What are your favourite software packages?

[Iggy_Drougge]

I run an A4000, same CPU since 1993. 16 MB "fast" on the mobo and 48 additional on the Fastlane Z3 SCSI card. Retina Z3BLT graphics card and Ariadne 1 ethernet.

The OS is OS 3.0, running on top of 3.1 ROMs which I bought in order to install OS 3.9, but I've never come around to that, since its advantages over my current, heavily patched and extended system are negligible.

My favourite packages are:
THOR - Thule Offline Reader. It's really the best news/mail/fido/whatever reader in existence, bar none. Some people swear by YAM, but it's not flexible enough for me, and the interface is not to my liking, either.
ArtEffect - It's the closest thing to Photoshop there is on the Amiga, and whatever the advantages of the other art packages on the Amiga are, I was reared on Photoshop. Can't really get myself to like Photogenics.
ScanQuix - used in conjunction with ArtEffect. Finally a working modern scanner solution like on the Mac or PC.
PPaint - It's like DPaint, but more modern. I just wish that it weren't so bloody slow.
KingCON - Makes every other shell/console handler seem like pure stone age.
IBrowse - People often complain about how Amiga browsers don't support this or that HTML or Javascript feature. But IBrowse has so many functions that it'd smash the PC browsers to bits if those HTML technicalities were fixed. Who needs popup killers and all that when you've got IB?

[Iggy_Drougge]

* Blacks Editor 1.0 (the subsequent versions are unstable...) If it had syntax colouring, it would be my favourite editor on any platform. (Yes, I know GoldEd has syntax colouring, but I prefer Blacks Editor, which is very good balance of power and simplicity. No eye candy for me

I mostly use a text editor for writing mail, and for that purpose, Thor's FSED suits me nicely. For all other tasks, I use plain Ed, or sometimes CED. GED is to slow-loading for me, and the control keys are all wrong, though I do use it for updating a few files, for no particular reason. For ascii art, I'm partial to a pre-ASDG version of CygnusED, with a hard-coded US keymap.

For TCP/IP, I use AmiTCP 4.2. It took me two years to set up, but I learned how to use it in the process, so now a GUI is just superfluous to me.

Other little things:
Visage. Lots of nice shell arguments, I just wish that it would work better with graphics cards.
AmIRC. How could you not love this program?
JACOsub. It could be more modern, but it works, and it's the only contender.

[Iggy_Drougge]

Dietmar wrote:

I use plain Ed, or sometimes CED. GED is to slow-loading for me, and the control keys are all wrong

It's not nice to comment on software if you have no clue With GoldED you can use exactly the same control keys. Just run the face/on utility and install the CED keymap (if you are too lazy to configure the keymap yourself, that is).

As to loading speed, that probably varies wildly with the hardware you are using. I can't count to one before it's up and running on my computers (UAE, Pegasos), which are only moderately fast @ 600MHz and 1.4GHz. On a 040/40 or with a slow 1GB HD,  you have a point.

Note that, if the HD is slow, and you are a victim of "classic" hardware, it's a good idea to enable the image cache, that has a major effect on starting performance. Also, enable the "resident" option, so that any future start of the editor will be near-instant.

It's not nice to accuse people of not having a clue, Hr. Eilert. ;-)
However, my light use of GED hasn't given me any incentive to explore all its features. And no matter what you might think, Clipboard functions should use the keys favoured by every other Amiga application in existence, just like you quit with RAmiga-Q and open a document with RAmiga-O. It's your program, so you're free to set any key combinations you wish, but I reserve the right to complain about lack of adherence to interface standards.

You're right, I do use a lowly 040, I just don't expect a speed penalty when using a text editor. Your computers, OTOH, aren't moderately fast, they're absurdly fast.

[Iggy_Drougge]

Hr. Eilert, I have refrained from upgrading my GED, both since I fear that it will be even slower, and since my current version does all I use it for. If I were a programmer, I would probably be more inclined both to use a newer version and configure it properly. As it stands, though, I just put up with it.