Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???

[takemehomegrandma]

"Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???"

Why not? It's deader than dead and has been so for, what, a decade? More? Besides, it's about as useful for browsing the web in 2012 as Lynx is, and even trying to charge money for something like that would be the *real* crime. But again, nobody is even doing that, it's obviously completely abandoned, so I'd say "Go ahead", I don't see any moral obstacles in this whatsoever, and I certainly don't understand why there is a 12 page long thread on the issue...?

[takemehomegrandma]

@CritAnime

How long does a developer/publisher have to not give a notice of discontinuation before software enters that grey area of Abandonware?

If your own moral compass is broken and doesn't show these things to you, then I'd say that when a great numbers of years has passed without product being on sale, without development, when the IP owner obviously doesn't care and has simply left the scene many years ago, and all means of communications and support that previously worked does no work since many years (reseller chain, product web page, developers e-mail, etc). Then after many years (is it a decade in this case?) when people (more than a few) independently of each others starts talking about "is it abandonware" because of one or more reasons above, then it probably is. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, chances are it's a duck...

Personally I would be inclined to say not to crack it. You never know if the development is in some form of hibernation.

The discussion is about v2.4 and nothing else, and this version is not sold and hasn't been sold for years and years. Should they release a v3.0 or something in the future (not very likely at all, I am certain it's pretty solidly abandoned now), then of course you should re-evaluate its features (CSS3? HTML4/XHTML? HTML5? Javascript engine? etc, etc) against its price, and buy that one if you want it and like it. But again, that's not what this discussion was about...

I don't think we'll ever see a viable browser for 68k Amigas with the *essential* features like those I mentioned above. It's completely unrealistic. It will be way too complex and heavy SW for way too limited, under-powered and old HW to handle. It will probably be worse than "Timberwolf" on a Sam440 by a factor of 50 or more, it will be unusable. If you are into retro Amiga (which many people here are), then use it for what it is, i.e. having fun with your museum objects, playing the old games on floppies, using the old apps, etc. Don't expect it to become modern, because it won't. That's why we have the "NG" systems like MorphOS. And on MorphOS you can run the Odyssey browser, which is heavily inspired by how IBrowse looked and functioned. It has all the essential features I mentioned above (it even beats Internet Explorer 9 in both CSS3/HTML5 features and overall performance), on top of that it has all the features you could wish for, and everything completely in the IBrowse style, so I'd dare to say that had IBrowse ever been evolved into a 2012 level browser, it would be pretty close (even an exact match) to what Odyssey is on MorphOS today.

Odyssey is IBrowse done right!


@Colmiga

I registered my copy of MUI in May 2010 and Stefan replied to me in a few days with a key

But MUI is anything but dead, it's very much under development, so it can't be compared to Ibrowse in any way...

[takemehomegrandma]

any coding effort would be better aimed at an open-source alternative. When it comes to spending money, a bounty for a small and fast open-source browser would be better spent. This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software

Writing a browser from scratch (to support all these modern features and standards), open source or not, isn't going to happen. Not on Amiga at least. The resources this will take would be enormous, even for a large company. Proposing an Amiga-bounty(!) to produce a browser for 68k from scratch is a little naive, it simply won't happen. So it would have to be based on either Firefox (bloated, slow and bulky) or Webkit (like Google Chrome, Apple's Safari and MorphOS's Odyssey), and *neither of these* (especially Firefox) running on a 68k processor wouldn't be very fun, even if you *could* make it running.

This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software at a somewhat reasonable price.

Fab has generously opened up and provided his Odyssey sources to developers on both AROS and OS4, and also gave a lot of advice to help them. However, neither the AROS or OS4 version are matching the MorphOS Odyssey 1.17 browsing esperience (especially not the OS4 version). So that didn't help much, despite the sources being handed out, with aid and advice to go with them. Although the main problems on those platforms has a lot to do with the OS themselves lacking features that you can't solve easily as an *application developer*, instead it's up to the OS developers to to improve the OS in various areas. Or you simply use MorphOS!

Netsurf is almost useable, with native gui it would be nice browser for REAL 68k amigas.

Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc. It has developed to work very low spec machines.

Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.

Interesting, but I always heard you needed a really fast/lots of RAM Amiga to run it?

OK..  So, what's your definition of "low spec?"

From what I can see on Aminet:

Requirements:
=============    
* AmigaOS 3.x  
* Picasso / CGX compatible graphic card.  
* 64 MB Ram (128MB for complex sites).  
* 68020+ CPU with FPU, for usable speed 68060 or emulator is required.  

With the ACAs and others out there, 64M RAM isn't out of the question (although saying an 060 for "usable speed" concerns me).
But that 2nd one on the list is going to be a killer.  I don't think many people would consider RTG low spec...  Lots of AGA (and OCS) only Amigas out there...

Oh you think RTG is too high spec?

I don't agree, I'd even say those requirements were a bit optimistic. At least for *real* use (instead of "can be used on some sites").

For the common, every-day, media-rich 2012 level browsing people are used to today, a semi modern RTG card (like Radeon R200/R300) would be kind of essential, 128MB RAM an *absolute minimum* (ask the Efika users), the double is preferred. I doubt it would be very usable on a 68060 as well, it would stagger under a normal web page with lots of div's, more than the most rudimentary css, and one or a few javascripts.

Look at this page (it's a Swedish newspaper):
http://www.dn.se/

It's a normal, every-day page, just one of the several of its kind we encounter when we do our daily browsing routine. It has more than 750 separate div's, most of those has their own styles attached to them, its css has more than 3000 entities, it has some 20 javascripts, it has close to 100 images, several other media objects.

I'd like to see a browser do this on a 680x0 CPU on an AGA screen. And why not some tabbed browsing as well?

Or no, I'd rather not.

There is a limit to what "It has developed to work very low spec machines" can do for you. After that, you simply need more resources under your engine hood.

I don't think webkit is considered bloated or bulky. It has been used on hand-helds for a long time for instance, which is what most people use as a *definition* for "very low spec machines".

Last generation handhelds stomped the Sam computer into the ground. The current generation handhelds stomps the entire PPC architecture into the ground (except perhaps the highest specced G5's). And you are talking about 680x0, where you think 68060 is a bit over the top?

Yeah...

:lol:

[takemehomegrandma]

I have actually seen someone browsing the web on a C64. It's true!

Doesn't make much sense though, other than for "gimmick" reasons, or to prove some nerdy point.

You can have *lots* of fun with a C64, even in 2012, if you take it for what it is. But if you want to browse the web in 2012 (for *real*), then you'll have more fun using enough modern equipment for modern browsers to run.

IMHO of course.

[takemehomegrandma]

Indeed, a port of Dillo would be much more useful.

Sounds about as useful as IBrowse 2.4 is today?

[takemehomegrandma]

We can't have modern browser with all features, just not possible. Netsurf would be nearest thing to that.

Could be that Netsurf would be the best option. But there is no way "around" the increasing complexity of normal, "every-day" websites and the HW requirements in order to display them properly, though.

I kind of admire any effort to update the "browsing experience" on classic Amigas. It has some nerdy kind of coolness over it that I like. Taking the HW way past what people commonly thinks would be possible. And that was my point of bringing up web browsing on the C64 above, I never meant to say that Amiga classic HW and the C64 HW would be the same or has the same capabilities, or anything like that.

But no browser on any classic Amiga can bring you a *proper* (read: *seriously useful*) browsing experience today. The penalties, compromises and sacrifices will be too big to make it meaningful. It won't come close. So what's the point, really? I mean, other than the "geek factor"? If you want to browse Aminet from your classic Amiga, you can do that already from IBrowse. You want more? Well, with some work, you could indeed get some more. But you could never get as far as to 2012. You would miss it by a decade. Or thereabout.

The C64, and the classic Amiga HW, is really cool HW. I have 3 C64's, 1 C128, 2 A1200 and 1 A600. They are in my garage, but sometimes I dream of rigging them up and spend a couple of days going through all the disks, all the games, read all the magazines I have saved, etc. Someday I know I will do that, just haven't had enough time yet. But they are museum objects, retro gear, and I would never use them to "surf the web" in 2012. It would be for retro reasons alone.

I like the Amiga environment though, and I always fancied the idea of having an Amiga with modern capabilities. I think my MorphOS MacMini fully qualifies there. And Odyssey (not "MUI-OWB", quit saying that please) actually does a better job with HTML5/CSS3 than Microsoft's latest publicly available version of Internet Explorer, and it outperforms Firefox by a magnitude, and it does it in a true IBrowse fassion.

That I like!

[takemehomegrandma]

MorphOS is an operating system.  It runs 68k code in an emulation layer just like AROS

Actually, there is nothing "just like AROS" about the way MorphOS runs 68k Amiga programs, and there is certainly no "emulation layer". MorphOS has a 68k to PPC JIT, but beyond that it's all native, and the Amiga programs runs happily directly on the operating system, in the same memory space as PPC compiled programs, using the same sheduler, the same resources, the same signalling system etc!

AROS on the other hand uses UAE which emulates Amiga HW, and every Amiga program runs inside its own emulated "sandbox".

A huge difference actually!

[takemehomegrandma]

That is an emulation layer...
One that runs "just in time," but an emulation layer nontheless.

Nope, emulation is when you use software to mimic hardware. UAE does that, but it's not what the JIT in MorphOS does. There is no "layer" sitting in between the Amiga applications and the OS/HW, it's all native.

[takemehomegrandma]

Yes, and that's how they get those 68k commands to run...  In software..

Nope, the 68k binaries are changed into PPC binaries. This does not involve emulation. Nothing is being run "in software", it's all native.

[takemehomegrandma]

@desiv

Translator != Emulator. Trance translates 68k code into PPC code, it's not software that mimics hardware. Translating isn't emulating, two different concepts really.

A 680x0 CPU *emulator* on the other hand would be a program (written in PPC in this case) trying to simulate a physical 68k CPU as close as possible, and it is boxed within this emulator you would run your Amiga 68k programs, and you run them as unchanged 68k binaries, since this "virtual 68k CPU" emulator is in place to run them. In this case you would *actually have* SW to mimic HW. As the 68k code is running, it affects the Program Counter of this "virtual CPU", as well as the available registers, and stack, etc, because it's a CPU (emulated in SW) with all its features and functionality, and thanks to that, it can handle the 68k binaries unchanged the whole time, no need for translation anywhere in the process when a "real CPU" is there by emulation. Then add emulation for the other chips found in a physical Amiga, and you get UAE.

But this is not what Trance does, it does not emulate a 68k CPU, it translates 68k binaries into PPC binaries, which then runs natively without any need for emulation layers.

[takemehomegrandma]

OK, not the real topic, but how do the Amiga programs written for an Agnus, Denise, and Paula run on a MorphOS system (which is APPLE hardware) without an Agnus, Denise, or Paula (let's ignore Gary, Ramsey, etc. for now)?  

Programs that explicitly needs those chips present (for "HW banging" instead of using Amiga OS API's in the proper way) will indeed need an emulator, and you can download UAE for those (mostly) games. You can easily set it up so that UAE is transparently started when you double-click the game/app icon. But practically all applications that followed the correct, formal guidelines from Commodore and using OS calls instead, will work fully native, side by side with programs compiled directly for MorphOS, in the same memory space, sharing the same sheduler, the same system resources (both HW/SW/OS), etc. No difference from a real Amiga, no emulation layer in between. And this actually goes for most Amiga applications you would want to use today.

Wikipedia says, "Emulation addresses the original hardware and software environment of the digital object, and recreates it on a current machine."

True, a C64 emulator that only emulates the HW wouldn't be much fun, would it? The HW is the vessel, the SW the soul. Without it, you would only have a bunch of useless "silicon", that you can't even look at or use as a door stop, since it's all "virtual". So the "ROM" is needed as well. In many emulators of consoles, you only need one ROM file that includes the game and everything. On UAE you need the Kickstart ROM for the system, and a separate ADF "ROM" for the SW. But this is emulation we are talking about now, which is not how MorphOS usually runs Amiga SW.

This describes MorphOS

No.

AROS

Only partly, when trying to run 68k apps on x86 HW, since AROS uses UAE for that.

UAE

True. UAE is an emulator.

and any software that pretends, imitates, or in any other fashion, lies to you saying it is an Amiga when it is not.

MorphOS provides a fully native Amiga API environment, and all programs runs natively on that. Programs are not normally (unless using UAE) run on an emulator, not if you don't want to. UAE isn't even included on MorphOS, since it's not needed. It's all native. On an emulator, you first start up a program (running on top of the native OS) that creates a little "box" consisting of a necessary HW/SW environment, and it is this program that then "executes" the game/program inside that box, taking care of HW calls, OS calls, all SW, etc, etc. This is emulation, and this is absolutely not how MorphOS runs Amiga apps. They are run directly/natively on the OS, no emulation layer in between, they are not executed within some "emulator program".

it only recreates an Amiga-like environment

It provides a full Amiga environment, fully native, on HW that isn't Amiga HW (thus doesn't have the Amiga custom chips).

(and poorly since there is MorphOS software that will not run on an Amiga).

MorphOS SW compiled as 68k that won't run on an Amiga probably uses features that MorphOS has that Amiga OS simply doesn't have. There has been a lot of evolution in MorphOS as well, backwards compatibility has been prioritized, but MorphOS is so much more than that. MorphOS has gone quite far beyond the point where Amiga OS stopped. It has stuff that Amiga OS never had. An A500 with WB1.2 can't run all OS3.1 apps. It's quite natural...

[takemehomegrandma]

Interesting statement there.  I think we're just in semantics now..

Could be. Or perhaps rather different views on definitions of the concepts "emulation" vs "translation"?

Are all of the 68k opcodes supported on the PPC?

:confused:

Of course not. And there is no need for that...

If not, what does the OS do when an app issues a command using an opcode for a 68k CPU that isn't supported on the PPC?

AFAIK no 68k opcodes is ever being executed. If that would have been the case, it would indeed have been through emulation, that would be the only way; by emulating the 68k CPU. Which AFAIK isn't what MorphOS is doing at all.

If it translates it, even on the fly, then (IMHO) it's emulating the 68k CPU from the programs perspective.

Programs (or "opcode streams" if you prefer) are de-facto rewritten, either dynamically while running, or before being started, through JIT. If a 68k Amiga program would ask which "68k CPU" it's running on, I'm sure it would be presented as 68060 (although in practice there is a mixture of numerous instruction sets), just like Itix said.

Two funny things about this though:

• There is no 68k CPU available in a MorphOS system, not even "virtual" (I don't share Itix definition there at all, my view of emulated/"virtual CPU" is in post #230, and had it been a "virtual 68k CPU" in the system in addition to the physical PPC CPU, it would mean that in the manner/context Amiga 68k apps is being executed on MorphOS, we would have a de-facto mutli-CPU system (which isn't really possible in an Amiga context, unless done in a PowerUP or AMP kind of way). And it's not like that on MorphOS, where all resources are shared, the sheduler is the same, etc. But maybe it's a matter of semantics as you said...? )
   
  
• The code actually doing the probing, will (at the moment it is being executed by the PPC CPU) be all PPC code. Which is kind of ironic, isn't it? It's being PPC without being "aware" of it (or indeed needing to care about it). Reconstructed. Native. And *that* is "the programs perspective"!
  

I love emulation.  I love virtual machines.

Well, have fun with UAE then. On MorphOS the Amiga 68k apps are being run natively on the OS (as PPC code), which in turn runs fully native on the hardware. No virtual machine. No "emulation layer". No 68k CPU in the system, neither physical nor virtual.

It sounds like MorphOS is doing "emulation right" in my opinion.
It's using it only when it needs to.

Exactly, it has UAE as an option to emulate a 68k Amiga!

:p

[takemehomegrandma]

@Topic

Valid key-files for IBrowse is obviously out in the wild. As I have said before, I can't personally see any moral obstacles for using them, as things are now.

You want web browsing to "continue"(?!) on classic Amigas, then:

1) Check out the possibilities to purchase the sources of IBrowse.
2) Check out the possibilities to purchase the sources of Voyager. As Itix said, it's not at all unstable, I used Voyager back on MorphOS 1.4, and its stability is definitely on par with IBrowse.

A community bounty ("NOOO, NOT AGAIN!!!!") might be an option, but IMHO, chances are very big that both IP holders will either:

1) Ignore any requests.
2) Greatly overestimate the real life value of the code today (like Magellan2 for example)

But why not try?

However, I think it's pretty safe to claim that neither of these would ever come very far (if anywhere at all) from where it is today. That is: Nowhere close to where Odyssey (for instance) is. They would both be stuck in past standards and never become really useful for much more than browsing Aminet and other Amiga-specific sites that is specially made for "smooth-talking" these kind of incapable browsers. My sentiments about the classic hardware on which they will run on remains: It can never be enough for modern standars. So why bother? Really?

Use the current IBrowse/Voyager/Aweb for what you can, if you want to. Don't expect any of them to become anything more, especially not for classic Amigas.

It's "teh true"!

[takemehomegrandma]

Why do so many legacy related threads get jacked by NG guys pounding their personal pulpits, lol.

Cracks me up to see how rabidly threads get derailed.

But FFS, this thread is more than FOUR YEARS OLD, its main question has been answered *a few times per year* since then. :lol: "Legacy thread derailed" -- Are you kidding me?

:lol:

(Duce, you seem to only show up to complain *about* discussions. Is that really all you can do? Meta discussions about what you think should be discussed? BTW, in another recent thread, weren't you "migrating" to AW.net?)