Hyperion announces OS 3.1 update

[gregthecanuck]

Yeah, to me, it feels like 3.5/3.9 was a dead-end fork, and development has resumed based on 3.1. AmigaOS 4.1 is based on the 3.1 codebase as well, and AROS/MorphOS are made to be API-compatible with 3.1.

In terms of features and eye-candy out of the box, 3.9 is probably still the best, but what matters in the end is that all the tools, commands, libraries, patches etc.

Agree completely. In addition, when I am handing money over for software I expect some basic level of support when problems/issues crop up. Why would I pay money for a dead product with no support?. If there are bugs or problems that was just money well wasted.

Plus with the 3.1 updates there are tangible developers benefiting from their work... developers that should be carrying the torch going forward.

[gregthecanuck]

Hey guys, a question on IDE device. There is a discussion on the Apollo IRC/forums on the poor IDE performance with modern flash drives. Any thoughts on this? Maybe an updated IDE device?

I have patched in the basics of the discussion below. Thanks and have a great day!

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The problem with AMIGA OS IDE is the following:

The old AMIGA OS SCSI /IDE device does "split" any access into 512 byte transfers.

So if the file system says  PLEASE LOAD 64 KB then the SCSI DEVICE will devide this into 128 individual LOAD commands each doing 512 Byte. This works but it lower the possible performance more a problem is WRITING as instead doing 1 write of 64 KB the existing SCSI device will split this into 128 writes each being 512 byte.

Modern flash devices do not support 512 byte block internally. They have internally bigger block - e.g. 4 KB.

To support 512 byte writes the flash device will internally read the 4 KB block / erase it / alter the 512 Byte into it / and the write it back to the flash device.

This means this splitting into miriads of 512 byte writes - is really bad for todays CF/SDD/ SDcard flash drives. This is all known.

This problem is known and was also reported to Hyperion 2 years ago.

[gregthecanuck]

@TrashyyMG

And the request was a generic one. This affects all users with solid-state drives.

[gregthecanuck]

@Thomas Richter

I understand about man-power.

Please consider this for future enhancements as it does affect all users with solid-state drives (excessive wear, low performance).

Thanks

[gregthecanuck]

Hey guys -

Any news on this OS3.1 update?

Thanks

[gregthecanuck]

What do you want to hear? It's down to the "tedious bug finding - bug fixing" part. Yes, that's the boring stuff.

Thanks for the good explanation on the latest bug fix. We have all been there before. Makes you want to take up raising Llamas or something.

But seriously, each of those old nasty bugs that is found and exterminated is a great thing - one less source of instability and pain for all developers going forward.

If you have a beer fund or something I would happily kick in.

Cheers!
Greg

[gregthecanuck]

On a related note, I would like to add.....

Stefan "bebbo" Franke continues to work on his 68K gcc6 port. He appears to be getting close to a working compiler. At the moment he is working on debugging his code optimizer.
 
There are a couple of developers filing some good bug reports and helping to iron out the last few issues.
 
I think now is a good time for some donations to keep Stefan motivated. He has mentioned he would like to get a working debugger as well (gdb) which would be very good.
 
Come on folks, pull out some spare change. A good base gcc compiler is important for many reasons. Let's give him some more motivation to keep going. I have done my part for now.
 
His PayPal donation link is part way down this page: https://github.com/bebbo/amigaos-cross-toolchain
 
Let's keep the party going!