for keyfiles. If I may suggest, no perceptible news leads to no perceptible user interest leads to no developer interest, maybe?
But there is interest, as the occasional, yet lively, IBrowse (and MorphOS2, etc.) threads show.
I think everyone is (or should be) aware that Amiga development isn't sustainable as a primary business and that coding is done on one's own time and therefore takes longer. No problem. I was too harsh with my comments on IBrowse development being slow. Amiga users are patient. They wait. But if it looks like there's nothing to be waiting for, then that's the problem.
Not asking for release dates. Maybe just a semi-annual check-in. What's been worked on, what's still to be done, a screengrab or two (WinUAE is great with these sorts of updates). That's all. And I'm not just talking about IBrowse. Visible activity on any product would help sustain the market (maybe even expand it if some hardware turns up), benefiting users and developers alike.
EDIT: Bottom line: Take pride in your products and let people know they exist! :-)
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...The sticking point is that Stefan has been very busy lately and not involved much in IBrowse, and it is he who needs to sort out the distribution stuff.
).
You here this time and time again. Just how busy are the lives of these software writers (its not just Ibrowse), that it takes them YEARS to do anything about distribution of their software?
The way I read it, its not that Stefan's been trying to set up a suitable distributor and failed. No, he's finding it hard to find the time to even try. I find it hard to believe that anyone who had any sort of priority or desire to distribute their software would have so little time in their lives to do so. What would it take, really? An email to a distributor, areply from the distributor, a deal and some space on a website. Actually the developers should be commended on their patience as well.
Don't get me wrong I appreciate that the software is there and being developed still, even slowly, and yes I am a registered user, but don't ask me to believe its due to a lack of time either: its due to a lack of desire on Stefan's part, Stefan should just come out and say it.
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I agree with the above poster. Until I saw this thread I had assumed that iBrowse was dead. It does not look in any way different than any other dead project/product that maintains a web page (example: MagicWB) (http://www.sasg.com/mwb/index.html)
I don't have a NIC, but if I did I would not have hesitated to use a hacked copy of any Amiga Browser with the understanding that all have been abandoned completely with a final parting message of "don't worry - we'll be back for ordering real soon!"
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No need to mess with cracking iBrowse! Just get a bootleg ibrowse keyfile! I own the original iBrowse 2.1 and could not upgrade but I am fine with using a bootleg keyfile that I found with Google.
I am sorry if you have a problem with that! But I could care less! Why? Because I am a paying customer that is entitled to the latest upgrade and cannot get it because it is not available any more!
I guess I should just junk my Amigas and just buy new PC's with Vista, it comes with IE7 for free.... :whack:
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Boot_WB wrote:
@Nearly-right
I've still got a warm fuzzy feeling about having the upgradae from 2.3 > 2.4 :-D
Ibrowse3 will be a bonus, but based on the time gap between 2.3 > 2.4, I'm not holding my breath.
Not being a "Ibrowse Fan", coming from a history of buying and using AWeb in the distant past and recently via AmiKit emulation, I have not kept up with the features that Ibrowse 2.4 has and AWeb3.5 does not.
It is my understanding that AWeb is currently being worked on as an Open Source project which I think is a good thing.
If Ibrowse2.4 were commercially available I would probably buy it just to support further development, but AWeb3.5 works fine for most of my browsing needs on an Amiga or emulated Amiga so far as I usually leave security sensitive Internet browsing for my Mac.
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futaura wrote:
In my view, this is a completely different situation to Miami(Dx).
Not really, we have a very good product, the people want to buy and the programming team say: NO WE DO NOT WANT TO SELL IT!!! :-(
It is a real strange situation, because normally the authors are complaining that they are selling not enought AMIGA VERSIONS. The people in my forum are now waiting since OVER 1 YEAR and my problem ist, that my forum is only running perfectly with IBrowse 2.4 (in 2.3 are some bugs).
And, IIRC, he was handling his own registrations so it was his choice to stop.
But the Ibrowse team got many offers and are doing nothing since over 1 year!!! Andreas Magerl / AmigaFuture is distributing many, many Amigasoftware and Amigabooks and everyone is happy. I do not know what you really want?
Even I can sell IBrowse!!! My programmer made the offer to generate a nice german / english homepage, with own domain, making the full registration. But even this offer was unanswered.
And YES, we are writing still friendly emails! Opening this thread was the first unfriedly thing that I have done to get in touch with someone, to help the community, to clear the situation, or to make a own keyfile generator. ;)
On the flipside, Amiga users have had years to buy IBrowse 2.x, so I don't think all the blame can be pushed in our direction.
STOP!!! In my german amiga community are very much people that came back in 2004/2005 when I start my forum! With my contacts I found many "new" users and many hardware developers (see the phoenix II). All this people never had the chance to buy IBrowse in the past.
The sticking point is that Stefan has been very busy lately and not involved much in IBrowse, and it is he who needs to sort out the distribution stuff.
Everyone is busy, I also have a girlfriend, a job and have to travel very much, but I still take care to solve my important problems. If Ibrowse 2.4 is no more important for Stefan, he can release a keyfile for the community. ;)
Can you please help me to get about 30 registered legal keyfiles?
I will pay using paypal, give to you all the data needed from the users and you will send me the keyfiles? Is this possible? Or not?
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@ Thread
I understand the frustration, but do you think a load of attitude is going to
a) encourage the Ibrowse team
or
b) Make the Ibrowse team see the Amiga community as full of ungrateful W@*kers.
These people are doing this for nothing, in their own precious free time (yes, we all have a life away from the Amiga), on top of having full time jobs.
Get a grip, check the attitude, and think about what approach is likely to yield results: ungrateful yapping about "what they owe their customers" (all of whom have already received the product they paid for - upgrades are offered as a free bonus) or friendly encouragement.
@TJlazer - frankly mate, your facts are incorrect. If you own a keyfile for v2.1, then the same keyfile will work for 2.4 without any modification. If you have had to download a bootleg keyfile then you obviously have not paid for a 2.x keyfile in the first place.
The v2.4 distribution is available on the Ibrowse website, so basically, your words say that you are just stealing their software.
Regards
Rich
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TjLaZer wrote:
No need to mess with cracking iBrowse! Just get a bootleg ibrowse keyfile! I own the original iBrowse 2.1 and could not upgrade but I am fine with using a bootleg keyfile that I found with Google.
I think it would be better as cracked :) Crack won't hurt sales of future versions, but using "bootleg" keyfile will (it's easy to forgot you haven't bought it if it works still).
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These people are doing this for nothing, in their own precious free time (yes, we all have a life away from the Amiga), on top of having full time jobs.
You are right, they are doing this for nothing!!! The people can not buy it and the programmers do not want to earn money.
What what the last price for the download version?
50 Euros x 30 registrations = 1500 Euros, and they do not want to have this money??????????? Really strange, I think generating 30 keyfiles will not take too long...
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Boot_WB wrote:
@ Thread
I understand the frustration, but do you think a load of attitude is going to
a) encourage the Ibrowse team
or
b) Make the Ibrowse team see the Amiga community as full of ungrateful W@*kers.
These people are doing this for nothing, in their own precious free time (yes, we all have a life away from the Amiga), on top of having full time jobs.
Get a grip, check the attitude, and think about what approach is likely to yield results: ungrateful yapping about "what they owe their customers" (all of whom have already received the product they paid for - upgrades are offered as a free bonus) or friendly encouragement.
@TJlazer - frankly mate, your facts are incorrect. If you own a keyfile for v2.1, then the same keyfile will work for 2.4 without any modification. If you have had to download a bootleg keyfile then you obviously have not paid for a 2.x keyfile in the first place.
The v2.4 distribution is available on the Ibrowse website, so basically, your words say that you are just stealing their software.
Regards
Rich
I don't agree with this.
No-one's saying: "Hey Ibrowse team , I demand that you write me a Firefox-beater, for nothing, because I deserve it because I paid you something a long time ago". He's saying: "Ibrowse team, guys you have had long enough to do something about making your software available to purchase. No excuses: "too busy" is a lot of BS when it takes maybe a few hours to do but you've done nothing to make it available to buy for YEARS. NO-ONE is THAT busy." People are doing the honourable thing by asking to PAY for the software AS IT IS. Given the fact that most users are hobbyists (like the developers) this is commendable. If they can't be bothered to make the software available for purchase then they should just say so and then things take their natural course, whatever that maybe.
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Hmmmm... this is very interesting. Frankly this situation amazes me. If this offer is genuine, I don't understand how they can just ignore it? No distributor? Baloney. They are offered to be paid directly, so no cut for the distributor; that guy also offered help with distribution (it doesn't have to be shrink wrapped; maybe a web page with a Buy Now button linked to say PayPal would work? or is that just too crazy of an idea???). 1500 Euros for 30 keyfiles? Just think about it. How much effort would that require? The Amiga has entered an extended near-dead state of suspension a long time ago. I hope the situation improves not too far in the future but something like this will not attract new users. Help them! It is very commendable that they want to obtain the software legally, for a platform that is not manufactured anymore. These are the kind of people we need. If they get frustrated with this situation they might turn away. Our community will be diminished. Think about the cost of that.
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stefcep2 wrote:
Boot_WB wrote:
@ Thread
I understand the frustration, but do you think a load of attitude is going to
a) encourage the Ibrowse team
or
b) Make the Ibrowse team see the Amiga community as full of ungrateful W@*kers.
These people are doing this for nothing, in their own precious free time (yes, we all have a life away from the Amiga), on top of having full time jobs.
Get a grip, check the attitude, and think about what approach is likely to yield results: ungrateful yapping about "what they owe their customers" (all of whom have already received the product they paid for - upgrades are offered as a free bonus) or friendly encouragement.
Regards
Rich
I don't agree with this.
Same here. Two things though: first IBrowse programmers are not doing it for nothing. Second those potential customers are not "yapping" about being owned anything, they are frustrated about wanting to buy something and not being able to. As regards "friendly encouragement" how does 1500 Euros sound?
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its one thing you all should think about, if you dont want the community to be diminished. that is to start learning to program the amiga, its a hobby computer and if you want things to happen you do it yourself, its as easy as that. amiga is not windows where you sit on your arse and wait until others do it for you, one time it was but today it is not. i guess some of you have a hard time accepting this. amiga today have no use for users that only sit on their arse and moan about programs they dont get. if you dont want to learn to program for the amiga then you have nothing in the amiga community to do, you can sell your amiga stuff and buy yourself a pc with window vista..
its a harsh reality but thats where we stand today. if you want things to happen on the amiga you do it yourself.
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@futaura
You have no idea how encouraging it is to see an Amiga developer on Here in Amiga.Org.
Its good to know your here.
please just for our sake............just drop buy often and say something as simple as: "Im here...Just saying hello!"
And that will be totally fine..... and believe me......encouraging to know that you are watching the Amiga scene.
That takes no time..............heck..say the same thing and just leave, just so we know your there.
It is greatly appreciated trust me.
Good to see you!
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Can you please help me to get about 30 registered legal keyfiles?
I will pay using paypal, give to you all the data needed from the users and you will send me the keyfiles? Is this possible? Or not?
Exactly, why you need a "distributor" for your own keys? Why pay someone for sending keys?
I REALLY don't understand that.
Kreciu
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I bought iBrowse from ebay and the seller could not find the 2.1 keyfile, all I have is the older disks and a paper saying I can upgrade to 2.1, but the site is down. I am not trying to BS anyone, I am entitled to version 2.4 and I now have it. I sleep well at night thank you.
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kreciu wrote:
Can you please help me to get about 30 registered legal keyfiles?
I will pay using paypal, give to you all the data needed from the users and you will send me the keyfiles? Is this possible? Or not?
Exactly, why you need a "distributor" for your own keys? Why pay someone for sending keys?
I REALLY don't understand that.
Kreciu
What do you not understand? I have my own amigaforum and it is one of the biggest in germany. Many users in my forum complain and complain about the IBrowse situation and now I try to help them. I care for my users. ;)
And if the Ibrowse team is so busy, 1 contact person for this deal should be enough.
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@apex,
Off topic, but do you have a new website url for the Phoenix2 project? The only one I have is no longer any good.
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This is the link to the original phoenix-project: http://phoenix.a1k.org
The phoenix 2 project is a totally new phoenix based on the same size from the original one, but with 030, IDE, fastram and so on onboard...
http://www.a1k.org/forum/showthread.php?t=8947
http://www.gb97816.homepage.t-online.de/
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Really truely you have to cut Amiga developers a fair amount of slack. A highly successful Amiga product will sell what, a few hundred copies? How many copies will a PC or Mac product sell? Plus there are far more tools and programming languages available for PC and Mac developers.
I am really surprised there are the even small number of developers there are. You piss them off and they are gone and where are you?
Amiga developers are an endangered species, treat them as such.
:hat:
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.
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a-pex wrote:
kreciu wrote:
Can you please help me to get about 30 registered legal keyfiles?
I will pay using paypal, give to you all the data needed from the users and you will send me the keyfiles? Is this possible? Or not?
Exactly, why you need a "distributor" for your own keys? Why pay someone for sending keys?
I REALLY don't understand that.
Kreciu
What do you not understand? I have my own amigaforum and it is one of the biggest in germany. Many users in my forum complain and complain about the IBrowse situation and now I try to help them. I care for my users. ;)
And if the Ibrowse team is so busy, 1 contact person for this deal should be enough.
Wait I made a mistake (it's an English think!).
I understand YOU who want to buy a KEY from author of IBrowse!
I don't understand why author of IBrowse needs some "distributor" for his own keys?
ufff... I cited before your post but the questions are for the author of IBrowse... I just noticed that that...
Now should be better :-D
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pVC wrote:
TjLaZer wrote:
No need to mess with cracking iBrowse! Just get a bootleg ibrowse keyfile! I own the original iBrowse 2.1 and could not upgrade but I am fine with using a bootleg keyfile that I found with Google.
I think it would be better as cracked :) Crack won't hurt sales of future versions, but using "bootleg" keyfile will (it's easy to forgot you haven't bought it if it works still).
I beg to differ with you pVC .........
I don't know about TJLazer's situation but I suspect its
about the same as mine.
'I AM' a legal holder of a IB 2.xx keyfile. I bought IB
back in around 95 or 96 and upgraded to 2.3. IIRC the
upgrade was at a discount price for IB 1.xx owners.
I have been 'UNABLE' to get my keyfile to work on IB 2.4.
And 'I AM A LEGAL HOLDER' of the file.
I don't know what the problem is, but I'm not seeing any
help from the authors in solving it.
Given my situation, I would also use a BootLeg file too.
(if I had one)
Mel
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Though your points might be right I would suggest you all use a friendlier tone. Maybe mails starting with appreciation for what has been done so far, or expressing the strong wish to purchase the software without using harsh words have a better chance of beeing answered.
I do not feel your comments are justified here to tell me or anyone else off as I do not think there is anyone who has so far made a comment about the IBrowse topic that has demanded anything from the IBrowse team that should not already have been put in place. The IBrowse team have just allowed current development, and support for their current product to gather cobwebs on the WEB, as a result of which they have lost the momentum, and failed to offer a reasonable amount of up to date information about their intended/current COMMERCIAL product, with NO COMMERCIAL PARTNER there to answer the demand for keyfiles. They have not kept the information available, in a reasonable way, of where IB3 might be up to, for all to be aware, and not have to ask these roundabout questions about it's future.
I for one, am particularly grateful to Oliver Roberts {futaura} for ALL his work on IBrowse, and on his work on Warp Datatypes (which I am a registered keyfile holder of), & that also includes all the other developers who have assisted in the release of all the IB2.x versions that we have enjoyed so far. The 2.4 version of course being the BEST SO FAR.
Which now side-tracks & reminds me . . . . why is Oliver Roberts NOT be the keyfile authoriser/distributor?
If he is magnanimous enough to volunteer to do it, for a small percentage of the keyfile fee, if OK'd by Stefan, to distribute/sell the IB keyfiles, as he is surely up to the task of being able to do this. He supplies his own for his own products, and collects the fee for his own keyfile.
I cannot think of another person who I would put my FULL TRUST in than Oliver Roberts to do this at this moment.
He has a website all can access and knows how to collect the fees, this could all be done swiftly and quite simply, if Oliver & Stefan could agree between themslves that it is OK.
I feel sure we would all appreciate a direct reply about this from futaura (Oliver), 1. if it is possible/feasible, 2. Would Stefan be agreeable to it.
I would really like to hear from Stefan about what has held him up with sorting out a distributor for his copyrighted software, but having been disappointed so many times about not having a reply from him, I feel it is highly unlikely to happen.
He seems in some way to have distanced himself away from his own product, which he should be proud of, and of the users who are still waiting to thank him for it, but he never seems to be listening for the praise or wanting to acknowledge his users, which is a REAL SHAME.
I use Firefox on the PC, and liken it to IBrowse, or should I say that the other way around as I use IBrowse a lot more than I do Firefox, and avoid using IE wherever & whenever I can. I really like using IBrowse, and just recently worked out that adding extra user defined buttons on the navigation keyline gave me as additional 5 extra HOTKEYS/FASTLINKS for regularly used sites, which I have been able to add logos to so I know they relate to Amiga sites or other sites I want to lookup quickly & regularly.
There must be lots of other features still hidden in the program that I have not as yet tapped into, but there is so much that it does with the limitations of the CPU speed we have at our disposal, and considering that compared to the Windows environment IBrowse is head & shoulders better for what it is capabale of doing.
I will be here until there is no more IBrowse Amiga that works on the web. I am a dedicated IBrowse user, and PROUD to be so.
Now get on with IB keyfile distribution, and IB3.x development, as quickly as you can. Make us PROUD.
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TjLaZer wrote:
I bought iBrowse from ebay and the seller could not find the 2.1 keyfile, all I have is the older disks and a paper saying I can upgrade to 2.1, but the site is down. I am not trying to BS anyone, I am entitled to version 2.4 and I now have it. I sleep well at night thank you.
Then I humbly apologise.
When you said that you bought IB2.1 I had assumed you meant from IOspirit, hence my misunderstanding.
I sometimes jump to the wrong conclusion, as in this case.
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persia wrote:
Really truely you have to cut Amiga developers a fair amount of slack. A highly successful Amiga product will sell what, a few hundred copies?
Do you read the whole thread? They could sell many copies more, but it seems they do not want. About 30 keys only in my forum, I think there are many other users that would buy IBrowse 2.4, but it is no more avaible! :-(
Only maybe 2 hours or less for making some keys, that are 750€ per hour...
Lovely IBrowse Team, please contact me, thank you!
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This situation is unique and bizarre.
If someone was offering me handfuls of cash for a product in the state that it is in currently, then I don't understand the reasoning behind not accepting it.
Everyone is busy but if it takes over a year to get your business in order, then you obviously either don't want or possibly even need the cash.
A year to release Keyfiles is more than enough time, and a developer who is so blase about their own product would have no one to blame but themselves if potential customers resort to piracy to get full functionality.
Incidentaly, it seems strange that the customer - vendor relationship here has been reversed. There are customers practically begging to pay for a product and an owner who won't let them.
It may be their right to do with what they want with their own software but it kind of smacks of a power trip to be perpetually saying 'you can have it, but not just yet (and we're not going to tell you when either)'.
The main thing is to be appreciative and support the guys who are still actively working and supporting the products we want and are using, if they're not doing that, then maybe its time they (and we) moved on to other things.
One of the most interesting things here is that it was mentioned earlier that the iBrowse team 'may' only sell a few hundred copies of their software worldwide.
A conservative estimate could be about 150-200 users 'worldwide' who would pay the asking 50 euros. (It is old software, so maybe discounting it to 20 euros is realistic and may generate more sales).
That still means earning 3000-4000 euros for setting up a method of payment and distribution of keyfiles for software already in existence.
I don't know about you but that sounds feasible and possible, and not a pile of cash to be sneezed at.
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@melott
If you started with IBrowse 1.x, then you need 2 key files for v2.4 to work. IBrowse1Key & IBrowse2Key, first is the IB 1.x key, second is the IB 2.x key.
I know an IB beta tester & a lot of progress is being made on it, just hope we have another 2.x update before 3.0.
Other then that, the situation sucks.
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It is a shame, until now no feedback again...
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Nearly-Right wrote:
Which now side-tracks & reminds me . . . . why is Oliver Roberts NOT be the keyfile authoriser/distributor?
If he is magnanimous enough to volunteer to do it, for a small percentage of the keyfile fee, if OK'd by Stefan, to distribute/sell the IB keyfiles, as he is surely up to the task of being able to do this. He supplies his own for his own products, and collects the fee for his own keyfile.
I cannot think of another person who I would put my FULL TRUST in than Oliver Roberts to do this at this moment.
Nice of you to say so, but the conclusion we all came to was that as long as there are reputable distributors out there who want to sell IBrowse for us, we're happy to let them do that. Why? Well, one reason is time - we'd rather spend what time we have developing, and not having to deal with handling sales, sales tax issues, etc, etc. We don't see any problem paying a distributor to handle all this for us, and then we can concentrate on coding. There are of course many other things a distributor can offer, such as support, CD-ROM versions (yes, some users still want this), publicity, etc, etc, and all those aspects need to be considered. If the worst comes to the worst, I'd be happy to handle the purchases myself, but not while there are better offers out there. It's also important to support the remaining Amiga shops out there - there aren't many left.
Regarding the WarpDTs, registrations for those are relatively low volume, and once payment is received I do everything else manually - takes a bit extra time, but automating the whole process would take even longer to setup in the first place.
And going back to my F1GP-Ed days, yes I handled all that myself too, and that was a relatively time consuming task considering everything was done manually back then and involved sending out floppy disks. That was a high volume product compared to the WarpDTs, and I suspect IBrowse is even higher, so I know enough to realize that I'd rather pay somebody else to do that task for me now (I'm a lot older now :-D).
I'm not saying any more on this matter - all I can say is that I have been in discussions with a particular distributor for some time, and I can only apologize if e-mails from other distributors have been ignored (I know some did get caught in spam filters). From memory, I guess we received e-mails from about 5 potential distributors - I think we did reply to all of them and/or forwarded them to Stefan. However, I guess we're trying to keep all options open until a definite deal is done via Stefan, which is why those interested might not have received a simple yes/no answer. I know this matter should have been sorted out a lot sooner, but this is beyond my control.
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hm, sorry, but i write many emails that we can publish IBrowse.
Its really to many work to write a simple email like "mail coming in, we answer later..." ?
Now 1 (!) year IBrowse are not available for the users. What think you how long the Users wait before there search the Keyfile on other places?
Its really to many work to search a new publisher for IBrwose in 12 months?
Andreas
APC&TCP
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@Futaura
Rather then spending your precious time writing post in this topic you already could have registered the 30 copies for our forum and earned 1500 freaking Euros...
That would be, as apex already stated around 750 Euros per hour.
But I do get the impression that earning money isnt what you like to do with you project.
Anyway. I'll be looking for a cracker, or maybe I should write a keygen. Hmm, or I'll just google for 5 secs and use a pirated key. Seems to me that this is what you want the users to do.
Thanks mate!
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@fautura
You will say no more to this topic? But you will help me to get about 30 keys for my community, or not?
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amigarules2k wrote:
Hmm, or I'll just google for 5 secs and use a pirated key. Seems to me that this is what you want the users to do.
There is already a cracked key avaible? Can I buy this one? :-D :-D :-D
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I fully understand the inpatience here, but hey its the Amiga and its no longer the top dog so letts all take a bit of a breath here.
Its no good moaning about this at least there is some one out there who is doing something with IBrowse, yes, yes yes I know it takes time but at least it may well be worth it in the end.
So moaning about it just will not help.
AWeb 3.5.09 is better than nothing for now at least it's not time limited, this is now making me want to say some people want every thing straight away.
But it dont work that way does it.
Let's all hang on and have a bit of faith here.
Tell you what if you cant wait then do it your self if you can not then wait. its as simple as that.
Yes a keycrack is an idea or some sort of legal key from them. BUT is it realy the way to go?
Would we be cutting out own throats by doing that just because we want it NOW.
I some how do not think so.
And to be honest AWeb 3.5.09 is far better than nothing, its not as bad realy. At least it gets you on the Internet.
Lets all think about this...........
Mike.
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Oh come on! Stop this {bleep} like: "its the amiga, and amigans are used to waiting." Thats a really really layy excuse for being freaking slow and lazy.
I am sick and tired of waiting. If they dont care, fine, then we atleast know that we can invest our money in other things than ibrowse.
I mean look at OWB. Joerg is doing all the work nearly alone, but he is shwoing more progress than Ibrowse did in the last 4 years.
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swift240 wrote:
I fully understand the inpatience here, but hey its the Amiga and its no longer the top dog so letts all take a bit of a breath here.
Impatient? Sorry, but I waited now 1 year!!!!!!!!!! How long have I to wait because it is amiga? 2, 3 years???
Yes a keycrack is an idea or some sort of legal key from them. BUT is it realy the way to go?
Seems so, they are not interested in selling about 30 legal keyfiles to my amiga users. They are not interested to earn 1500 Euros. They are not answering emails.
Regarding the 3.0 development: When will it be ready, in 2016? The users want NOW a fully working 2.4 version and if the IBrowse team is not interested in selling legal keys, they may have to live with a cracked version or a keygen.
This really a unique situation! I think this is the first time in history that people are asking for a legal version BEFORE cracking it. :-D :-D :-D
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Huh?!
Wasn't IBrowse 2.4 cracked years ago?
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kreciu wrote:
Do you believe that anybody who us turning Amiga on and off now how to "compile" anything? Do you know how your body/organism respond for a virus infections? O, I forget you are not a doctor of medicine? :-o
I do...
The former, not the latter.
I guess you could know both of them if you did some research....
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Crack my a**
While I understand the frustration, I wouldn't do anything to interfere with any remaining software developers. When I receive my A4000 from Gary Danko, I'll be actively searching out the remaining AmigaOS 3.X developers and buying as many applications as I can find. If Ibrowse 2.4 is available it'll be one. If not, I'll see what else is available.
I wish I had the time and ability to pour through the Firefox source code but it's too large for me to tackle it.
I can't wait to to email on the Amiga again, I used to love the old email client I used. I'm trying to remember the name - YAM something?
-Nyle
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Is'nt Ibrowse made in Sweden?
Taxes here are brutal. If you are self employeed.
So you get 1500 euro, I think after social payment and taxes you are left with ~800 euro. Then you should split that up between developers. 800 euro might sound much but in business terms, its peanuts. But I can understand frustration of not being able to buy it.
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I still think copyright law needs to be changed. If you don't sell your software you have no right to complain when people start copying it or cracking it.
I'm sorry but thats just way too easy. Before I said I would like to see a 2-3 year period transfer time for this but I now think this period should be 6 months.
It's as easy as peas these days with the interwebs and all to sell the software so there just no excuses.
So basically; if IBrowse is being pirated; they called it in upon themselves. And don't give me the 'it's Amiga' crap because thats bollocks.
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There is no excuse about the iBrowse. I wanted to register 2.4 version but where? I want to give my money and they don't want them? How strange... :-D
Anyway, I think to generate new keyfiles are the simplest way not to wait till eternity, to get a registered copy of iBrowse.
It's really sad, about the iBrowse team, that now one whole year they did nothing to fix this problem about the registration. :-o
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The way I feel...
If there is a piece of Amiga software I want and I cant buy it, I'll use a crack, copy etc. Its not my problem its not available, nor am I one to coddle developers. If they want to make money, its their business to get the software out there to the customers otherwise people will find other means.
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Until NOW no feedback from fautura, no feedback from anyone in the IBrowse team!!! :angry: :evil: :madashell:
It really seems that they are not able or interested to make this deal with 30 keys for germany with me...
This is really nice, ignoring the community until it is dead... starting complaining if a keygen will be avaible.
I really do not understand you!!!
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@fautura
YES, I am a registered user of your datatypes and also of IBrowse 2.4! But regarding IB2.4, there are so many users that never had the chance to buy it... (it was avaible onyl 4 month!!!)
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don't know if you got it but Oliver is NOT the owner of IBrowse.
Is not up to him to decide anything.
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@a-pex
Calm down. No shouting please, we all understand your frustrations and share them. But your behaviour and statements are counter productive.
@Framiga
Okay, I don´t know if you´re right. But when you state who´s not the owner, perhaps you can state who is?
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a-pex wrote:
@fautura
YES, I am a registered user of your datatypes and also of IBrowse 2.4! But regarding IB2.4, there are so many users that never had the chance to buy it... (it was avaible onyl 4 month!!!)
From a purely personal point of view, it amazes me that so many new IBrowse users have sprung up since IOSPIRIT stopped supporting the Amiga, given that Amiga is a supposedly dead platform with a shrinking userbase. I wonder how many of these 30 new users never used IBrowse before 2.4? I remember huge threads about 2.4 taking so long, and it was well publicised that 2.4 would be a free upgrade to those who bought 2.3 then (and therefore 2.2, 2.1 or 2.0), which as I've said before means that 2.4 keyfiles have effectively been on sale for 10 years (minus the HiSoft->IOSPIRIT transition period), so not only 4 months strictly speaking.
Just makes me wonder really. And just so that I'm clear, these thoughts have absolutely no effect on the current situation - I am fully in agreement that it needs to be sorted out asap, and for that we need Stefan.
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Well I do think that the unavailability of iBrowse 2.4 has made more people want it. Thats normal. I had a chance to buy it during those infamous ~4 months but wanted to wait as I did not really have $50+ USD just laying around. I thought that price was a little steep. I did end up getting a boxed original copy of iBrowse 2.1 off ebay though.
Overall I think 2.4 is a solid product and an excellent upgrade. I do hope they start to sell/support it again.
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PulsatingQuasar wrote:
I still think copyright law needs to be changed. If you don't sell your software you have no right to complain when people start copying it or cracking it.
I'm sure there are many companies out there with proprietary software they've paid to have designed that disagree with you.
By this mode of thought I should have access to most of ILM's software to do video compositing in my home... or run a WOW server for $$$.
It's frustrating - but that statement comes from inconvenience.
I don't own Ibrowse, I'd like to.... but if it's not been turned over to the public domain, or the author hasn't said 'copy away! it's free!', I won't touch it.
That's me, but I don't expect many others to follow that route.
That being said - I do find it incredible that someone wanting that quantity can't even get a yes/no answer on the subject... honestly that's just poor buisness.
And lets face it... it's NOT a crapload of effort for him to give them x amount of money and y amount of email addresses and have 30 emails sent back out......
I find that just boggling.
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by futaura on 2008/4/13 12:07:15
Just makes me wonder really. And just so that I'm clear, these thoughts have absolutely no effect on the current situation - I am fully in agreement that it needs to be sorted out asap, and for that we need Stefan.
I just wonder then, seeing that you are one of the developers, and you cannot manage to contact Stefan to resolve this problem, how long will it take for this KEYFILE/DISTRIBUTOR problem to be resolved, nevermind the dreadfully slow release of IB3.x.
There is no way for a normal IB user to contact Stefan as he does not seem to want to take e-mails from his users' questions, as their is no e-mail address publicly available for him to be asked these questions.
I, for one, am grateful to you Oliver for taking the stance where you keep us as informed as you feel you can, and it is all credit to you, it is just a pity you do not have more control over the program release/distribution at this point, and are unfortunately unable to get Stefan to do what needs to be done, for us all.
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I think there are many people like me...
left amiga years ago (slow A2000, A1200).... came back last year... now i own A4k 060 and A2k 060 + gfx
From a purely personal point of view, it amazes me that so many new IBrowse users have sprung up since IOSPIRIT stopped supporting the Amiga, given that Amiga is a supposedly dead platform with a shrinking userbase. I wonder how many of these 30 new users never used IBrowse before 2.4? I remember huge threads about 2.4 taking so long, and it was well publicised that 2.4 would be a free upgrade to those who bought 2.3 then (and therefore 2.2, 2.1 or 2.0), which as I've said before means that 2.4 keyfiles have effectively been on sale for 10 years (minus the HiSoft->IOSPIRIT transition period), so not only 4 months strictly speaking.
Just makes me wonder really. And just so that I'm clear, these thoughts have absolutely no effect on the current situation - I am fully in agreement that it needs to be sorted out asap, and for that we need Stefan.
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@all
Anyone shouting at IBrowse (or other) developers should read THIS (http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic_id=25919&forum=2&start=20&viewmode=flat&order=0#437600) , especially point 7 and 8.
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If we filter through all the posts there is a very clear question.
"Is IBrowse still a comercial enterprise?"
It just looks like poor planning from this side of the fence if the owner of the business left and made himself unavailable for whatever reasons.
Perhaps IBrowse developers SHOULD consider if their time and knowledge is better spent on other projects.
regards
Bandis
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This is how I see it. I realize the situation, I read the thread on Amigaworld.net. I guess Stephen is not avail. And I see that iBrowse is still being developed further. Then IMHO what they should do is offer a keyfile for iBrowse 2.4 to the Amiga Community (or at a minimum to people that had previous versions--like myself!) That way they can take their time to sort all this out, get a distributor, locate Stephen, etc... I know stuff happens and in this small market it will not be a fast process. But this way there is no cracking going on, and no spreading of pirate keyfiles!!!
Just my two cents really!
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Its a ludicrous situation: purchasers are saying:"We wish to buy your product." The seller replies:"I won't sell it to you because I refuse to spend the hour of my time that would be required for me to sell it to you". Only Amiga makes it possible.
Getting to the original question, no we shouldn't crack it, because that would be stealing, its Stefan's product. Will it be cracked? Of course.
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@ AmiKit & thread
I'm going to quote Dave Fisher's AW post directly.
7. Work continues on IBrowse mainly with Oliver atm. If his motivation drops off due to all this crap, chances are thats the end of IBrowse simply as Stefan hardly works on it anymore anyway.
8. If Stefan doesn't reply to e-mails, or read the forums, or care if IB is currently available for sale or not, shouting at Oliver and I, and/or threatening to crack the software is hardly going to help matters.
Emphasis added.
User frustration is inevitable and understandable, but support, not threats, is better in the long run. I already suggested a way for developers to keep users interested and engaged, so it'd be nice if users might return the courtesy by not trying to hasten the demise of a program so they can get it for free. :roll:
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Yep, Amiga doesn't have a modern language to program in, have only a few hundred users and lacks operating system support for many features. It would be real easy for Oliver to pack up his Amiga and go program in the PC or Mac world. Heck with the packages out there he could easily write for both.
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User frustration is inevitable and understandable, but support, not threats, is better in the long run. I already suggested a way for developers to keep users interested and engaged, so it'd be nice if users might return the courtesy by not trying to hasten the demise of a program so they can get it for free. :roll:
What better support can a developer, who's basically not doing it for the money, get then a user saying :"yes I like your product, I think you've done such a good job, so much so that I WANT to pay you MONEY for it"...
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@ iBrowse guys
I can't shed any light on the US situation, but if it helps I can tell you my story. I began looking for a NIC when I saw the iBrowse 2.4 announcement and didn't obtain one until a few months later (got outbid a few times.) I eventually got a hydra card, but also had to shop for a tranciver. I got one a few weeks after that. I then went to buy iBrowse but the site had been closed for only about a week. If you search this web site you may even be able to find a bitter rant from me about the situation. I was out about $100 for the hardware. I then sold the pair at a slight loss on eBay, any perhaps that person is now looking to buy iBrowse...
@A-Pex
I looked at your website a1k.org
It's pretty slick. It's also very clear that your users are not anything like the typical Amiga users here. I see your users are actively hacking together new hardware and banning together to complete grassroots projects. None of that happens anywhere else. Your fustration stems from the fact that you really are not a normal type of Amiga user. A "normal" Amiga user is a sad and slow moving animal that would rather lament for years and years about the state of things. A normal Amiga user sees no problem with waiting 3 or 4 _YEARS_for a web site to begin selling new licenses for a dead product.
That's actually why I stick around here. It's like watching a train wreck every day. I can't turn away.
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I looked at your website a1k.org
It's pretty slick. It's also very clear that your users are not anything like the typical Amiga users here. I see your users are actively hacking together new hardware and banning together to complete grassroots projects. None of that happens anywhere else.
Thank you! Our community was founden at the end of 2004 with the phoenix project. I was able to bring the nice side of amiga back to many users, users that have no frusted storys in the past (AInc/MOS/OS4 and other flamewars). ;-)
A "normal" Amiga user is a sad and slow moving animal that would rather lament for years and years about the state of things.
Then we are really no normal amiga users, but we are many! :-)
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futaura wrote:
given that Amiga is a supposedly dead platform with a shrinking userbase.
Old frustrated users go, new users are coming. Take a look on our community, most of this users are returners...
I wonder how many of these 30 new users never used IBrowse before 2.4?
I do not know your perspective about the community, but there are still so many people that come back, starting again their hobby because today they have the money and so on. You have just to found this people doing community work and put them in one forum and then you will have more than 30 users with need to get a keyfile.
I am fully in agreement that it needs to be sorted out asap, and for that we need Stefan.
Ok, Stefan has no time to sort out a distribution. But can you contact him and maybe make the keyfile work for him? I only want to buy some keys. I will send you a list with names and emails and the money using paypal?
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@TheMagicM
If there is a piece of Amiga software I want and I cant buy it, I'll use a crack, copy etc.
Is that the official word from AO moderation on this subject?
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@TheMagicM
@TheMagicM
If there is a piece of Amiga software I want and I cant buy it, I'll use a crack, copy etc.
Is that the official word from AO moderation on this subject?
As Weirdami speaks, so speaks my nation.
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@ stefcep2
Granted, the situation with IBrowse is bad, very bad, but not catastrophic. There's a demo available and there are other browsers (http://aweb.sunsite.dk) to use in the meantime.
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persia wrote:
Yep, Amiga doesn't have a modern language to program in, have only a few hundred users and lacks operating system support for many features. It would be real easy for Oliver to pack up his Amiga and go program in the PC or Mac world. Heck with the packages out there he could easily write for both.
:-?
Most OSes see all major development happen in C & C++, we have both of those. What particular language are you referring to?
Hans
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Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???
NO!
Hi futaura,
About 4 weeks ago I bought Hollywood 3, Hollywood Designer 2 and Mindspace 1. (Fluke, I know, but not kidding.)
Next week I was going to buy IBrowse 2.4 (seems contrieved, but I'm _not_ kidding). Not that I'm not happy with AWeb3.5.08 (I think it's quite good and very stable), but I want to see a PPC version 3.0 made for AOS4.0; also, heard good things. So I need a key file as well, where do I send the $cash$?
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Atheist wrote:
Next week I was going to buy IBrowse 2.4 (seems contrieved, but I'm _not_ kidding). Not that I'm not happy with AWeb3.5.08 (I think it's quite good and very stable), but I want to see a PPC version 3.0 made for AOS4.0; also, heard good things. So I need a key file as well, where do I send the $cash$?
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
I offered to send 1500 Euros without feedback and you hope for feedback for only 1 key? :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
Until now no news. :evil: This makes me sooo angry, I think I will stop trying to get this keys.
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Objective-C, Ruby, Python. Not to mention all the frameworks that come with XCode tools. On a Mac I can build a web browser in half an hour, a screensaver with a rotating live image that responds to room volume? 10 Minutes. View and edit pictures? A simple app done in half an hour.
Programming for the Amiga is downright painful, there are few objects to use with C++ and they don't help with the hard tasks, you have to write all the code yourself. And then it doesn't work because it doesn't have memory protect, desn't handle interupts right or just breaks for some unknown reason. AmigaDos is old, it made a number of choices that are just wrong.
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It's not about money... it about idea... Amiga make this possible... :P.
Today, we have so many ways to send a money to someone without leaving a house... this is "funny" when we just can't buy some programs.
For me it is not true that a Amiga user don't want to buy software, there is number of people who want to program for this "system".
Today STUPID game cost you about $50 and what... PEOPLE BUY this.
Hollywood 3 is for around $100 this is GOOD PRICE.
I think that people who own Amiga TODAY realize that there are ONLY them and nobody "outside" who can help. So WE need to create this community. Some people will write software, some make a hardware and some will BUY this stuff.
And please don't tell me that this is hobby... because of this there is no RESPONSIBILITY for the product... (not to full extend and not in all cases ;) )
My opinion.
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persia wrote:
Objective-C, Ruby, Python. Not to mention all the frameworks that come with XCode tools. I can build a web browser in half an hour, a screensaver with a rotating live image that responds to room volume? 10 Minutes. View and edit pictures? A simple app done in half an hour.
Objective-C is only a few years younger than C++ (1986 instead of 1983) so I hardly see it as a more modern language. GCC will happily compile Objective-C for you; we're just missing a working copy of the runtime library. At least on OS4, that is. I just tried compiling an Objective-C program on OS4, and, after I downloaded the header files, it failed on linking. Libobjc is missing __objc_class_name_NSObject (or something like that). With a little work, Objective-C could be an option.
Amiga OS4 also has both Ruby and Python.
Programming for the Amiga is downright painful, there are few objects to use with C++ and they don't help with the hard tasks, you have to write all the code yourself. And then it doesn't work because it doesn't have memory protect, desn't handle interupts right or just breaks for some unknown reason. AmigaDos is old, it made a number of choices that are just wrong.
This is true. Software libraries providing common functionality is hard to find for the Amiga. BitByBitSoftware was working on a RAD suite that would make GUI development easy, but, unfortunately it's now on hold. The AVD template is pretty useful for setting up a typical application. It gives you a basic app in a matter of minutes.
There's also Emperor, which I haven't tried in a while. It did look useful though.
There were a few C++ class collections, but AFAIK, they were never fully developed.
Hans
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persia wrote:
Programming for the Amiga is downright painful, there are few objects to use with C++ and they don't help with the hard tasks, you have to write all the code yourself.
Well those obejcts did not appear over night by magic, they were programmed by others (they had to do it all by themself)
Just sticking together existing librarys and system functions isn't what usually goes by the name of programming.
Take Photoshop for example: If it wouldn't come with a whole bunch of predefined filters (created by the work of others) it would only be half as usefull thought it would still be the same program.
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An analogy to programming with the Amiga versus the Mac is a cookbook that begins a cake recipe with "start with pond scum and lightning and evolve a chicken" in the Amiga version whilst the Mac version reads "take two eggs." I write code when I need it, Objective C mainly, Ruby and Python as I learn them. Any when I write a routine it's there in the list for me to use it.
I program in my spare time, in an evenings' work I have something to show for it. The apps are visually stunning. Is it programming?, well all programming that's not 1s and zeros is an abstraction...
:rtfm:
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How long has the iBrowse team been unavailable for comment. Seems odd that they would not want to make any residual income.
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persia wrote:
An analogy to programming with the Amiga versus the Mac is a cookbook that begins a cake recipe with "start with pond scum and lightning and evolve a chicken" in the Amiga version whilst the Mac version reads "take two eggs." I write code when I need it, Objective C mainly, Ruby and Python as I learn them. Any when I write a routine it's there in the list for me to use it.
That's a bit extreme don't you think? Starting with pond scum is more akin to having to write your own drivers. We have drivers; we have libraries for many tasks; what's missing are the RAD tools and middleware. Out of interest, have you ever tried Emperor? Or how about MUI builder? They're nowhere near as advanced as what's available for the Mac, but they're certainly no pond scum.
I've already told you that OS4 has Ruby and Python. Objective-C is just missing a working runtime library, which probably wouldn't take too much effort to fix. There's more coming too. On AROS, Rob Norris is working on Traveller, and IIRC, he's planning on turning the Webkit portion into a shared library. If he does, creating your own web-browser will become much easier.
I program in my spare time, in an evenings' work I have something to show for it. The apps are visually stunning. Is it programming?, well all programming that's not 1s and zeros is an abstraction...
There's nothing wrong with using RAD tools. However, instead of ranting about how awful coding for the Amiga is, why not help improve the situation? Someone has to write the middleware, foundation classes and RAD tools. Otherwise I guess that Amiga coding just isn't for you.
Hans
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weirdami & boot wb:
Is that the official word from AO moderation on this subject?
Unless english is your second language and you didnt comprehend what I typed, my post is very clear as to whom I am speaking for. I'm sure if you re-read it a second or possibly fifth time it will become more evident to you.
-Alex
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Who cares. If developers don't take money to licence someone, give it a rest. It's their decision. Cracking it is just demotivating any developer. Relax people, why the sudden need for a full fledged browser on the Amiga platform? Just use Firefox for now. I grew up with terminal emulation software on the Amiga, never touched any webbrowser until WinUAE came around.
-
Last time I looked Firefox was not yet ported. Running it through PC-Task or similar would be very slow. Maybe you meant AWeb?
>And then it doesn't work because it doesn't have memory protect, desn't handle interupts right or just breaks for some unknown reason. AmigaDos is old
If it's coded correctly it won't need memory protection, the task will not be trying to write to memory it hasn't allocated. As for "d- esn't handle inter[r]upts right", they work fine, sounds like you are a lamer. AmigaDOS is the same age as Windows (c. 1985). I don't see any need for "toy languages" like Ruby and Python.
>There's also Emperor, which I haven't tried in a while. It did look useful though.
Don't forget ReActor...
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Minuous wrote:
>There's also Emperor, which I haven't tried in a while. It did look useful though.
Don't forget ReActor...
Ah, yes. It's a real shame that ReActor wasn't developed further.
Hans
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a-pex wrote:
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
I offered to send 1500 Euros without feedback and you hope for feedback for only 1 key? :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
Heh. Well, I was just chiming in that there are others as well that want it. It's just coincidental that I was trying to acquire it at the same time as the news broke that it isn't readily available.
Until now no news. :evil: This makes me sooo angry, I think I will stop trying to get this keys.
I do hope (please) futaura is able to contact Stephan, as all of these people will spend their money on something else and there are PLENTY of other things they could buy, things not even Amiga related, like 25 beer at the local pub.
I'm willing to wait, no, actually I'll buy some other AOS4.0 SW, and will be buying IBrowse later on in that case. A few months from now.
But you have till next Friday for my purchase this time around.
Amiga has many problems and weird ones as well, and this is among the weirdest.
-
Krusher wrote:
Who cares. If developers don't take money to licence someone, give it a rest. It's their decision. Cracking it is just demotivating any developer. Relax people, why the sudden need for a full fledged browser on the Amiga platform? Just use Firefox for now. I grew up with terminal emulation software on the Amiga, never touched any webbrowser until WinUAE came around.
You assume that everyone has the same browsing needs t(or lack thereof) as you.
Even so, the real question of cracking is moot. Many (most?) Amiga enthusiasts may not even be on these forums and therefore will find iBrowse by navigating to the homepage for iBrowse, read the "latest update" from Jan '07 and rightly assume the product is abandoned. Leaving a page up, posting "lastest news" that is over a year old and then never coming back is the norm for abandoned Amiga projects. In another year or two the page will dissapear alltogether.
-
The way it should go...
On sunday I went to the homepage of DVPlayer (http://dvplayer.amigarevolution.com/) for AOS4. I ordered my keyfile, paid with credit card and on monday evening I got my keyfile!
Simple and easy, a very good example!
-
i'm voting "yeah go ahead!" i'd like to see all those amiga crackers brake out the good stuff and do moana while you're at it... :idea: :idea: :idea:
have they finished yet. :roll:
-
I agree, let's get Moana working and put to work those old PPC Macs...
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persia wrote:
I agree, let's get Moana working and put to work those old PPC Macs...
I detest pirating of software and those that do it, but I have to admit that given the current state of Amiga Inc. and Hyperion, I am all for turning all the pirates loose on getting Moana to work on every PPC Mac ever produced.
It would be the greatest thing to happen to the Amiga community since the invention of the Video Toaster!
It might even bring back a few of the Amiga developers and coders that have left us long ago.
-
No news until yet...
-
3 days later and a full weekend without any feedback again.
:madashell: :madashell: :madashell: :madashell: :madashell:
-
a-pex wrote:
3 days later and a full weekend without any feedback again.
:madashell: :madashell: :madashell: :madashell: :madashell:
Be patient... the IB team 'IS' reading this thread.
I posted earlier in this thread about my problem of owning
a legal copy of IB 2.3 and not being able to get my key to
work.
I was supprised and happy to receive an EMail from one of
the IB team interested in solving my problem. :-D
So I think they should be cut a little slack, they obviously
care, else I wouldn't have receive the EMail help.
Mel
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Stop your bloody moaning, AWeb 3.5.09 and IBrowse 2.4 is better than nothing.
So its a wait, so what.
Take no notice IBrowse team your doing what you can where no one else is.
I say this, if those who moan about this, then why don't they do better?
I for one cant, but at least the IBrowse team are trying slow yes but they are sticking with it.
So come on slag me off for typing this lot.
Here are my options:-
1:- Athlon 64bit dual core and Firefox 2.0.0.14
2:- Amikit and AWeb 3.5.09 and IBrowse 2.4
3:- Amiga 1200 expanded Aweb 3.5.09 and IBrowse 2.4.
Can I get onto the Internet with this lot? Yes I can.
Can I access the sites I want with this lot? Yes I can.
Do I moan? no I don't
I am grateful for what I have, ANY of this lot gets me onto the Internet.
Do I get the downloads I want? yes I do.
My best site is Aminet and Amiga.org do I get them? yes I do.
Mike.
:pissed: :pissed:
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swift240 wrote:
Stop your bloody moaning, AWeb 3.5.09 and IBrowse 2.4 is better than nothing.
How can use a User IBrowse without a key?
-
For certain things IBrowse is ok for 30 minutes.
Mike.
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swift240 wrote:
For certain things IBrowse is ok for 30 minutes.
Mike.
for some days/weeks ok. but for more as 1 year?
-
AndreasM wrote:
swift240 wrote:
Stop your bloody moaning, AWeb 3.5.09 and IBrowse 2.4 is better than nothing.
How can use a User IBrowse without a key?
The IB Demo version works, but I think it only allows an
hour on line at a time (not real sure about time).
Mel
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swift240 wrote:
Take no notice IBrowse team your doing what you can where no one else is.
Really, take a look on http://www.reg.net/, I bought some days ago my DV-Player key. Why is this not possible for IBrowse?
I say this, if those who moan about this, then why don't they do better?
I can not program, but I am a good marketing guy, I offered my help and 1500€, what can I do more???
But you are maybe right, I will STOP!!! I have my original key since many, many years, but I tried to get some keys for the users in my forum.
I tried to help the users and I got many flames and bad emails, so I will stop. :crazy:
-
This thread reminds me again why I never asked any money for my software.
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a-pex wrote:
swift240 wrote:
Take no notice IBrowse team your doing what you can where no one else is.
Really, take a look on http://www.reg.net/, I bought some days ago my DV-Player key. Why is this not possible for IBrowse?
I say this, if those who moan about this, then why don't they do better?
I can not program, but I am a good marketing guy, I offered my help and 1500€, what can I do more???
But you are maybe right, I will STOP!!! I have my original key since many, many years, but I tried to get some keys for the users in my forum.
I tried to help the users and I got many flames and bad emails, so I will stop. :crazy:
You have to admit it's kind of funny that your group is able to remake a run of brand new Amiga motherboards, then a run of 68030 accelerators for the motherboards, then an all new form factor ethernet card for the new motherboard and as soon as the run is finished the main application you have for the hardware is removed from the market!
You should get together and make a run of PPC boards for your Amiga 1000s and then watch as OS 4.0 gets yanked from the market a few weeks before they ship!
-
Still no news for the community...
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Piru wrote:
This thread reminds me again why I never asked any money for my software.
Gday Piru!
Piru is an interesting man, knows alot about amiga, Does he have a BLOG or homepage detailing the work he does for amiga (morphos). Im sure others would be interested tooo!
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Since the devs have NO clear intention of releasing it, then...
"Let the cracking begin... NOW" :-)
All for the benefit of this so-called ameega community!
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0amigan0 wrote:
Since the devs have NO clear intention of releasing it, then...
Except that in this very thread, an IBrowse developer stated that development continues, and that they do have the intention of clearing up this problem.
"Let the cracking begin... NOW"
Yes, because that would motivate them, obviously*.
(*that was sarcasm, incase your sarcasm detector is faulty).
-
I have IBrowse 1.0, bought it from Software Hut when it came out. I wasn't around the Amiga scene when 2.0 came out unfortunately. I only got back into it last year.
I really HATE AWeb. It's too clunky and feels clumsy.
I use the IBrowse 2.4 DEMO and I hope I can buy a keyfile some time soon.
-
We would be happy to distribute/sell IBrowse through our webstores and provide the aftersales support.
-
not only you :)
-
Nearly 1 year later and it is still not possible to buy IBrowse 2.4. :( What a shame, there were offers enought...
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amigakit wrote:
We would be happy to distribute/sell IBrowse through our webstores and provide the aftersales support.
Heh.
And here I was going to ask about why no one has gone to you yet, about distribution, as you're pretty much the sole, reputable Amiga dealer left other than Discreet. (NOTE - I'm not bashing any other dealer that's still out there. I'm just making a note that of them all, those two are the ones you see on a regular basis on the sites. Jen's also falls in this category, but he's hardware, not software).
I just wanted to read through all the posts, before I made mine. :-P :lol:
-
Thank you :-)
Our offer still stands, we would also be willing to sponsor future development of this Classic Amiga browser.
-
mathew to the rescue GREAT :-D
we are certainly in desperate need for this browser to updated,and your just the man to do it :-)
-
How's anything going to get done unless its cracked and/or allowed to be continually developed? And why is iBrowse NOT considered and treated as abandonware at this point?!?
-
After all this time Still no iBrowse to buy i know they say they are working on a distributor to sell there software, but they have had a long time to sort it out (even with no time to do anything you can still manage at least 1 email per week) even also after Amigakit has offer to distributor and help fund the software. I normally would keep my mouth shut, but since i am planing to put my A4000 on the web i would really like a chance to at least buy something i can use everyday. (yes i know the demo version is out there but i dont want to be hampered by any restrictions) And No I didnt get a chance to buy this before since i came back into the scene not to long ago.
Just wish they gave some people the chance to buy their product or atleast comment on WHEN it can be available to purchase!
They maybe working on 3.0 but i would rather but 2.4 now and then upgrade if/when they release 3.0.
BUT if i can't do any of the above then i will look to piracy since to me they seem like they have abandon us all with their promise of a chance to buy the software.
-
AmigaKit,
Have you ontacted them and offered to support and distribute the product?
-
Does owning iBrowse 1.0 entitle/provide unlocking 2.4?
-
No, but I think you could get a discount.
-
It really is a shame that Ibrowse 2.4 is not currently available. I was able to get a copy when it was first released and think it's the best 68k browser available for the Amiga. If the Ibrowse team is reading this thread then why not let Amigakit distribute the product? I would continue to support any future versions of Ibrowse (68k versions since I do not have Amiga 4.x hardware right now).
Just my two cents:
In addition, I wish CSS was available for any 68k browser. I tried OWB through Winuae but it needs work, and Merlin is just not up to the task. This is where I wish my programming skills could help contribute to a CSS capable 68k web browser. Singular for the Commodore 64 seems to be a great CSS browser... can't we do something for the Amiga?
-
NETSURF would be css capable browser for 68k amigas.
1. It works just fine with 50% less cpu power than 060
2. Porting would be easy task, makers of OS4 version has said multiple times that they had made OS4 version so that OS3.9/3.5 version should be easy to port. Unsupported OS4 things could simply comment out from source etc.
-
RMK305 wrote:
AmigaKit,
Have you ontacted them and offered to support and distribute the product?
For Octamed have we a publishing contract...
-
...
This is where I wish my programming skills could help contribute to a CSS capable 68k web browser.
@Miked:
You can use your skills to add CSS support to AWeb, which is open source.
-
I am fairly certain that Stefan posted on Amigaworld.net(?) about an OS 4 thread in the past month, so I think it can be said he's still an Amiga developer. i thought about hijacking the thread and asking about an Ibrowse key, but eventually thought better of it..
-
How about HighWire, Atari CSS capable browser?
http://highwire.atari-users.net/
-
__artur wrote:
How about HighWire, Atari CSS capable browser?
http://highwire.atari-users.net/
They could add insult to injury and show a screen shot of HighWire browsing Amiga.org...
-
from Matt_H:
It's a weird dynamic we have in the Amiga market. We have a long history of vaporware announcments, culminating, I think, with Amiga, Inc.'s Executetive Updates in the 2000-2001 period. Eventually even they said that they wouldn't announce anything until it was ready to ship. They've been essentially silent ever since (apart from additional vapor announcements), and I think that others, consciously or not, don't want to be perceived as another Amiga, Inc. (or similar non-delivering entity).
The pendulum's gone too far in the opposite direction, though. We've gone from vapor to nothing and I think that's hurting the "market" just as badly. With no news, it looks like there's no activity and users are ready to throw in the towel, whether that be leaving the platform (as seems to have happened with a lot of Pegasos/MOS users), or declaring a product dead and asking for keyfiles. If I may suggest, no perceptible news leads to no perceptible user interest leads to no developer interest, maybe?
But there is interest, as the occasional, yet lively, IBrowse (and MorphOS2, etc.) threads show.
I think everyone is (or should be) aware that Amiga development isn't sustainable as a primary business and that coding is done on one's own time and therefore takes longer. No problem. I was too harsh with my comments on IBrowse development being slow. Amiga users are patient. They wait. But if it looks like there's nothing to be waiting for, then that's the problem.
Not asking for release dates. Maybe just a semi-annual check-in. What's been worked on, what's still to be done, a screengrab or two (WinUAE is great with these sorts of updates). That's all. And I'm not just talking about IBrowse. Visible activity on any product would help sustain the market (maybe even expand it if some hardware turns up), benefiting users and developers alike.
EDIT: Bottom line: Take pride in your products and let people know they exist!
Exactly! Best post I've seen on this in awhile. :hat:
-
EyeAm wrote:
from Matt_H:
It's a weird dynamic we have in the Amiga market. We have a long history of vaporware announcments, culminating, I think, with Amiga, Inc.'s Executetive Updates in the 2000-2001 period. Eventually even they said that they wouldn't announce anything until it was ready to ship. They've been essentially silent ever since (apart from additional vapor announcements), and I think that others, consciously or not, don't want to be perceived as another Amiga, Inc. (or similar non-delivering entity).
The pendulum's gone too far in the opposite direction, though. We've gone from vapor to nothing and I think that's hurting the "market" just as badly. With no news, it looks like there's no activity and users are ready to throw in the towel, whether that be leaving the platform (as seems to have happened with a lot of Pegasos/MOS users), or declaring a product dead and asking for keyfiles. If I may suggest, no perceptible news leads to no perceptible user interest leads to no developer interest, maybe?
But there is interest, as the occasional, yet lively, IBrowse (and MorphOS2, etc.) threads show.
I think everyone is (or should be) aware that Amiga development isn't sustainable as a primary business and that coding is done on one's own time and therefore takes longer. No problem. I was too harsh with my comments on IBrowse development being slow. Amiga users are patient. They wait. But if it looks like there's nothing to be waiting for, then that's the problem.
Not asking for release dates. Maybe just a semi-annual check-in. What's been worked on, what's still to be done, a screengrab or two (WinUAE is great with these sorts of updates). That's all. And I'm not just talking about IBrowse. Visible activity on any product would help sustain the market (maybe even expand it if some hardware turns up), benefiting users and developers alike.
EDIT: Bottom line: Take pride in your products and let people know they exist!
Exactly! Best post I've seen on this in awhile. :hat:
I agree totally (well not totally, MorphOS users ARE part of the Amiga community, not people who have left it), very well said Matt. A simple mention that work is continuing would be nice every 3 to 4 months, a detailed list of what is being worked on and what has been completed would be even better. The lack of effort to set up sales of 2.4 keyfiles after tons of requests and offers to help by AmigaKit and others is just not to be understood by the rest of the Amiga community.
-
But we have no news regarding the actual situation?
Nice to have Google, for all who need a key and can not buy it. :crazy:
-
8 days, 1 month & 2 years later!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Empty promises, no changes, no updates...
Oh, something has changed, I closed my order for over 30 copies...
Can not found a word for this! :(
-
No, but now there are other free browsers, almost so good as IBrowse, although not all for 68k, that is is pity.
-
The browsers for MOS and AOS4 are massivley better and more advanced the Ibrowse.
But as you said for 68k not much choice, though i think Aweb is still being wroked on
-
Whilst I don't condone cracking IBrowse there really is no reason in this time of free domain registration and advertising free website hosting and free paypal e-commerce HTML code for buttons.
1. Register a domain
2. Write a simple website.
3. Stick PayPal buy it now buttons on site
4. When you receive payment reply to purchasers email with a working key
1-3 would take half a day at most and 30 minutes if you don't care how smart your website looks. It's not rocket science, and it's a bit dumb not to do it. Costs you nothing more than 3.7% PayPal commission too, so the only reason is nobody bothered to do this.
Why turn away customers wanting a simple key to activate demo software when you can automate 90% of it and have it out there in the world of commerce for ZERO cost?
-
Whilst I don't condone cracking IBrowse there really is no reason in this time of free domain registration and advertising free website hosting and free paypal e-commerce HTML code for buttons.
1. Register a domain
2. Write a simple website.
3. Stick PayPal buy it now buttons on site
4. When you receive payment reply to purchasers email with a working key
1-3 would take half a day at most and 30 minutes if you don't care how smart your website looks. It's not rocket science, and it's a bit dumb not to do it. Costs you nothing more than 3.7% PayPal commission too, so the only reason is nobody bothered to do this.
Why turn away customers wanting a simple key to activate demo software when you can automate 90% of it and have it out there in the world of commerce for ZERO cost?
Ahem, yes,.
-
Ahem, yes, *cough* (http://www.google.co.uk/webhp?hl=en&tab=iw#sclient=psy&hl=en&site=webhp&source=hp&q=Ibrowse2key&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=&pbx=1&fp=6b0a14789c3fa015).
This is against posting guidlines and TOS I think
-
I dont browse the web using my Amiga for anywhere close to 30 minutes because web browsing using iBrowse sucks anyway. Why bother when my Amiga 4000 is sitting next to my iMac 21.5" :P
With regards to the 30 days limit, screw them, i just have my clock set to like 1979 or something.
-
This is against posting guidlines and TOS I think
Why? iBrowse is a dead software...
-
Oh noes. Quick. someone posted a link to a google search. Bring in the Amiga Police!
-
Oh, something has changed, I closed my order for over 30 copies...
I realize it's way too late, but you could take what would be spent on those 30 copies and offer a "bounty" on what you are looking for feature-wise....
Be it, "add CSS to AWeb" or ????
Just a thought...
desiv
-
I would pay a few moon rocks for an even slightly enhanced 68K browser. Or re-release...
-
I realize it's way too late, but you could take what would be spent on those 30 copies and offer a "bounty" on what you are looking for feature-wise....
First time I made this offer was before I started this thread over 2 years ago!
At this time it was not too late and many members from the a1k forum really want to have a legal version... I never got feedback and now, most of them are no more interested, thank you to google!
I will never understand the iBrowse team, they could still sell this product, but because of their stupidness, they just lost many thousand of euros... some people still have to much money. :)
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Ibrowse no longer works, paid for my version, gave up on it a long long time ago
Errr, no.
Use the time limited version or the demo for now, continue to be patient and continue trying to contact the developers.
Otherwise, chances are, there will be no Ibrowse v3.
Why kill off development of the best Amiga Browser, and the only native one still in development?
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2 years later! Many people are now using a key that was a long time available via Google search (is no more available)... No news about a legal registration, no news about a version 3 release.
I will never understand it!
-
2 years later! Many people are now using a key that was a long time available via Google search (is no more available)... No news about a legal registration, no news about a version 3 release.
I will never understand it!
Yes it looks like it is a dead end. I been reading the thread, it is a shame there is no version 3 release.
-
I will never understand it!
I know this will be unpopular, but what don't you understand? In fact, I think it is perfectly clear why they dropped the Amiga and why new developers are not writing new software for the Amiga. There is no money in it!
Writing a good piece of software is no small task and and my time is pretty valuable (I like to eat, my kids too!). So when you think about writing a browser for the Amiga with modern features, I just don't see how you can make any money from it.
I just do not think there are enough Classic Amiga Users left to sustain this. I mean it's either going to sell a bunch of copies or each copy is going to be pretty damn expensive.
I write commercial software on the side and the Amiga market would be suicide at this point.
As somebody in this ancient post said, the die hards are going to have to learn to program and divide up the work. If you want a decent browser with modern features on classic Amiga I would start dividing up the project now.
Somebody mentioned a bounty and that might inspire a die hard Amiga programmer to write a new browser but even in a labor of love that is no small task.
-P
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what don't you understand?
He doesn't want to understand, that's his problem. In contrast to what he claimed in 2008 (beginning of the thread), IBrowse developers were (and probably still are, I'm not going to verify) still responding to inquiries.
And in contrast to what he claims now, there has actually been a statement regarding IBrowse's future:
http://www.amiga-news.de/en/news/AN-2009-11-00041-EN.html
All this bitching didn't achieve anything in 2008 (except pissing off the remaining active IBrowse developers - I was sitting next to one of them in IRC when he started shouting), and it doesn't achieve anything today.
IBrowse is dead because Burstroem doesn't care anymore. That's bad luck, but it's not like this is a new phenomenon. Bundle the browser with OS3, Miami and any FTP client of your choice - and you got a whole system that isn't supported or legally available anymore.
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He doesn't want to understand, that's his problem.
To be fair, he wasn't asking for a new version.
He was just asking for someone to take his group's money and sell them keyfiles for the existing version....
I think it's a bit silly that someone couldn't set up an automated system for that, or give the code generator to someone like Amigakit or someone else to handle it.
But they obviously gave it all up...
Oh well..
desiv
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"I refuse to let you give me money"
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"I refuse to let you give me money"
(http://forums.watchuseek.com/attachments/f21/814725d1347051480-seiko-star-wars-collaboration-series-what-shut-up-take-my-money-fry-futurama-twilight-avatar.jpg)
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"Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???"
Why not? It's deader than dead and has been so for, what, a decade? More? Besides, it's about as useful for browsing the web in 2012 as Lynx is, and even trying to charge money for something like that would be the *real* crime. But again, nobody is even doing that, it's obviously completely abandoned, so I'd say "Go ahead", I don't see any moral obstacles in this whatsoever, and I certainly don't understand why there is a 12 page long thread on the issue...?
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"Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???"
Why not? It's deader than dead and has been so for, what, a decade? More? Besides, it's about as useful for browsing the web in 2012 as Lynx is, and even trying to charge money for something like that would be the *real* crime. But again, nobody is even doing that, it's obviously completely abandoned, so I'd say "Go ahead", I don't see any moral obstacles in this whatsoever, and I certainly don't understand why there is a 12 page long thread on the issue...?
indeed - who cares... it's dead, most (serious) websites don't work... so why even bother ?
Move on ....
TomUK
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It would take about 20 minutes to setup a simple website with a paypal but it now button, they could email people keyfiles.
If the guys won't take 20 minutes to do that when people actually want to buy their product...
Then what hope should everyone have for a new improved version?
Start a bounty to improve netsurf 68k instead with your money...
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The key is available all over the place so why bother cracking it?
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The key is available all over the place so why bother cracking it?
This. It's not difficult in the least to find a key for IBrowse.
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How long does a developer/publisher have to not give a notice of discontinuation before software enters that grey area of Abandonware?
Personally I would be inclined to say not to crack it. You never know if the development is in some form of hibernation. However, and i don't condone this either, if someone where to stumble upon the key through some form of search and that key happened to get to the program and it magically worked then I suppose, so long as that person keeps it to themselves and we enever know, it could be alright.
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if someone where to stumble upon the key through some form of search and that key happened to get to the program and it magically worked then I suppose, so long as that person keeps it to themselves and we enever know, it could be alright.
Should work well for people who want to buy it: Get the key somehow, and pay the cash when it's actually possible to buy the product again.
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The same with MUI3.8, IBrowse no answer.
I registered my copy of MUI in May 2010 and Stefan replied to me in a few days with a key, albeit in another MUI developers name (apparently his A3000 with the key generator program was not working at the time).
I assumed Stefan was still taking registrations for MUI...
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It would take about 20 minutes to setup a simple website with a paypal but it now button, they could email people keyfiles.
If the guys won't take 20 minutes to do that when people actually want to buy their product...
Could u kindly explain me how one would do this, (not specifically for Ibrowse, just in general for any piece of software) ?
And could I substitute "PayPal" with a more reputable company?
Or does the 20 mins trick only work with PayPal?
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What is a more reputable company than Paypal?
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My intension was not to blame people not reading here, it was just to show that there are still people asking for this software, even if it is in most cases useless.
You can still make money with Amiga software, but you need a long term strategie, it is not possible to make money within a very short time.
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Didn't we have a :beatingdeadhorse: emoticon?
The issue is the same as it always were - commercial companies are abandoning the Amiga platform.
From a purely theoretical point of view, cracking the software is useless - spreading a key would be more efficient. Besides, any coding effort would be better aimed at an open-source alternative.
When it comes to spending money, a bounty for a small and fast open-source browser would be better spent. This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software at a somewhat reasonable price.
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@a-pex
Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???
Not really...
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@CritAnime
How long does a developer/publisher have to not give a notice of discontinuation before software enters that grey area of Abandonware?
If your own moral compass is broken and doesn't show these things to you, then I'd say that when a great numbers of years has passed without product being on sale, without development, when the IP owner obviously doesn't care and has simply left the scene many years ago, and all means of communications and support that previously worked does no work since many years (reseller chain, product web page, developers e-mail, etc). Then after many years (is it a decade in this case?) when people (more than a few) independently of each others starts talking about "is it abandonware" because of one or more reasons above, then it probably is. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, chances are it's a duck...
Personally I would be inclined to say not to crack it. You never know if the development is in some form of hibernation.
The discussion is about v2.4 and nothing else, and this version is not sold and hasn't been sold for years and years. Should they release a v3.0 or something in the future (not very likely at all, I am certain it's pretty solidly abandoned now), then of course you should re-evaluate its features (CSS3? HTML4/XHTML? HTML5? Javascript engine? etc, etc) against its price, and buy that one if you want it and like it. But again, that's not what this discussion was about...
I don't think we'll ever see a viable browser for 68k Amigas with the *essential* features like those I mentioned above. It's completely unrealistic. It will be way too complex and heavy SW for way too limited, under-powered and old HW to handle. It will probably be worse than "Timberwolf" on a Sam440 by a factor of 50 or more, it will be unusable. If you are into retro Amiga (which many people here are), then use it for what it is, i.e. having fun with your museum objects, playing the old games on floppies, using the old apps, etc. Don't expect it to become modern, because it won't. That's why we have the "NG" systems like MorphOS. And on MorphOS you can run the Odyssey browser, which is heavily inspired by how IBrowse looked and functioned. It has all the essential features I mentioned above (it even beats Internet Explorer 9 in both CSS3/HTML5 features and overall performance), on top of that it has all the features you could wish for, and everything completely in the IBrowse style, so I'd dare to say that had IBrowse ever been evolved into a 2012 level browser, it would be pretty close (even an exact match) to what Odyssey is on MorphOS today.
Odyssey is IBrowse done right! :)
@Colmiga
I registered my copy of MUI in May 2010 and Stefan replied to me in a few days with a key
But MUI is anything but dead, it's very much under development, so it can't be compared to Ibrowse in any way...
;)
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Netsurf is almost useable, with native gui it would be nice browser for REAL 68k amigas.
Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc. It has developed to work very low spec machines.
Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.
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Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc.
Interesting, but I always heard you needed a really fast/lots of RAM Amiga to run it?
It has developed to work very low spec machines.
OK.. So, what's your definition of "low spec?"
From what I can see on Aminet:
Requirements:
=============
* AmigaOS 3.x
* Picasso / CGX compatible graphic card.
* 64 MB Ram (128MB for complex sites).
* 68020+ CPU with FPU, for usable speed 68060 or emulator is required.
With the ACAs and others out there, 64M RAM isn't out of the question (although saying an 060 for "usable speed" concerns me).
But that 2nd one on the list is going to be a killer. I don't think many people would consider RTG low spec... Lots of AGA (and OCS) only Amigas out there...
desiv
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iBrowse is still THE SOLUTION to visit Amiga forums, Aminet or other Amiga made pages on a machine like an A1200. This is the reason why there are still request for an legal key left.
Netsurf is nice, but needs a GFX card, very much RAM and a fast CPU.
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I run NetSurf on my beefed CSPPC/GREX with Voodoo3 and it's not the best experience at all.
It's running okeish (if you have the time to wait for it starting).
I can't imagine it running in specs less than 040 (which even 040 would be really unpleasant experience imho), so it's certainly not meant for low specc Amigas.
As Apex said, iBrowse is still the best way of surfing old content like Aminet, A.org's proxy, or old version of forums :)
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any coding effort would be better aimed at an open-source alternative. When it comes to spending money, a bounty for a small and fast open-source browser would be better spent. This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software
Writing a browser from scratch (to support all these modern features and standards), open source or not, isn't going to happen. Not on Amiga at least. The resources this will take would be enormous, even for a large company. Proposing an Amiga-bounty(!) to produce a browser for 68k from scratch is a little naive, it simply won't happen. So it would have to be based on either Firefox (bloated, slow and bulky) or Webkit (like Google Chrome, Apple's Safari and MorphOS's Odyssey), and *neither of these* (especially Firefox) running on a 68k processor wouldn't be very fun, even if you *could* make it running.
This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software at a somewhat reasonable price.
Fab has generously opened up and provided his Odyssey sources to developers on both AROS and OS4, and also gave a lot of advice to help them. However, neither the AROS or OS4 version are matching the MorphOS Odyssey 1.17 browsing esperience (especially not the OS4 version). So that didn't help much, despite the sources being handed out, with aid and advice to go with them. Although the main problems on those platforms has a lot to do with the OS themselves lacking features that you can't solve easily as an *application developer*, instead it's up to the OS developers to to improve the OS in various areas. Or you simply use MorphOS! ;)
Netsurf is almost useable, with native gui it would be nice browser for REAL 68k amigas.
Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc. It has developed to work very low spec machines.
Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.
Interesting, but I always heard you needed a really fast/lots of RAM Amiga to run it?
OK.. So, what's your definition of "low spec?"
From what I can see on Aminet:
Requirements:
=============
* AmigaOS 3.x
* Picasso / CGX compatible graphic card.
* 64 MB Ram (128MB for complex sites).
* 68020+ CPU with FPU, for usable speed 68060 or emulator is required.
With the ACAs and others out there, 64M RAM isn't out of the question (although saying an 060 for "usable speed" concerns me).
But that 2nd one on the list is going to be a killer. I don't think many people would consider RTG low spec... Lots of AGA (and OCS) only Amigas out there...
Oh you think RTG is too high spec?
I don't agree, I'd even say those requirements were a bit optimistic. At least for *real* use (instead of "can be used on some sites").
For the common, every-day, media-rich 2012 level browsing people are used to today, a semi modern RTG card (like Radeon R200/R300) would be kind of essential, 128MB RAM an *absolute minimum* (ask the Efika users), the double is preferred. I doubt it would be very usable on a 68060 as well, it would stagger under a normal web page with lots of div's, more than the most rudimentary css, and one or a few javascripts.
Look at this page (it's a Swedish newspaper):
http://www.dn.se/
It's a normal, every-day page, just one of the several of its kind we encounter when we do our daily browsing routine. It has more than 750 separate div's, most of those has their own styles attached to them, its css has more than 3000 entities, it has some 20 javascripts, it has close to 100 images, several other media objects.
I'd like to see a browser do this on a 680x0 CPU on an AGA screen. And why not some tabbed browsing as well?
Or no, I'd rather not.
There is a limit to what "It has developed to work very low spec machines" can do for you. After that, you simply need more resources under your engine hood.
I don't think webkit is considered bloated or bulky. It has been used on hand-helds for a long time for instance, which is what most people use as a *definition* for "very low spec machines".
Last generation handhelds stomped the Sam computer into the ground. The current generation handhelds stomps the entire PPC architecture into the ground (except perhaps the highest specced G5's). And you are talking about 680x0, where you think 68060 is a bit over the top?
Yeah...
:lol:
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Netusurf requirements for RiscOs is 030 equalent machine with 16mb ram and yes it works 8bit screens also. 16bit screens are because SDL.
Because of SDL, wich is meant to be debuggin only by the way, it wouldn't even start.
SDL removes "amiga feeling" from it and it is bog slow with any 68k amigas. Never used any SDL game that is actually useable with 68k.
AGA is possible
Here is what needs to be done to get NATIVE, not SDL frontend of netsurf to 68k Amigas.
http://vlists.pepperfish.net/pipermail/netsurf-dev-netsurf-browser.org/2011-January/002304.html
Chris is also promised to help if somebody could take a task
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Oh you think RTG is too high spec?
I'm not saying it's "too high spec" for the task.
I'm saying there are a LOT of Amiga owners that don't have RTG, and they would consider RTG high spec.
For the common, every-day, media-rich 2012 level browsing people are used to today,..
And I don't expect that...
What I think would be nice would be a browser (new or modified code) that renders existing pages in a much better way, so that more modern sites would be usable.
That doesn't mean that all the features would be supported.
This is a 68000 series architecture... That's not realistic.
But something that handles the web "better" than the current gen of browsers would be great.
Now, maybe it's not realistic. It's possible...
And again, I'm not saying RTG and an 060 is "over the top."
I'm only saying that, for a lot of Amiga users, it's not considered "low-spec"...
Jeesh.. Relax! :-)
desiv
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I have actually seen someone browsing the web on a C64. It's true!
Doesn't make much sense though, other than for "gimmick" reasons, or to prove some nerdy point.
You can have *lots* of fun with a C64, even in 2012, if you take it for what it is. But if you want to browse the web in 2012 (for *real*), then you'll have more fun using enough modern equipment for modern browsers to run.
IMHO of course.
;)
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Browsing web with 68k amiga could be pleasant surprise, but not with current software. You cant compare amigas to c64.
For me some download pages would be essential, maybe some news pages, like amiga.org ;)
Netsurf could do it useable way.
At this point, somebody usually start to talking to firefox/owb for 68k amigas. Those are not options.
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Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.
When I last spoke to Chris about porting to 68k he said that Netsurf renders internally in 16bit, converting that to 8bit for AGA would kill performance. If Jens ever gets around to releasing the *fabled* 16bit chunky mode for the Mrk2 then a port to AGA 68k starts to become more realistic.
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Writing a browser from scratch (to support all these modern features and standards), open source or not, isn't going to happen. Not on Amiga at least. The resources this will take would be enormous, even for a large company. Proposing an Amiga-bounty(!) to produce a browser for 68k from scratch is a little naive, it simply won't happen. So it would have to be based on either Firefox (bloated, slow and bulky) or Webkit (like Google Chrome, Apple's Safari and MorphOS's Odyssey), and *neither of these* (especially Firefox) running on a 68k processor wouldn't be very fun, even if you *could* make it running.
Indeed, a port of Dillo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dillo) would be much more useful.
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Indeed, a port of Dillo would be much more useful.
indeed, indeed.
afair radoslaw, the netbsd coder, has compiled it to run on his amiga hardware under netbsd.
porting it to over to amiga or aros demands one essential dependency which is a simple gui library afair. i looked at it some time ago.
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Not bad, but would still I prefer Netsurf. It is also for low spec machines and some work has already done.
Requirements are 30MHz ARM 6 computer with 16MB of RAM, wich is equalent to 68030
When Amiga OS3.x version is just SDL frontend, originally intendent to debuggin, requrements are totaly different. With 16mb ram it wouldn't even start.
BUT it can considered to proof of consept those who have tested it knows it is almost useable. Just build proper reaction gui, get rid of true type fonts etc. and it would useable.
TO DO LIST :
http://vlists.pepperfish.net/piperma...ry/002304.html
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Indeed, a port of Dillo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dillo) would be much more useful.
Sounds about as useful as IBrowse 2.4 is today?
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Sounds about as useful as IBrowse 2.4 is today?
Pretty much - with the major exception being that Dillo is an active project and that porting it would be legal and benificial for the entire community.
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Interesting, but I always heard you needed a really fast/lots of RAM Amiga to run [NetSurf]?
OK.. So, what's your definition of "low spec?"
From what I can see on Aminet:
[blah, blah, snipped]
Netsurf is nice, but needs a GFX card, very much RAM and a fast CPU.
*sigh*
This is what happens when somebody ports the Framebuffer frontend (designed for debugging or no-GUI systems) to something it isn't really designed or appropriate for. Forget about "NetSurf-68k" and only pay attention to what utri007 has written.
I have been trying to distance the OS4 version from the 68k version because the two are barely comparable, and FWIW the NetSurf core developers aren't keen on the 68k version either.
There are currently three different versions of NetSurf available for the Amiga (four if you include the old MorphOS version). The 68k one is the worst of the lot, and has the highest requirements. (The third one is the gtk version under AmiCygnix, which I also try to distinguish the OS4 native-GUI version from, but for different reasons)
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When I last spoke to Chris about porting to 68k he said that Netsurf renders internally in 16bit, converting that to 8bit for AGA would kill performance.
Actually that's old news now. In 3.0 I have added 8-bit plotters, and the performance hit from dithering bitmaps down doesn't notice, probably because it is offset by the speed gained by not anti-aliasing text. It's done via DataTypes so could surely be optimised should somebody have the inclination to do so.
OS4 users can try it out on the newly-available development builds by telling it to run on an 8-bit screen: http://ci.netsurf-browser.org/builds/
(http://www.amigans.net/uploads/photos/403.jpg)
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Hiya Chris,
We'll if it's rendering to 8bit that will make an AGA port more practical. I don't want to commit to doing a port as I've already got 3 big AGA projects occupying my limited 'hobby coding time'
If you can give me a link to the source code etc I'll take a quick look at it to see what I think the chances of an AGA port are.
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@novacoder
i dont know why chris cannot do 68k adjustments himself, as best familiar with the code instead seeking to encourage others since years, which as we see leads to nothing. lets assume its just additional work and maintenance involved he doesnt want to be doomed to. alright.
im not a coder, but ive looked at the source once and think that it is not trivial to make it run on 68k, since there is a lot of os4 functional dependency afair. however if youd succeed id push your contribution upstreem. perhaps it would hold some time without breaking and without the need of big adjustments.
the other possibility is to check into aros owb on aros68k. it has compiled and started already to certain extent, but jason has gave it up due to more essential tasks. owb is far more functional than netsurf as it seems.
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99% sure that Netsurf would have much more use tnah OWB with 68k amigas, because it really shoul run faster/less memory.
We can't have modern browser with all features, just not possible. Netsurf would be nearest thing to that.
NovaCoder: With all the respect to you current projects, but could you consider this? Are there any of those for 68k already? Netsurf would be great benefit for all, not just gamers.
Chris : Could you consider to take a part of job? That way it wouldn't require so much time? And if you could do it co-work with experienced coder like novacoder, it could materialice quite fast? Did you say that you don't have 68k amiga any more, novacoder has, so problem solved. ;)
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im not a coder, but ive looked at the source once and think....
No offense but...
That's a great quote right there... ;-)
My guess is that Chris is pretty busy, and might welcome some assistance in porting it to 68k, as long as that port is in line with what he is doing and doesn't cut corners just to get it ported..
desiv
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We'll if it's rendering to 8bit that will make an AGA port more practical. I don't want to commit to doing a port as I've already got 3 big AGA projects occupying my limited 'hobby coding time'
If you can give me a link to the source code etc I'll take a quick look at it to see what I think the chances of an AGA port are.
http://git.netsurf-browser.org or, more specifically, http://git.netsurf-browser.org/?p=netsurf.git;a=tree
ALL the Amiga specific code is in the "amiga" directory, it shouldn't be necessary to touch anything else.
lets assume its just additional work and maintenance involved he doesnt want to be doomed to. alright.
You assume correctly.
im not a coder, but ive looked at the source once and think that it is not trivial to make it run on 68k, since there is a lot of os4 functional dependency afair. however if youd succeed id push your contribution upstreem. perhaps it would hold some time without breaking and without the need of big adjustments.
Most of the OS4 functions used could be wrapped into compatibility functions quite easily. The most troublesome bit is probably getting the window scrollbars working (AIUI the older window.class won't do scrollbars for you), Personally I'd leave that until I have a working web browser that won't scroll :)
And, yes, if the port is done properly it will be pushed upstream and I won't seek to break it. It would be beneficial to have somebody else working on the Amiga side of things beyond the initial port anyway, as currently it's just me.
Chris : Could you consider to take a part of job? That way it wouldn't require so much time? And if you could do it co-work with experienced coder like novacoder, it could materialice quite fast?
I already do bits where it benefits OS4 too (such as the recent 8-bit plotter work). The majority of backporting to OS3 is going to be mundane things like changing functions to older equivalents, which doesn't need two people, but obviously I'll help out where I can.
It's a bit more of a pain these days though due to the code being in a git repository, I end up cross-compiling everything and copying it across for testing.
Did you say that you don't have 68k amiga any more, novacoder has, so problem solved. ;)
No, I never said that.
My guess is that Chris is pretty busy, and might welcome some assistance in porting it to 68k, as long as that port is in line with what he is doing and doesn't cut corners just to get it ported..
That's pretty much it, yes. If some of the bugs get fixed or other areas get improved along the way that's a bonus.
Basically if the OS3 side involves compatibility versions of OS4 functions where possible, and #ifndef __amigaos4__ in all other cases, I'll be quite happy. If it involves replacing existing code with OS3 compatible versions (eg. ending up using functions when built for OS4 that are no longer recommended to use), then I'll be much less happy.
When it works (or mostly works) I'll get it into git and try not to break it. Ideally whoever takes this on will stick around to look after it and help out generally, in which case they'll get their own access to the repo.
btw, this is the updated OS3 todo list: http://wiki.netsurf-browser.org/Todo/AmigaOS_frontend#OS3_Support
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We can't have modern browser with all features, just not possible. Netsurf would be nearest thing to that.
Could be that Netsurf would be the best option. But there is no way "around" the increasing complexity of normal, "every-day" websites and the HW requirements in order to display them properly, though.
I kind of admire any effort to update the "browsing experience" on classic Amigas. It has some nerdy kind of coolness over it that I like. Taking the HW way past what people commonly thinks would be possible. And that was my point of bringing up web browsing on the C64 above, I never meant to say that Amiga classic HW and the C64 HW would be the same or has the same capabilities, or anything like that.
But no browser on any classic Amiga can bring you a *proper* (read: *seriously useful*) browsing experience today. The penalties, compromises and sacrifices will be too big to make it meaningful. It won't come close. So what's the point, really? I mean, other than the "geek factor"? If you want to browse Aminet from your classic Amiga, you can do that already from IBrowse. You want more? Well, with some work, you could indeed get some more. But you could never get as far as to 2012. You would miss it by a decade. Or thereabout.
The C64, and the classic Amiga HW, is really cool HW. I have 3 C64's, 1 C128, 2 A1200 and 1 A600. They are in my garage, but sometimes I dream of rigging them up and spend a couple of days going through all the disks, all the games, read all the magazines I have saved, etc. Someday I know I will do that, just haven't had enough time yet. But they are museum objects, retro gear, and I would never use them to "surf the web" in 2012. It would be for retro reasons alone.
I like the Amiga environment though, and I always fancied the idea of having an Amiga with modern capabilities. I think my MorphOS MacMini fully qualifies there. And Odyssey (not "MUI-OWB", quit saying that please) actually does a better job with HTML5/CSS3 than Microsoft's latest publicly available version of Internet Explorer, and it outperforms Firefox by a magnitude, and it does it in a true IBrowse fassion.
That I like! :D
;)
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Ok I've download the NetSurf sources and started to compile a few classes to see how it hangs together on OS3.
The Amiga code that I've seen so far looks nicely put together, good job Chris. What do you use to compile it Chris, I use AmiDevCpp myself.
Anyone know if the 68k SDL port's sources have been published? I might be able to use them for reference.
Also I agree with the above post, an Amiga 68k browser is never going to be good enough to use for most sites but I also think it's a bit sad that the current 68k browsers are so far behind the times.
Like I said before, I'm way too busy with my other 68k ports to commit to this project at the moment.
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Meynaf's fast high quality HAM8 renderer could be a viable alternative to error diffusion for 8 bit AGA screens. This algorithm produces very good results, and uses around 120 cycles per pixel on a 68030, which shouldn't be much different from error diffusion (unless it's very highly optimized).
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which as I've said before means that 2.4 keyfiles have effectively been on sale for 10 years (minus the HiSoft->IOSPIRIT transition period), so not only 4 months strictly speaking.
.
Thanks for posting on the thread. It would be great to hear from Stephan as well. By the above quote do you mean that if you have an original Ibrowse 1.x software that you can use that key for Ib2? If so, there is an NOS copy on us ebay right now! I'm lucky and have my IB 2.x key I purchased.
Also as an intersting note in regards to Holger and MiamiDX. Unbeliavably Holger told me personally at a USA Amiga show in Stlouis years ago that the reason there were no more keyfiles and why some people who ordered a keyfile never got one (me being one of those ppl and forced to use a *crack* even though I purchased DX key online through holger's system) is that he was actually using a real amiga 1200 for his database and the hard drive failed and there it went! Believe it or not, but thats what he told me. Then he just dropped out of the amiga scene! How strange
Netsurf 68k would be the future for classic browsing IMHO even though IB is the KING of classic browsing!
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I'm sorry but how does MorphOS fix the abandoned software issue? I have Amiga hardware that runs Amiga software, not Apple hardware that emulates Amiga hardware to run SOME Amiga software. IBrowse 2.4 runs well, yeah it is out of date, but it runs on old hardware. As a 68K program (with JavaScript.library blacklisted) it runs fast and tight on OS 4.1
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My vote is that we get a HUGE bounty together so novacoder can buy all the pizza, beer, meth, crack, pot,coke and asian hookers he will need to keep himself happy while coding on this project.
If anyone can do it, he can!
If you don't like asian hookers, we can get you another kind.
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I'll participate, who has experienced to setup boynty? Somebody with native English, so it wouldn't be full of spelling mistakes ;)
Wich leads to question : NovaCoder could you consider this if you could get some money of it?
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Anyone know if the 68k SDL port's sources have been published? I might be able to use them for reference.
http://aminet.net/comm/www/netsurf-m68k-sources.lha
a bit old, but updates were not essential i think and the new versions seem to contain some bug that crashes them on aros68k, maybe not worth to reproduce.
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so novacoder can buy all the pizza, beer, meth, crack, pot,coke and asian hookers he will need to keep himself happy while coding on this project.
Well I'll drink to that!
;)
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I'm sorry but how does MorphOS fix the abandoned software issue? I have Amiga hardware that runs Amiga software, not Apple hardware that emulates Amiga hardware to run SOME Amiga software. IBrowse 2.4 runs well, yeah it is out of date, but it runs on old hardware. As a 68K program (with JavaScript.library blacklisted) it runs fast and tight on OS 4.1
At the moment there is no solution for the 'abandoned software issue'. Unless you can convince the author to keep selling keys, give them away for free, or give away the rights for IBrowse, then there isn't anything we can do about it. At least not legally
This is why we're discussing alternatives.
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Ok I've download the NetSurf sources and started to compile a few classes to see how it hangs together on OS3.
The Amiga code that I've seen so far looks nicely put together, good job Chris. What do you use to compile it Chris, I use AmiDevCpp myself.
Thanks. At the moment I'm cross-compiling under Cygwin using the setup on zerohero's website. It also compiles quite happily natively under OS4.
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.. Somebody with native English, so it wouldn't be full of spelling mistakes ;)
Wich leads to question
OK, was that on purpose??? :laugh1:
I would support a bounty for Chris and Nova.. ;-)
desiv
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I am really asking me whats going on in the brain from the programmers? There are so many people willing to buy this product without any possibility.
Similar situation with the Amiga GURU Book by Ralph Babel?
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I'd buy IBrowse 3...
and also guru book if that was available (the new version that is)
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I'm sorry but how does MorphOS fix the abandoned software issue? I have Amiga hardware that runs Amiga software, not Apple hardware that emulates Amiga hardware to run SOME Amiga software.
*sigh* This, again. MorphOS is an operating system. It runs 68k code in an emulation layer just like AROS and OS4 because the actual hardware on which the OS runs is neither a 68k CPU nor real Amiga hardware (with the exception of OS4 for Classic, to which I cannot speak with any authority on how the hardware is managed other than that the 68k is never touched.)
Emulation is completely different. Yeah, it has an Apple logo on the hardware, but the operating system makes it not-Apple. Just the same as all of these other boards which run OS4 and the Intel CPUs which run AROS. Emulation would be Apple hardware running Apple operating system running an Amiga 68k emulation layer. It's an argument of semantics since that's the exactly how the other systems work.
In any case, there are a bazillion other threads in which to have this discussion. So, I'll add to this current topic by saying, it's very easy for those who want to run IBrowse 2.4 on whatever system to find IBrowse2key if so inclined.
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Hmm...
We've all agreed that we use it, are willing to buy it, and to fully use it you need a "Key. But it is not for sale because it has been "abandoned"
So...
I wonder if, we "Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4?" Or perhaps consent to allowing unrestricted access to one of the "keys" floating on the web. If the source code was in the public domain, then issues of use and improvements would be a moot point.
This is the alternative to abandonware, not emulation.
*Ralph Babel was still active and updating his book when the previous edition was "torrent'd." This activity affected his income (and pissed him off). Now, no book.
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We've all agreed that we use it, are willing to buy it, and to fully use it you need a "Key. But it is not for sale because it has been "abandoned"
So...
I wonder if, we "Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4?" Or perhaps consent to allowing unrestricted access to one of the "keys" floating on the web. If the source code was in the public domain, then issues of use and improvements would be a moot point.
I am personally on-board with a generic key being made available for IBrowse 2.4, even if that means condoning the use of one floating around -- provided this doesn't affect sales of any Amiga dealer actively selling IBrowse 2 with legitimate keys.
At the same time, I'm more apt to support the development of a new 68k browser with reasonable performance and capability which looks like is happening now (albeit slowly as done in spare time.) That is, I'm very happy to support novacoder's efforts, as well as those upstream, though I don't have any access to Asian hookers.
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MorphOS is an operating system. It runs 68k code in an emulation layer just like AROS
Actually, there is nothing "just like AROS" about the way MorphOS runs 68k Amiga programs, and there is certainly no "emulation layer". MorphOS has a 68k to PPC JIT, but beyond that it's all native, and the Amiga programs runs happily directly on the operating system, in the same memory space as PPC compiled programs, using the same sheduler, the same resources, the same signalling system etc! :)
AROS on the other hand uses UAE which emulates Amiga HW, and every Amiga program runs inside its own emulated "sandbox".
A huge difference actually!
;)
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A huge difference actually!
not when it comes to aros68k, then all is native again, even more native than on mos or od4 so to say.
@chris, nova: hope something comes out of that, even though i have my doubts if this will provide better speed that the current sdl port. tell me if i may be of any assistance.
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er...
... there is certainly no "emulation layer".
But I thought..
MorphOS has a 68k to PPC JIT,
um..
uh..
That is an emulation layer...
One that runs "just in time," but an emulation layer nontheless.
Glad we're back on topic tho...
All this off-topic talk about iBrowse and keys and cracking was getting me worried..
desiv
p.s. Yes, I myself was musing about netsurf earlier in this thread. I realize the irony.. ;-)
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Why is this still being debated, lol.
You people have been throwing money at the developer for years with no reply.
I took 5 minutes last night and did a web search and found a fully functional key for IBrowse 2.4. Simple Google search. One click download.
If it gets any funnier, I'll be back in a week or two to recommend you try Lynx again....
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I did the same a week ago after questioning my decision first. Am I depriving the author of money? No. Would I pay for a better program? Yes. Is there such an place to send money to guarantee I will get a better product. Not yet
The next step is saying where that key is located on a .fr server in the "clefs" directory.
Folks, I don't hide behind an avatar name. My user name is my name
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Piracy didn't kill Amiga, open source did, Or rather the developers who refused to face reality of open source, they pretty much killed this platform.
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That is an emulation layer...
One that runs "just in time," but an emulation layer nontheless.
Nope, emulation is when you use software to mimic hardware. UAE does that, but it's not what the JIT in MorphOS does. There is no "layer" sitting in between the Amiga applications and the OS/HW, it's all native.
:)
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Nope, emulation is when you use software to mimic hardware.
Yes, and that's how they get those 68k commands to run... In software..
desiv
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Yes, and that's how they get those 68k commands to run... In software..
Nope, the 68k binaries are changed into PPC binaries. This does not involve emulation. Nothing is being run "in software", it's all native.
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Nope, the 68k binaries are changed into PPC binaries. This does not involve emulation. Nothing is being run "in software", it's all native.
But that's not how you'd run Shadow of the Beast??
When an app makes a 68k call that doesn't have a PPC equivalent, you have to do that in software...
And if they are "changed" on the fly, then that changing is in software...
And..
aarrghhh!!!!
You got me...
Off topic!!! Dang it..
I'm so weak... ;-(
desiv
p.s. Someone needs to update this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trance_JIT if there's no emulation in MorphOS.
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@desiv
Translator != Emulator. Trance translates 68k code into PPC code, it's not software that mimics hardware. Translating isn't emulating, two different concepts really.
A 680x0 CPU *emulator* on the other hand would be a program (written in PPC in this case) trying to simulate a physical 68k CPU as close as possible, and it is boxed within this emulator you would run your Amiga 68k programs, and you run them as unchanged 68k binaries, since this "virtual 68k CPU" emulator is in place to run them. In this case you would *actually have* SW to mimic HW. As the 68k code is running, it affects the Program Counter of this "virtual CPU", as well as the available registers, and stack, etc, because it's a CPU (emulated in SW) with all its features and functionality, and thanks to that, it can handle the 68k binaries unchanged the whole time, no need for translation anywhere in the process when a "real CPU" is there by emulation. Then add emulation for the other chips found in a physical Amiga, and you get UAE.
But this is not what Trance does, it does not emulate a 68k CPU, it translates 68k binaries into PPC binaries, which then runs natively without any need for emulation layers.
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OK, not the real topic, but how do the Amiga programs written for an Agnus, Denise, and Paula run on a MorphOS system (which is APPLE hardware) without an Agnus, Denise, or Paula (let's ignore Gary, Ramsey, etc. for now)?
Wikipedia says, "Emulation addresses the original hardware and software environment of the digital object, and recreates it on a current machine."
This describes MorphOS, AROS, UAE and any software that pretends, imitates, or in any other fashion, lies to you saying it is an Amiga when it is not. MorphOS does not "eat" Apple hardware and a bit later "crap" out the Amiga custom chip set; it only recreates an Amiga-like environment (and poorly since there is MorphOS software that will not run on an Amiga).
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This has gone to 3 pages already... So crack it and be done with it....
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Actually, there is nothing "just like AROS" about the way MorphOS runs 68k Amiga programs, and there is certainly no "emulation layer". MorphOS has a 68k to PPC JIT, but beyond that it's all native, and the Amiga programs runs happily directly on the operating system, in the same memory space as PPC compiled programs, using the same sheduler, the same resources, the same signalling system etc! :)
AROS on the other hand uses UAE which emulates Amiga HW, and every Amiga program runs inside its own emulated "sandbox".
A huge difference actually!
;)
And there ya go. hehehe My point, more or less, was the it is not emulation in the sense that it's accused of being. But it definitely doesn't hurt to have this information visible.
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OK, not the real topic, but how do the Amiga programs written for an Agnus, Denise, and Paula run on a MorphOS system (which is APPLE hardware) without an Agnus, Denise, or Paula (let's ignore Gary, Ramsey, etc. for now)?
Programs that explicitly needs those chips present (for "HW banging" instead of using Amiga OS API's in the proper way) will indeed need an emulator, and you can download UAE for those (mostly) games. You can easily set it up so that UAE is transparently started when you double-click the game/app icon. But practically all applications that followed the correct, formal guidelines from Commodore and using OS calls instead, will work fully native, side by side with programs compiled directly for MorphOS, in the same memory space, sharing the same sheduler, the same system resources (both HW/SW/OS), etc. No difference from a real Amiga, no emulation layer in between. And this actually goes for most Amiga applications you would want to use today.
Wikipedia says, "Emulation addresses the original hardware and software environment of the digital object, and recreates it on a current machine."
True, a C64 emulator that only emulates the HW wouldn't be much fun, would it? The HW is the vessel, the SW the soul. Without it, you would only have a bunch of useless "silicon", that you can't even look at or use as a door stop, since it's all "virtual". So the "ROM" is needed as well. In many emulators of consoles, you only need one ROM file that includes the game and everything. On UAE you need the Kickstart ROM for the system, and a separate ADF "ROM" for the SW. But this is emulation we are talking about now, which is not how MorphOS usually runs Amiga SW.
This describes MorphOS
No.
AROS
Only partly, when trying to run 68k apps on x86 HW, since AROS uses UAE for that.
UAE
True. UAE is an emulator.
and any software that pretends, imitates, or in any other fashion, lies to you saying it is an Amiga when it is not.
MorphOS provides a fully native Amiga API environment, and all programs runs natively on that. Programs are not normally (unless using UAE) run on an emulator, not if you don't want to. UAE isn't even included on MorphOS, since it's not needed. It's all native. On an emulator, you first start up a program (running on top of the native OS) that creates a little "box" consisting of a necessary HW/SW environment, and it is this program that then "executes" the game/program inside that box, taking care of HW calls, OS calls, all SW, etc, etc. This is emulation, and this is absolutely not how MorphOS runs Amiga apps. They are run directly/natively on the OS, no emulation layer in between, they are not executed within some "emulator program".
it only recreates an Amiga-like environment
It provides a full Amiga environment, fully native, on HW that isn't Amiga HW (thus doesn't have the Amiga custom chips).
(and poorly since there is MorphOS software that will not run on an Amiga).
MorphOS SW compiled as 68k that won't run on an Amiga probably uses features that MorphOS has that Amiga OS simply doesn't have. There has been a lot of evolution in MorphOS as well, backwards compatibility has been prioritized, but MorphOS is so much more than that. MorphOS has gone quite far beyond the point where Amiga OS stopped. It has stuff that Amiga OS never had. An A500 with WB1.2 can't run all OS3.1 apps. It's quite natural...
:)
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But that's not how you'd run Shadow of the Beast??
When an app makes a 68k call that doesn't have a PPC equivalent, you have to do that in software...
And if they are "changed" on the fly, then that changing is in software...
If you want to run Shadow of the Beast you need an emulator to emulate custom chips. To execute 68k code you dont need an emulator. I.e. there is no more emulation involved than when you execute Java apps on your machine.
p.s. Someone needs to update this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trance_JIT if there's no emulation in MorphOS.
Calling Trance JIT is an emulator is also correct but one could also consider it as a byte code translator.
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OK, not the real topic, but how do the Amiga programs written for an Agnus, Denise, and Paula run on a MorphOS system (which is APPLE hardware) without an Agnus, Denise, or Paula (let's ignore Gary, Ramsey, etc. for now)?
Wikipedia says, "Emulation addresses the original hardware and software environment of the digital object, and recreates it on a current machine."
This describes MorphOS, AROS, UAE and any software that pretends, imitates, or in any other fashion, lies to you saying it is an Amiga when it is not. MorphOS does not "eat" Apple hardware and a bit later "crap" out the Amiga custom chip set; it only recreates an Amiga-like environment (and poorly since there is MorphOS software that will not run on an Amiga).
I think here is the difference how you and tmhgm see "amiga". To you amiga is hardware, to tmhgm it is software.
Likewise many Amiga games didnt run on my Amiga even when Commodore claimed it was an Amiga and said title was written for Amiga. This is something you can run circles again and again.
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We've all agreed that we use it, are willing to buy it, and to fully use it you need a "Key. But it is not for sale because it has been "abandoned"
So...
I wonder if, we "Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4?" Or perhaps consent to allowing unrestricted access to one of the "keys" floating on the web. If the source code was in the public domain, then issues of use and improvements would be a moot point.
Did anyone ask developers directly? I think Futaura is still around occasionally.
Another solution could be opening a bounty and buy out IBrowse source code to the public.
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How about the Vapor software suite? Is Ollie still around?
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How about the Vapor software suite? Is Ollie still around?
AFAIKVapor software is owned by indenpendent authors sold under same company. To get Voyager open sourced (or at least free key) Zapek should be contacted, I think. Helps if inquiries are not written in traditional Amiga is back to the future style.
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voyager has a nice clean, simple and appealing gui, that on the plus side. but its so buggy underneath, i dont even know if it pays to open its sources. i have recently played a little with aweb, both under aros68k and os3.1 as this is the simplest working browser i know working on both, and must correct my previous opinion about it. it doesnt look very funky, but considering the circumstances it is quite fast, stable and accurate even under plain amiga chipset. if it was possible to plug in css into it i could become much better usable nowadays.
edit: the problem is, its open source but i dont know where to look for them. likely they are kept hostage by big gun who apparently was the last who worked with it, and rescued it from lost repository or something the like.
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To execute 68k code you dont need an emulator
Interesting statement there. I think we're just in semantics now..
So, let's leave out the "custom chips."
Are all of the 68k opcodes supported on the PPC?
If so, then I agree...
If not, what does the OS do when an app issues a command using an opcode for a 68k CPU that isn't supported on the PPC?
If it translates it, even on the fly, then (IMHO) it's emulating the 68k CPU from the programs perspective.
Now, I have to say that I don't think in any way that it's a bad thing.
I love emulation. I love virtual machines.
It sounds like MorphOS is doing "emulation right" in my opinion.
It's using it only when it needs to.
desiv
p.s. Java is an interesting case. Most VMs are (again, IMHO) emulators. Java is, in a way, an emulator.. But, it's not emulating a pre-existing system. It's emulating a generic "virtual machine" that was created just for the purpose of Java... Of course, you could say that, since the platform didn't exist, it's not "emulating" anything.. That's a toughy..
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edit: the problem is, its open source but i dont know where to look for them.
http://www.yvonrozijn.nl/aweb/index.html
desiv
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@wawrzon
The latest AmigaOS 4 version of AWeb APL 3.5.10 from Andy Broad includes the sources to compile for AmigaOS 3.x. It's available on OS4Depot.
http://os4depot.net/index.php?function=showfile&file=network/browser/aweb.lha
I tried to compile it with GCC 3.4.0 but the complicated make script file had problems. I used to get older versions of AWeb APL to compile most of the way through in AmigaOS 3.x. Let me know if you can figure out how to fix the compile problems. I might have to help out if you get it fixed up to compiling again ;).
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voyager has a nice clean, simple and appealing gui, that on the plus side. but its so buggy underneath, i dont even know if it pays to open its sources. i have recently played a little with aweb, both under aros68k and os3.1 as this is the simplest working browser i know working on both, and must correct my previous opinion about it. it doesnt look very funky, but considering the circumstances it is quite fast, stable and accurate even under plain amiga chipset. if it was possible to plug in css into it i could become much better usable nowadays.
edit: the problem is, its open source but i dont know where to look for them. likely they are kept hostage by big gun who apparently was the last who worked with it, and rescued it from lost repository or something the like.
Paid Voyager releases are actually very stable. It is those free evaluation versions which were from yesteryears having annoying crash bugs. Not very good strategy to get customers, though.
The biggest downside in Voyager is that it is using lot of private MUI calls. Getting it running on AROS (Zune) require lot of in depth knowledge about MUI. On OS3 it of course is not problem.
However, who is going to continue development of those browsers? AROS, MorphOS and OS4 users have got access to better browsers with HTML5, CSS, (limited) flash, Javascript, Unicode support and many more. Old Amiga browsers have their own quite efficient engines tailored for Amiga and I still like IBrowse very much for its efficiency. But unless someone is going to work on it 24/7 their feature set is frozen to year 1999 forever.
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okay matt, i will see if anything s left stuck from way back. i have devcpp setup here, ll try to revive it and come back to you.
desiv: yesss.. you and the mos boys are stuck in semantics. it doesnt pay to discuss it, whether it is emulation or not. does it?
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Paid Voyager releases are actually very stable. It is those free evaluation versions which were from yesteryears having annoying crash bugs. Not very good strategy to get customers, though.
ohh. i see. i know only the eval versions. i stand corrected.
The biggest downside in Voyager is that it is using lot of private MUI calls. Getting it running on AROS (Zune) require lot of in depth knowledge about MUI. On OS3 it of course is not problem.
talking about aros, this is actually an advantage if voyager would get open sourced. zune has to be fixed also up to the private mui classes. thats what currently prevents it from running ibrowse. so if a tool using private non documented mui features has been open sources, fixing zune might become much easier i suppose. you are actually meking me hot about voyager.
itix, do you have any link to the developers? olaf schoenweiss has proven to be very effective in gathering contributions for his aros68k distibution, perhaps he can get involved. i think it would be an advantage not only for aros but at least for 68k amiga users to have voyager open as pfs3 was.
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Interesting statement there. I think we're just in semantics now..
So, let's leave out the "custom chips."
Are all of the 68k opcodes supported on the PPC?
If so, then I agree...
If not, what does the OS do when an app issues a command using an opcode for a 68k CPU that isn't supported on the PPC?
If it translates it, even on the fly, then (IMHO) it's emulating the 68k CPU from the programs perspective.
It depends on from what perspective you are looking at it. I would call it a virtual 68k processor. 68k emulator or translator in MorphOS is not emulating any specific 68k CPU. It announces itself as 68060 CPU but it supports almost full range of (non-MMU) instructions from 68000 to 68060 including those not available on the real 68060 CPU. FPU instructions can generate slightly different results due to differences in 68k and PPC FPU and it also extends the original instruction set with its own set using trap instructions.
The programs never see the difference so from programs perspective it is emulating 68k CPU. From the operating system point of view there is no 68k CPU. There is only dynamic 68k translator reading a 68k op-code stream.
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The programs never see the difference so from programs perspective it is emulating 68k CPU. From the operating system point of view there is no 68k CPU. There is only dynamic 68k translator reading a 68k op-code stream.
Yeah, that's what I was thinking...
And I think that's incredibly awesome.. ;-)
Very nicely done...
desiv
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ohh. i see. i know only the eval versions. i stand corrected.
talking about aros, this is actually an advantage if voyager would get open sourced. zune has to be fixed also up to the private mui classes. thats what currently prevents it from running ibrowse. so if a tool using private non documented mui features has been open sources, fixing zune might become much easier i suppose. you are actually meking me hot about voyager.
itix, do you have any link to the developers? olaf schoenweiss has proven to be very effective in gathering contributions for his aros68k distibution, perhaps he can get involved. i think it would be an advantage not only for aros but at least for 68k amiga users to have voyager open as pfs3 was.
Try contacting Zapek (David Gerber). Most likely the answer is no (and most likely there are other factors involved) but you can try. You dont get a 2nd chance -- be careful what you write to him.
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Wow!
A lot of sharing here. I don't know whether to cry or rejoice.
Y'all please contact the developers/owners (if you think it will help).
1) If you can sleep at night with a key file that you could not pay for, then use it. If you use a key file you WOULD not pay for, then you are not a nice person.
2) Opinions (semantics) are like anal orifices, most of us have them (barring anal agenesis and ostomies), and some of us are them.
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Try contacting Zapek (David Gerber). Most likely the answer is no (and most likely there are other factors involved) but you can try. You dont get a 2nd chance -- be careful what you write to him.
"Be careful" is an understatement - IIRC he is (or was) very anti-OS3.5 and 3.9. I hate to think his thoughts on OS4! Things used to get quite, um, heated on the Microdot-II mailing list if you dared mention that something didn't work on OS3.5, with the fault being attributed quickly to the "pseudo-OS" (or whatever he called it) and no chance of it being fixed in MD2 unless you could prove it didn't work on OS3.1 either.
Actually I still use Microdot-II. It has an annoying bug I discovered recently, which I'd like to get fixed. Maybe if Zapek is amenable to open-sourcing Voyager I'll have a go at getting the source for MD2.
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very anti-OS3.5 and 3.9. I hate to think his thoughts on OS4!
encouraging to hear. he might actually have had some point..;)
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ADMINS: I know this post is a provocation, but please read the full post, before deleting it...
Hello Amiga-Community,
now we have the same situation like with MiamiDX. On the one side we have a very, very good product, on the other side the programmers are no more interested in selling it. :-(
Now it is more than 1 year gone and it is still not possible to buy IBrowse 2.4 anywhere!!!!!!!!!!!!
I am writing this post because in my german amiga-forum more than 30 users are willing to buy it, but no reaction from the programmers.
Andreas Magerl (AmigaFuture) and many other people tried to get in touch with the IBrowse programmers, to sell IBrowse 2.4 again with no result :-(
I am really asking me whats going on in the brain from the programmers? There are so many people willing to buy this product without any possibility.
That is the reason why I asked this provocation question about cracking IBrowse 2.4. It seems they are no more interested in a legal product.
Maybe someone from the IBrowse team can comment this? Why are you not answering the emails? Why are you no more interested to sell IBrowse 2.4????
If you have a crack or a keyfile use it, worry about the future of ibrowse at this times seems a bit crazy.
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FPU instructions can generate slightly different results due to differences in 68k and PPC FPU
Is the same thing true with WinUAE, UAE, etc?
I am wondering how careful I must be when using floats.
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Interesting statement there. I think we're just in semantics now..
Could be. Or perhaps rather different views on definitions of the concepts "emulation" vs "translation"?
Are all of the 68k opcodes supported on the PPC?
:confused:
Of course not. And there is no need for that...
If not, what does the OS do when an app issues a command using an opcode for a 68k CPU that isn't supported on the PPC?
AFAIK no 68k opcodes is ever being executed. If that would have been the case, it would indeed have been through emulation, that would be the only way; by emulating the 68k CPU. Which AFAIK isn't what MorphOS is doing at all.
If it translates it, even on the fly, then (IMHO) it's emulating the 68k CPU from the programs perspective.
Programs (or "opcode streams" if you prefer) are de-facto rewritten, either dynamically while running, or before being started, through JIT. If a 68k Amiga program would ask which "68k CPU" it's running on, I'm sure it would be presented as 68060 (although in practice there is a mixture of numerous instruction sets), just like Itix said.
Two funny things about this though:
- There is no 68k CPU available in a MorphOS system, not even "virtual" (I don't share Itix definition there at all, my view of emulated/"virtual CPU" is in post #230 (http://www.amiga.org/forums/showpost.php?p=711207&postcount=230), and had it been a "virtual 68k CPU" in the system in addition to the physical PPC CPU, it would mean that in the manner/context Amiga 68k apps is being executed on MorphOS, we would have a de-facto mutli-CPU system (which isn't really possible in an Amiga context, unless done in a PowerUP or AMP kind of way). And it's not like that on MorphOS, where all resources are shared, the sheduler is the same, etc. But maybe it's a matter of semantics as you said...? ;))
- The code actually doing the probing, will (at the moment it is being executed by the PPC CPU) be all PPC code. Which is kind of ironic, isn't it? It's being PPC without being "aware" of it (or indeed needing to care about it). Reconstructed. Native. And *that* is "the programs perspective"!
I love emulation. I love virtual machines.
Well, have fun with UAE then. On MorphOS the Amiga 68k apps are being run natively on the OS (as PPC code), which in turn runs fully native on the hardware. No virtual machine. No "emulation layer". No 68k CPU in the system, neither physical nor virtual.
It sounds like MorphOS is doing "emulation right" in my opinion.
It's using it only when it needs to.
Exactly, it has UAE as an option to emulate a 68k Amiga!
:p ;)
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Why do so many legacy related threads get jacked by NG guys pounding their personal pulpits, lol.
Cracks me up to see how rabidly threads get derailed. I've even got TMHG on my blocklist and the thread is a complete offtrack toilet now, lol.
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@Topic
Valid key-files for IBrowse is obviously out in the wild. As I have said before, I can't personally see any moral obstacles for using them, as things are now.
You want web browsing to "continue"(?!) on classic Amigas, then:
1) Check out the possibilities to purchase the sources of IBrowse.
2) Check out the possibilities to purchase the sources of Voyager. As Itix said, it's not at all unstable, I used Voyager back on MorphOS 1.4, and its stability is definitely on par with IBrowse.
A community bounty ("NOOO, NOT AGAIN!!!!") might be an option, but IMHO, chances are very big that both IP holders will either:
1) Ignore any requests.
2) Greatly overestimate the real life value of the code today (like Magellan2 for example)
But why not try?
However, I think it's pretty safe to claim that neither of these would ever come very far (if anywhere at all) from where it is today. That is: Nowhere close to where Odyssey (for instance) is. They would both be stuck in past standards and never become really useful for much more than browsing Aminet and other Amiga-specific sites that is specially made for "smooth-talking" these kind of incapable browsers. My sentiments about the classic hardware on which they will run on remains: It can never be enough for modern standars. So why bother? Really?
Use the current IBrowse/Voyager/Aweb for what you can, if you want to. Don't expect any of them to become anything more, especially not for classic Amigas.
It's "teh true"!
;)
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Why do so many legacy related threads get jacked by NG guys pounding their personal pulpits, lol.
Cracks me up to see how rabidly threads get derailed.
But FFS, this thread is more than FOUR YEARS OLD, its main question has been answered *a few times per year* since then. :lol: "Legacy thread derailed" -- Are you kidding me?
:lol:
(Duce, you seem to only show up to complain *about* discussions. Is that really all you can do? Meta discussions about what you think should be discussed? BTW, in another recent thread, weren't you "migrating" to AW.net?)
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FPU instructions can generate slightly different results due to differences in 68k and PPC FPU
Is the same thing true with WinUAE, UAE, etc?
I am wondering how careful I must be when using floats.
Most 68k FPU "emulations" and probably even new 68k fpga/ASIC FPU's will use a 64 bit double (.D) float instead of the 80 bit FPU register/96 bit load and save extended (.X) format. The 68k FPU was an improvement of the x86 FPU which also used a higher precision than double float extended format. Almost no other modern mainstream CPU supports more than double float for speed. The extended precision bits beyond a double (and some rounding bits) are left off in the register while extended precision format is supported for immediates and an . It's usually not a problem unless assumptions are made about the least significant bits in a floating point register which isn't a good idea anyway. It's best to avoid extended precision immediates (trapped on 68060) and extended precision format for loading/saving except for FMOVEM.X to load/save registers. In general:
1) extended precision in a register is ok and means modify the whole register
2) extended precision immediates and format for an mean let's be slow and we are going to lose any extra precision past a double float anyway ;).
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This thread was about good software that can't be used fully because it needs a key file; good software that would still generate a profit; good software that has been abandoned. The discussion should deal with the implications of either "cracking" the key file or just openly listing the source of a valid key file.
It was not a thread on emulators.
It was not a thread on "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" of Amiga browsers. Although that is nearer than discussing FPU's. Maybe I should start a new new thread on the Browser Preferences.
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encouraging to hear. he might actually have had some point..;)
Regardless of personal opinions, if your software doesn't work correctly on a newer official version of the OS which it was designed for, it's highly likely that the software has a problem which simply was not evident before. Dismissing it out-of-hand just because a bug does not manifest itself on an older version or derivative is (a) not good programming practice and (b) not going to encourage customers to buy your software in the future.
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@chris: or perhaps he just wanted to keep his support efforts down, not much else than telling people bugs have to be replicated with clean os4 install. but i was joking. :D
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@matthey:
about aweb: it will not build on crosscompiler due to those 68k tools that do not execute there. but it builds under my cubicide (winuae) im just completing headers..
check here:
http://www.favrin.net/txt/articoli/vari/awebapl_compile_faq.txt
titlebar headers seems to be a problem yet, classact is supposed to be a part of 3.9 ndk, but i cant find those headers there. there is os depot archive that contains it, but i suppose it isnt appriopriate for 68, so seems broadblues has broken 68k compatibility introducing os4 reaction classes to aweb. how convinient...
and also miamissl is missing.
MiamiSSL SDK can't be found on the web. It has to be
requested from the author. Since Holger Kruse has been
unreachable for months the only two options seems to be to
drop the support for MiamiSSL (see section 12) or to build a
dummy include file based on the source code's references of
the library. Juergen Lachmann followed this way and he
managed to compile AWeb and browse some SSL sites with
MiamiSSL.
i could ask jürgen, have been in contact with him because of scalos.
edit: damn, id love to have a more versatile shell on cubic than tcsh, also it is damn slow to build there.
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Could be. Or perhaps rather different views on definitions of the concepts "emulation" vs "translation"?
er..
That IS semantics.. ;-)
Don't worry tho.
Based on what you've said about programs written for 68k Amigas running on MorphOS, I agree that it's emulation.
Thanx!
desiv
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@chris: or perhaps he just wanted to keep his support efforts down, not much else than telling people bugs have to be replicated with clean os4 install. but i was joking. :D
No, I think it was a genuine hatred of anything post-3.1 which wasn't MorphOS.
FWIW the bug still exists when I run MD2 on OS4.1, but it's an unimportant feature I wouldn't use anyway.
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@chris:
why, then we could have a good chance. this is not about os4, as os4 doesnt need voyager anyway. this is all about genuine amiga, even if it means up to 3.1 which is fine with me.
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@chris:
why, then we could have a good chance. this is not about os4, as os4 doesnt need voyager anyway. this is all about genuine amiga, even if it means up to 3.1 which is fine with me.
Good point.
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PHP 5.4.x is coming up and most of the older used community software like VBulletin 3 will be incompatible. This mean we have also to drop iBrowse support, no more need for legal keyfiles.
But it would be nice to have a browser like NETSURF also for 68k/AGA, to visit some pages, like before with iBrowse. I know there is a NETSURF version for 68k, but it is not supporting native chipset, it is SDL based and slow. I am talking about a highly optimized release using native GUI. :)
If someone is willing to do something in this direction, the a1k Community would collect money and pay for this, like we tried it in the past for iBrowse! So this is the chance to earn some money and with the help from other communities I think it should be possible to gain a good loan for the programmer.
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Anyone knows if NovaCoder is still working on Netsurf AGA port ?
http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=66229
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http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=862784&postcount=25
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Yes and no. I asked him to get paid for a native port, but his answer was short and clear. ;)
Novacoder likes more programming games on the Amiga.
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on all respect, despite what chris suggests its not just a walk by to port his netsurf back to 68k. if it was so easy he would best do that himself in an instant, gifted as he is and already familiar with the code and implementation details.
i still suspect the easiest, fastest and most effective would be to have odyssey building for aros68k. here is all in place for it imho, including the dependencies. just some dediacted coder with a knowledge of complex build processes involving cmake is missing. aros devs dont have time for it, there is already enough workload, and 68k isnt the main priority of course, except the users will somehow express and push that.
i have aros owb in ocassional use here, and while it isnt fast, its almost usable, faster than expected. and expect odyssey to be faster as aros owb is only a basic port, not even sure if it doesnt involve statically linked sdl.
once owb runs on aros68k the users may switch to it given aros is fast and dependable enough by the time or an attempt on backport might be undertaken. jason already has prepared some basic means to run aros apps on aros afair, just none has followed on that and its been covered in dust.
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on all respect, despite what chris suggests its not just a walk by to port his netsurf back to 68k. if it was so easy he would best do that himself in an instant, gifted as he is and already familiar with the code and implementation details.
I do bits here and there to help with the back-porting (such as the recently-added 8-bit plotters), but I'm not interested enough to spend time doing all the boring bits - I'd rather progress the browser for OS4, where I actually use it.
If anybody wants to step up and give it a try or help NovaCoder out (who was having problems with cross-compilation btw, not the code itself) then that would obviously be appreciated.
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@chris:
here we have it as it ever was. doesnt look like anybody actually able to do the job is going to step up.
aros odyssey version has an advantage that the existing code shouldnt need to be modified to run on aros and an amiga with gfx card, it needs only to be made to build.
of course it will not give us planar potters magically, but i fear the same is true for netsurf.
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on all respect, despite what chris suggests its not just a walk by to port his netsurf back to 68k. if it was so easy he would best do that himself in an instant, gifted as he is and already familiar with the code and implementation details.
No it's not easy to port, and that's speaking from experience ;)
I gave this a good crack but even with Chris's excellent help I still struggled to get my build environment configured properly and get to the stage where I could do some actual coding.
We need someone who is good with setting up a 68k cross compiler environment, building library dependencies and editing makefiles (none of which is me).
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@NovaCoder
you may receive more help if you put your stuff including dependencies in sourceforge for example :-)
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I'd be happy to do that but I'm not sure if there are any 68k coders left in the community who would help. I only put my hand up originally because nobody else offered to give it a try.
I think nearly all the C/C++ 68k coders have either gone to OS4/AROS/MorphOS or they've just left the community. I'm the only one who seems to be coding large scale C/C++ 68k projects these days and obviously my time is very limited.
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of course it will not give us planar potters magically, but i fear the same is true for netsurf.
Except I've already written those. They aren't planar per se, just built for any palette-mapped screen mode.
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@Novacoder
Stupid question perhaps, but why cross compile?
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@Novacoder
Stupid question perhaps, but why cross compile?
Well you always have to cross compile when coding for Amiga on any modern projects because the only modern compiler we have is gcc (UNIX). Thanks to AmiDevCpp though it's not as painful as it could be for most projects, you can simple import the source code into the workspace and AmiDevCpp will automatically create your makefile and setup your standard dependencies. I managed to get a new port of Quake 2 running in two days using this approach.
With NetSurf you have to setup your own UNIX cross compiler environment (eg using Cygwin) and then manually edit the various makefiles to try and get it to build a 68k executable. This is not something I'm very familiar with or something that I'd enjoy learning how to do.
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Well you always have to cross compile when coding for Amiga on any modern projects because the only modern compiler we have is gcc (UNIX).
Vbbc isn't modern? Ouch!
With NetSurf you have to setup your own UNIX cross compiler environment (eg using Cygwin) and then manually edit the various makefiles to try and get it to build a 68k executable. This is not something I'm very familiar with or something that I'd enjoy learning how to do.
I thought C was supposed to be portable. I should be able to take the project from GCC and compile it with any other modern compiler, right? What other compilers are portable and modern? Clang?
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Hiya again,
I've tried to build a few big projects using vbcc with CubicIDE and I could never get it to produce a reliable exe. After coding for a few years now for Amiga 68k the only ones I've used to do anything with are StormC V4 (gcc mode) and AmiDevCpp.
GCC is the best bet for porting work anyway, most of the things I've worked on (ScummVM, DosBox) are coded with gcc in mind, even my DOOM port was originally written for gcc.
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Hiya again,
I've tried to build a few big projects using vbcc with CubicIDE and I could never get it to produce a reliable exe. After coding for a few years now for Amiga 68k the only ones I've used to do anything with are StormC V4 (gcc mode) and AmiDevCpp.
GCC is the best bet for porting work anyway, most of the things I've worked on (ScummVM, DosBox) are coded with gcc in mind, even my DOOM port was originally written for gcc.
Hey NovaCoder this is completely not part of the OP, but since you are here and here I am wondering...what is the status towards DOSBoxAGA?
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i think porting software you can forget about anything else than gcc. if you roll off your own project you can tailor it for something else.
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i think porting software you can forget about anything else than gcc. if you roll off your own project you can tailor it for something else.
That's true, shame gcc on 68k is so damn painful really ;)
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Hey NovaCoder this is completely not part of the OP, but since you are here and here I am wondering...what is the status towards DOSBoxAGA?
Yep, very off topic ;)
You can read all about it on the project thread -> Dossy Box (http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=66709), actually it's in my signature you big silly.
Matt has been making good progress with the dynamic 68k core and it's actually generating 68k code now. I've been very lazy, too busy on my port of Quake 2 to AGA.
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I've tried to build a few big projects using vbcc with CubicIDE and I could never get it to produce a reliable exe. After coding for a few years now for Amiga 68k the only ones I've used to do anything with are StormC V4 (gcc mode) and AmiDevCpp.
Vbcc is a lot better with the last version but is developing slowly. There are newer versions of the vbcc assembler vasm that can be compiled to fix some bugs and add more optimizations. Vasm has been actively developed and is a mature product for the 68k. I wish GCC used it and a great project would be to try and retrofit it to GCC as it's supposed to be compatible with GAS. Anyway, vbbc does need some development. It's become more GCC like and more stable but it's still slow to compile and buggy on higher optimization levels. It does generate pretty good code on the low optimization levels which is good.
i think porting software you can forget about anything else than gcc. if you roll off your own project you can tailor it for something else.
You hit the nail on the head. Most software uses GCC and is customized for GCC. Porting with anything else is more difficult.
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Well you always have to cross compile when coding for Amiga on any modern projects because the only modern compiler we have is gcc (UNIX).
What is your definition of "modern"?
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What is your definition of "modern"?
Something that supports C++
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Isn't C++ a higher level object oriented language than C? Wouldn't it slow things down for classic Amiga?
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C++ is a different language than C.
Amiga C compilers are good.
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i dont even know if amidevcpp sports up to date c++ compiler. afair the last available version was around 3.4.x. on the other hand there is a c backend 4.5.0 by bernd, which makes it fine for a contemporary project written entirely in c as netsurf is, and likely therefore artur was able to compile it for amiga/sdl without major changes.
on the other hand whether we like it or not, a lot of stuff we desire is nowadays written in c++. i cant argue if c++ produces slow code, i know some claim that. the main question is though, do we want to try to port these apps even if just to see if they are slow or not, or do we resign on them entirely. from my experience with aros owb on 68k real hardware i must say it is not as slow as you might expect it.
as said, odyssey/owb/webkit is c++, so any kind of owb needs c++ toolchain. aros has it including 68k (4.6.2 afair). 68k amiga lacks it. perhaps someone can work out and provide appropriate devpacks for amidevcpp. id like to have amiga/aros68k 4.6.x. that might simplify the situation. but dont see anyone up to the task.
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I'd be happy to do that but I'm not sure if there are any 68k coders left in the community who would help. I only put my hand up originally because nobody else offered to give it a try.
You should use GIT/CVS/SVN if you want to receive any help. It seems Netsurf guys use GIT, you could start using it locally and then commit the changes to github for example. There's TortoiseGit if you want to do it in a comfortable/graphical way. Even if you uploaded a LHA with your changes somewhere if someone tried to help you the files would get out of sync soonish and sync-ing sources manually is a pain in the ass. Perhaps using diff correctly would solve that problem but for me GIT/SVN/CVS is the most comfortable way.
I don't promise much help but I could take a look at it and try to help from time to time (as long as we don't use ixemul).
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Isn't C++ a higher level object oriented language than C? Wouldn't it slow things down for classic Amiga?
C++ is just as fast as C. If you use certain features of C++ such as virtual methods in your classes, yes, they can be slower than a straight function call in C (or C++). But a virtual method does more than a straight function call in C. To do the same thing in C you'd need a function pointer and then it starts costing you the same in performance.
In the end you can accomplish a lot of stuff in C that you can also do in C++, C++ just makes it easier by building useful concepts into the language that you have to otherwise code manually in C. As long as you know the cost of using various C++ language features and don't try to use features you don't need to achieve something, it's the same. E.g. using a class with no virtuals is not going to be more expensive than any C alternative.
On the other hand it may be that a given C++ compiler isn't as good as a given C compiler on Amiga due to how old they are (this is certainly not true on most other platforms). But that's a compiler implementation issue, not a language issue.
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Hello all,
maybe this is some kind of motivation, but the http://www.a1k.org Community grand a minimum of 750€ for a working optimized Browser supporting 68k, AGA & CSS.
And I am sure this will be more only from our side, together with other Amiga Communities this could be enough money for a nice holiday. :-)
Regarding OS4 we have enough good solutions, but we need something again for the Classic Amigas...
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Too less money for a feedback? ;-) May we should move the last postings in a new thread and close this one...
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Too less money for a feedback? ;-) May we should move the last postings in a new thread and close this one...
Absolutely put this in a new thread!
The original is a part of an ongoing ethical and perhaps legal argument. You can't just "close" a thread on ethics.
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9 months gone trough land, are there any news on this? Is it possible to buy iBrowse now or has it been cracked?
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Well, they are working on it, but possibly only for internal release. Nobody can buy it.
The following is an unedited list of the majority of changes made since IBrowse 2.4 was released:
02-Nov-18 Beta 25.80 out
Updated welcome, store and acknowledgement text
Fixed user agent strings for release/demo verison
Added AmigaOS 3.1.4 detection
OS4: Changed random number generation routine
More key related changes in preparation 2.5 release
JS: OS4: Removed usage of obsolete OS functions
OS4: Rebuilt with GCC 8.1.0
14-Sep-18 Beta 25.79 out
22-Jul-18 Beta 25.78 out
BUGID 1667: Added support for application/xhtml+xml MIME type
Added support for 3-digit HTML hex colour values
Prevent spoofing entries from deletion if used in URL prefs
Finished localising spoofing preferences
29-May-18 Beta 25.77 out
Added custom spoof string settings for HTTP(S) User-Agent and related JavaScript Navigator object properties, allowing new strings to be added, strings to be reordered and "Spoof as" menu to be customised, all interlinked with the existing URL Prefs spoof setting
Made Search bar prefs list titles' style consistent
Tweaked the IBrowse/Amiga part of the User-Agent strings
Fixed new browsers not always inheriting current spoof setting
JS: Fixed crash when accessing navigator object properties via the URL gadget without a page loaded
07-Apr-18 Beta 25.76 out
Key related changes in preparation for the new 2.5 keys
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What on earth would be the point of "AmigaOS 3.1.4 detection"?
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I dunno. Maybe they had a workaround for long filenames, or there are differences regarding datatypes?