Consequences of the AmigaOS 3.1 source code "leak", one year after?

[slaapliedje]

Kind of reminds me of the whole SCO vs Linux battle, where they were trying to prove that some code from Unix was reused in Linux, even though all they could find was stuff that was already in the public domain.  

That is more what the source dump is, pretty much public domain.  Guess in less than 50 years the copyright will be up, and all the hardware that it runs on will mostly be dead.  Yeah, that makes sense... seriously copyright law for software should change.  It was meant to be for those writers so they could make money off their royalties.  After 20 years of being out, I can't think of anyone that would purchase software, most 20 year old software won't even run outside emulation or for us nutters who still have an ancient system.

Granted there are still a few commercially supported software packages that I have no problem buying to get continued support.  Hell, I even bought OS4 even though I don't have a system (outside of emulation) that will even run it.  Maybe one day someone will make a new PPC board for my A4000D that doesn't cost my left nut.  But I'm mostly interested in the OS anyhow, and would rather keep my real hardware at 68k.  

It's kind of funny though, speaking of old software that people do still buy.  Like from GOG.com.  Kind of surprised they only do DOSBox wrapped games, and haven't started with UAE wrapped ones.  

The only other thing I could think the source code would be useful fo is to maybe be able to modify it a bit to get it working from a VM or better emulation.  Maybe someone could port it to the TT030 or Falcon?  

[slaapliedje]

So wait, by Pat's logic, if you distribute someone's copyrighted source code, you are in infringement, but if you distribute the binaries (compiled or 'translated'), you are okay?  I mean the copyright is on the pre-compiled TEXT according to him.  

That would pretty much change everything on how software copyright works.  Hell if that logic works, people download compressed (translated into computer 1s and 0s) music and movies that should also not be considered copyright infringement, right?

Not a personal attack, just wondering because if there is a translation clause out there, you could actually argue the difference and maybe push for a more sane copyright on the binaries.  Afterall, binaries do become useless after so long, while source code could be tweaked and updated to work with newer ssystems.

[slaapliedje]

Why would this need "special software" btw?

I was going to ask the same thing, I very rarely see any drivers on a CD for hardware, since almost all of it is handled and is in the kernel.  

Yes, udev is part of systemd, you just entered dragon territory.

As you pointed out, why any special software?  Copy the udev rules over and you're good to go.  Why would this depend on a specific version of libudev?  And even if it did, they actually DO use backward compatibility.

Wrong, it has _nothing_ to do with open source, it's just not the goal of certain popular Linux distributions.

It sounds me to that you would be much more at home running NetBSD, for example.

Yeah, not sure what the beef with Linux is that he has.  A while ago I bought Heavy Gear 2 for Linux.  Guess what?  Even though it came out in 2000,  it still works on my Debian Sid desktop.  That's 16 years ago, for a very much proprietary game.  This "Linux changes all the time!" is a mantra that Microsoft and the BSD guys have thrown out there to try to discredit Linux.  

Granted, as you said, systemd is a whole different beast.  It's still pretty heavy in development, but the api level stuff is all pretty solid, otherwise RedHat wouldn't have put it into RHEL7.

Back on topic; If AmigaOS went open source, even now, it'd help all of the AmigaNG projects, not to mention just improvements all around.  Would be nice to get updated kickstarts as well so we wouldn't have to use reboots to get it patched up to newer standards.

Even if no one was interested in hacking on it, it'd be good to be able to look through the code for academic reasons.  Personally I like looking at how operating systems are designed and how they're used, so from that perspective having source available is fantastic.

[slaapliedje]

I think the sole problem of the AROS kickstarter project is that it's still a reimplementation of the 3.1 API, as the rest of AROS.  

You're right about Hyperion not needing it, since they already have it.  I figure the AROS kickstart is much like EmuTOS for the Atari's.  Open source, but they're still reimplementing things that they wouldn't have to spend as much time on if TOS/GEM had gone fully open source.  EmuTOS doesn't have full compatibility with the hardware banging software out there, and neither does AROS' kickstart.  That's neither here nor there though, since AROS I believe is a recreation of 3.1, whereas we already have 3.9+BB1-BB4 that updates all of this.  

I really should get an burner and try out the AROS kickstart on my A4000D to see how well it works, I've only used it under UAE, but then again I should do the same with EmuTOS.

But (with the exception of Thomas of course ) we have lots of 'hackers' that could/would probably do something amazing with the source if it were actually opened.  

But knowing what I do about various licensing, it's almost impossible to do that.  For example, even if Linus wanted to shift Linux to GPLv3, he probably couldn't because of the clause where if you want to re-license code, you have to have the okay by the developer.  Some of the coders have surely passed on from AmigaOS, so getting things relicensed so that people could reuse it without someone bitching up a storm (whomever that someone is).

[slaapliedje]

Not every machine necessarily needs to be connected to the internet :-)



Of course, and in my experience I've seen the most computer-illiterate people use Linux on a daily basis without any of the hassles you're describing. Upgrades and all that mess as well. These people are nowhere remotely close to what anyone would describe as a "developer".

If I really wanted to mess with them, I'd give them an AmigaOS 3.1 machine ;-)

You aren't kidding, even AmigaOS 3.9 has a ton of patches for it.  

Granted, it DOES make things much simpler to have a machine connected to either the Internet or networking in general.  I use an NFS mount for my Falcon to copy things I've gotten off the net over to it, since I still haven't set up a web browser on it.  It's either that or direct FTP which I also use.  It is much easier than trying to convert everything over to an .hfe and then install it that way (do that too, but it's annoying).

[slaapliedje]

I've said this many, many times....
AROS is OS3.1 compatible. This doesn't mean "restricted to".
Exactly the same as MOS or OS4. It has its own advantages and disadvantages vs the other "NG" options, much as the reverse is true.
Some people know this and just like to repeat it like some sort of weird mantra, others simply aren't aware of this.
You all know which group you fall into.

My point was that if the sources had been available much sooner as open source, AROS could have been spending that time on the 'not restricted to' part of development instead of reverse engineering.  AROS making AmigaOS multi-platform has taken a very long time.  I would absolutely love to be able to buy AROS ROMs and replace kickstart and have a modern version of AmigaOS running on my A4000D, but I don't think it's possible currently, since it would most likely break some compatibility.

[slaapliedje]

Oh, I was well aware of being able to do that, my point was I would rather run an open source operating system that can continually be supported by a community over copying out updated libraries/device files that may or may not get continued support.

[slaapliedje]

replace cd with download software, whatever.
Either way its been uninstalled, reinstalled, etc multiple times and still won't print legal size.

My experience with HP printers specifically and printers in general is  that if they are supported in CUPS, they WILL work a lot better under  Linux than under Windows.  Windows has always had a really crap printing  system.  I mean it's just absolutely terrible.

I recall having  to do some weird voodoo to get my mother's printer to even work after it  randomly stopped printing.  All with install drivers, make sure it's  not plugged in, plug it in when it tells you, oh wait, it didn't detect,  okay unplug, reboot, remove drivers, reboot again, install drivers,  plug in printer.. oh is going to work?  Nope, try again...

[slaapliedje]

Nope, they did not fix anything, they made the camera not work at all with Windows 10 - not work as in.. no software would find any camera, despite it being there the device list, and according to Windows, working.

That's because they're already watching you through it... Device in use.. :laughing:

[slaapliedje]

You mean a company like Red Hat ?

Red Hat definitely keeps their customers happy.  On the other hand, Microsoft are successful by a lot of strong arming of OEMs and generally shady, cut throat deals.  Granted Atari and Commodore were far too concerned with each other to open their eyes up in time to notice that the IBM compatibles were sweeping in to take over.

[slaapliedje]

Okay, no one has really come out and said it... but.. does it actually compile?

I seem to recall when it was leaked that people were having a hard time getting it to compile  anything, and that sources were missing.  But then it was long enough ago that I could be remembering something else.

Can you compile it with gcc?