Zune for all platforms

[takemehomegrandma]

The Zune-project on power2people is splitted in several projects.

phase 1 is making it full compatible to MUI38.
http://www.power2people.org/projects/profile/61

In the next phase it will be ported to MorphOS and AmigaOS to have a common standard for applications.

Please donate and support the efforts.

What do you think? I hope for more common bounties to reduce the split in the community.

The "common standard" already is MUI, it will never be Zune. Current version is MUI4, which is an *integrated component* of MorphOS (an OS component required for MorphOS to run, older versions won't work). MUI4 sets the standard, the agenda, if you want a common denominator. On OS4 and AmigaOS, MUI 3.8/3.9 is available as add-on package/bundle. A lot of work has recently been put into bringing some MUI4 features into the OS4 version of MUI3.9, hence it's possible to port Fab's excellent web browser Odyssey, and also other MorphOS stuff, to OS4.

I think this is the path to go for AROS - aim for making Zune MUI4 compatible instead of expecting people to go back and satisfy with a MUI3.8 (i.e. MorphOS 1.0 IIRC) level API. There is a reason to why development goes *forward*, and that's because it brings a lot of new goodies to the table! And once you tastes the sweet's, there is no going back!

[takemehomegrandma]

i have a different view. When you want to support different platforms you need a reliable environment and not new features. Zune will not stop at this point and there is no reason not to improve it. Even if not everyone welcomes it now, it should be done and when it is really available everyone can decide if he takes it or not.

Nobody is suggesting that Zune development should stop, where did you get that from? Zune is - and should be - a MUI re-implementation, and of course it should be improved (this is one of many areas that AROS lags seriously behind, the only way to ever catch up is start developing). It should be improved to cover more and more of MUI's features so that eventually it behaves exactly as MUI does. AFAIK it has quite a bit to go, but this should be the goal. Then, when/if Zune is 100% MUI3.8 compatible (for example), then the same AROS program using this API could be recompiled for MorphOS, 68k Amiga OS or OS4 more easily. MUI is backwards compatible, OS's with MUI3.9 should be able to run MUI3.8 applications (and so on). But the added features in MUI4 aren't neglectable, it makes new kind of applications possible, better and easier. The right way forward is to put effort in developing the the various "MUI" implementations in Amiga OS 68k, AROS and OS4 towards MUI4, and not trying to turn the clock backwards a decade or more and expect everyone to write MorphOS 1.0 level applications (GUI-wise), and AFAIK, Zune has yet a bit to go to even reach that point.

[takemehomegrandma]

I don't see anyone arguing for sticking to 3.8. The point of the bounty is to bring Zune *forward* to MUI 3.8 compatibility as a first step. Getting to 3.8 would already be a big step in the right direction and make it a lot easier for app developers to target OS4, AROS and MOS in one application.

Then MUI4 compatibility can be a next step. At that point an OS4 port becomes desirable too.

No-where did I say otherwise, did I? Of course Zune should be developed forward. What I objected to was the idea of having a more or less incomplete MUI3.8 (or less) "Zune" ported to MorphOS and other OS's, expecting this limited (and perhaps somewhat different and perhaps not always 100% MUI compatible) API to become some kind of standard. The only standard is MUI, it's still evolving AFAIK, and Zune has to walk carefully in its footsteps until it catches up, carefully avoiding "branching out". Not the other way around. It will be great though for AROS once it's capable of compiling MUI3.8 level applications, and AROS developers using this API will be able to recompile their SW to other MUI3.8 (or later) enabled platforms more easily.

[takemehomegrandma]

It's not very interesting before it's 3.8 compatible, that's true. But when it is, having a port makes a very big difference:

Anyone wishing to target MOS, AROS and AmigaOS at the same time will need their software to work with Zune to have it work on AROS.

No, when Zune reaches MUI3.8 level, anyone wishing to target MorphOS, 68k Amiga OS, AROS and OS4 should have their software work with MUI3.8!

If by then any MUI3.8 applications doesn't compile for/run on Zune, then Zune is broken or lacking stuff, as simple as that. It's the MUI API that needs to be intact, regardless the underlying software (be it Zune or anything else).

This confusion of API's and underlying software sounds very familiar to the "oh, but MorphOS is not Amiga because it doesn't have the Amiga sources" nonsense, completely disregarding the fact that the very same Amiga API is completely re-implemented by using *other* sources, and it works just fine!

Not only would it be impossible (or have to be done in a very weird way, as already explained by others) to run Zune in parallel with MUI4 on MorphOS, or "MUI3.9 + some 3rd party MUI4 additions" on OS4 for that matter, it would also be *totally redundant*, since all MorphOS developers, and OS4 developers too, can *already* target their software for the  MUI3.8 API if they really want to. No need to squeeze in some Zune SW with a hammer and a shoehorn, that provides a fraction of the functionality compared to what's natively available, and in a worse way. Crazy!

If Zune is available on all three platforms, then they get a choice: They can target Zune on all of them, as the lowest common denominator, without worrying about incompatibilities, or they can target three different libraries with varying capabilities.

In that case, it will be MUI3.8 that will be the common denominator. Zune is merely a re-implementation of MUI. In practice, this will mean MUI on MorphOS and Zune on AROS, both using the same API (if Zune is done right). Why is this so difficult to understand?

[takemehomegrandma]

Au contraire, mon frere, it is you that has missed my point. As I said before, I don't care if MorphOS gets Zune or not, as long as the goal of improved cross-compatibility is reached.

Then fulfill Zune's purpose, and make it a true MUI API re-implementation on AROS! For a start, the MUI 3.8 API would be something to aim for...

[takemehomegrandma]

By the definition of Zune (read MUI-replacement) at any point where such a compability layer would be needed it should be considered a bug in Zune.......

Please entertain redefining Zune as cross-platform GUI toolkit. Then you'll see your talk of bugs in Zune is totally missing the point.

Are you suggesting *a brand new* GUI toolkit, reminding of some very old MUI API but incompatible to MUI to various degrees, and *ahelluvalot less capable*? And you think this would be better than giving Zune true MUI compatibility?

Wow.

Well, go ahead and do it, relese your "Zune" for MorphOS and OS4, see how many will use it, and learn the true meaning of "redundant" the hard way...

[takemehomegrandma]

You will be able to use a lot of MUI code with Zune when it's fully MUI3.8 compatible

You should be able to use *all* MUI3.8 code when Zune is fully MUI3.8 capable, right?

This is exactly what this thread is about! Read the bounty description for yourself:
http://www.power2people.org/projects/profile/61

Yes I get that much, MUI3.8 re-implementation. But what I don't quite understand is why Zune should be ported to Amiga OS, MorphOS and OS4, when all these platforms *already have* MUI3.8? AROS is the only one lacking this, and this is what Zune aims to fix, right? Then the MUI3.8 API will be everywhere, right? So why port Zune anywhere?

Edit: OK, after thinking about this one more time, I now realize that it must be as a way of improving 68k MUI on Amiga OS 68k by simply replacing it, as development goes on further and tries to catching up with MUI4, right?

[takemehomegrandma]

Do they though, do they all have access to MUI3.8? As far as I understood, MorphOS has MUI4, OS4 has MUI3.9. It's only OS3 that has MUI3.8. Whilst it might seem like I'm being pedantic, the point is that these different versions of MUI are not fully compatible with each other.

Backwards compatibility to MUI3.8 API, as the lowest common denominator?

[takemehomegrandma]

Are these incompatibilities documented somewhere, like in a chart or something?

Code: [Select]

Feature name    works in MUI3.8     works in MUI3.9      works in MUI4.0
Thing 1              yes                 missing              yes
Thing 2              yes                 yes                  flaky
Cat                  yes                 yes                  yes
Hat                  missing             yes                  yes
etc...

Then we all know (1) what to avoid for full cross-platform, and (2) what to fix in our OS of choice's MUI.

I expect Zune developers to have some kind of list like this as their roadmap towards MUI4? If they haven't mapped out the differences between the MUI versions and current Zune, they ought to be quite lost. Maybe they could post it on the bounty page? Would also be a good way of doing progress reports to show how Zune is developing over time...

[takemehomegrandma]

One could ask app developers what they think should be in a hypothetical MUI 5.x, feature list and then take that info along with examining the currently available MUI3.9 and MUI4 implementations to shape the Zune development plan.

MUI is still under development AFAIK, so let the Zune re-implementation coneinue being a re-implementation of MUI (3.8/4.0) and nothing else, and then when/if MUI reaches some MUI5 level, only *then* have a look at it!

[takemehomegrandma]

Money is not the issue. The main problem is that the effort is rather pointless. MUI4 is a closed environment moving target for a close to nonexisting plattform. Why bother with it? In my view, AROS and Zune should ignore whatever goes on in MUI4 and MorphOS and rather dictate its own future on its own merits, this so called "catch up" game doesnt help anyone. The sooner AROS breaks away from MorphOS and AmigaOS4, the better.

1. Not having a proper MUI re-implementation would affect Amiga compatibility in a very negative way (as it already does), making it more difficult to develop- or port applications for all 4 platforms, instead of easier (which seems to be the spirit of this bounty). MUI is the common denominator.

2. Since time and effort has to be spent on development *anyways*, why not spend it towards making it easier to port Amiga, MorphOS and OS4 applications to AROS (which, again, seems to be the spirit of this bounty), instead of creating a GUI that's something obscure and incompatible to Amiga, available only to the dozen of AROS devs and handful of users?

[takemehomegrandma]

While I do agree that AROS would benefit in the long run from going it's own way with Zune, I don't agree it's time yet. Catch up first. Then port, so it's available "everywhere", making it a much more desirable target. Only if/when Zune is there is it really worth talking about extending it and try to make Zune more desirable than the original MUI.

OMG, not another pointless branch-out just for the sake of it! Haven't we had enough of those...? Is this the true long-term goal of the bounty project? Would be *very* interesting to know that now, because it suddenly feels a lot more pointless and futile...

[takemehomegrandma]

I think starting with Zune and 3.8 compatiblity is a good begin, but zune could and should evolve further.

You know what has evolved further than MUI3.8? MUI4! Of which some of its functionality is now being brought to OS4 by third party developers on the OS4 platform, for the purpose of making it easier to port/write cross-platform applications. Does that ambition sound familiar...?

[takemehomegrandma]

Is there some agreement between MorphOS and MUI dev that MUI4 can not be used on AOS4 or AROS?

Of course the MUI API can be re-implemented (just like the Amiga API was re-implemented on MorphOS)...