OS4 How close to Alpha release

[Kronos]

@BigBenAussie

Problem is atleast some of these "companies" (one just can't take them
serious) have allready prooven to be daft beyond believe ...

But to answer the qusetion at hand:

OS4 is clearly released in "aplha", so one could say it's getting
further and further away (since it is a date in the past), wether it
is also in "beta" is a question on how you define beta.

Some say "beta" is something that has all mayor features and only a
relative low number of bugs&quirks to be resolved.

Other will happiely use beta for everything that just works somehow on
a basic list of functionality.

OS4 would tend to be more in the 2nd group.

Even "OS4-final" is something that would very much rely on everybodies
definition, and in my opinion a final version of any (Amiga)OS should
atleast have:

- fast 68k-EMU (JIT) or enough native SW not to use ANY 68k AT ALL
(which is offcourse quite unrealistic with the remaining
developer-base).

- 2D/3D support for current GFX-cards

- USB-support, includeing scanners, kbd/mouse/joypad, masstorage etc.

- a printing system that allows the user to get a quality thats o.k.
for the printer used (3.x drivers need not apply)

And a whole lot of other thinks....

Or in other words, not this year.

[Kronos]

@Ben

You know that there is a reason why JIT and 3D haven't made it into the public release....


Undergoing betatesting for several months also means that it may take several months till something is actually released.

Rule 1: If something isn't released, it ain't ready.
Rule 2: If something isn't ready, it doesn't exist.

Hard rules, but also fair rules looking back at the past 12 years  :-x


And one could offcourse argue what "current GFX-cards" means, IMO that doesn't include a Radeon7000 (it's 2005 not 2002 afterall).

[Kronos]

@mikeymike

I'm not talking to anybody contributiong anything positive, I'm talking to Ben H. who has probraly done more harm than all Bills combined.

Also don't forget that Hyperion, apart from being productive, has also set up a pattern of announcing early, releasing late (if at all), a pattern that was true in the years before they started OS4, and hasn't changed eversince.

JIT for example is a thing they talked about since late 2001, and the was "allmost done" since late 2002.

Nobody (probraly not they themselvs) know when the last missing 1% will be done, so it's perfectly o.k. to warn people not to look at what things are promised, but at what is actually there.

Claiming that the stuff I listed won't completed within this year is probraly still on the optimistic side of realism, but who wants realism anyway....