AfA OS (AROS For AmigaOS)

[bloodline]

motorollin wrote:
I don't have many hacks. Just VisualPrefs.

What does AfAOS actually do?

--
moto

Well, as you say, it replaces AmigaOS libraries with AROS ones. This allows 68k AmigaOS users to take advantage of AROS enhancements to the system... right now this is a "proof of concept", but as more libraries get ported it should help bring 68k users more up to date (since no one else is supporting the 68k anymore).

[bloodline]

motorollin wrote:
And I guess because the original libraries are not overwritten, backwards compatibility is maintained?

No, backward compatibility is maintained because AROS is fully compatible with AmigaOS. The original libraries are overwritten.

Sounds cool, but not enough for me to get excited over yet.

Maybe not... :-)

[bloodline]

motorollin wrote:

bloodline wrote:
No, backward compatibility is maintained because AROS is fully compatible with AmigaOS. The original libraries are overwritten.

Are you sure? Look here. Specifically this part:

It is easy to boot with or without the new libraries.
No original libraries in your LIBS: directory need to be overwritten

On disk, your old libraries are not touched, so you can use them if you want. But in memory the old libraries are gone... no program can use them until the AROS ones are removed (by a reset/reboot/etc)

Maybe this has changed since that document has written. If AROS is fully compatible with AmigaOS, then why use OS3.x+AfAOS at all? Why not just use AROS natively and use this to run AmigaOS binaries?

--
moto

--EDIT
Ahhh, I've just looked on the AROS Exec home page and there is no Amiga version of AROS. I guess that's why some of the AROS libraries are being backported. I hope the ultimate goal is to have a fully ported and bootable AROS environment for 68k Amigas.

Yes :-)

[bloodline]

Matt_H wrote:
@ bloodline and other AROS folks

I'm confused as to why the new libraries (freetype2.library, for example) still need the AFA memory patch. I thought AROS was supposed to be source compatible with AmigaOS3.1. Shouldn't the 68K-compiled libs just work out of the box? Or do they depend upon AFA patched functions?

I'm not sure exactly how AFA works as it patches away AmigaOS, it all a bit messy really... but I think the AFA memory patch is something that sorts out the private function probems (AROS and AmigaOS may have different private funtions, invisible to software on the system).