Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: mark_k on February 11, 2008, 12:17:22 PM
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Hi,
I'm trying to get hold of some very early Amiga software:
- The Electronic Arts demo disks that were used to demonstrate the Amiga before its release. Apparently, those don't work with any release Kickstart version, and need Kickstart v27. I want to (hopefully) patch the code so the demos work with later Kickstarts. These disks are not the same as the EA Kaleidoscope/Polyscope disk which came with early A1000s.
- The first A1000s came with a version of BASIC by Metacomco called ABasiC, version 1.00. Out of historical interest, I'd like to obtain a copy of ABasiC 0.9 or any earlier version. (A few years ago I figured out a patch to ABasiC 1.00 to get it to work on Kickstart 2.0 and later; that's on Aminet.)
Has anyone heard of or seen any other really early Amiga software? I'm particularly interested in "prehistoric" stuff, e.g. which ran on the black box development machines which were provided to companies like EA, Arktronics etc. Those machines would have been significantly different to any released Amiga. I'm guessing all earlier software is almost impossible to find, since it would likely have been supplied on tape for long-since-scrapped Sun workstations, or maybe even on the strange 5.25" GCR floppy disks that the Amiga was originally going to use. Were any Kickstart versions earlier than v27 ever made available?
Here's a little bit of history from the 1986 developers conference notes, about Exec:
EXEC-O-CENTRIC HISTORY
SEP-83 Design Begins
DEC-83 HACK 1.0 (HP-64000)
MAR-84 EXEC 1.0 (no tables)
JUN-84 EXEC 1.5 (CES)
AUG-84 EXEC 2.0 (all new)
OCT-84 EXEC 21.0 (CAOS)
JAN-85 EXEC 23.0 (new-improved)
MAR-85 EXEC 25.0 (list struct)
JUN-85 EXEC 29.0 (release 1.0)
Another interesting tidbit: the Amiga was originally going to have 128KB chip RAM, expandable to 256KB or 512KB. Kickstarts 1.0 and 1.1 still work with 128KB chip RAM.
Regards,
-- Mark
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Have you though about sending a message to Carl Sassenrath at Rebol.com? He worked on the original Exec, still has a soft spot for Amiga, and might be able to tell you more about early developement resources.
Plaz