Finishing OS4 Mac PPC port?

[billt]

I'd tried suggesting the iBook as a suitable "Amiga laptop" a few years ago to the official licensing contacts. They weren't interested in allowing it to be done. But, for those interested in collecting specs/documentation for hte PPC mac hardware...

http://amigamac.wikispaces.com/

Though considering how very very very very little was contributed by anyone other than myself (I did copy/paste a couple small things from an email or two, but I did have to do that much too) I doubt it's really worth it at this point. And I would absolutely LOVE OS4 on a laptop. So much I've been trying to figure out other altarnatives for years. Ain't an easy problem to solve...

P.S. Why all the jonesin for the Mac Mini? It's still tethered to a particular location. I want something portable.

[billt]

A couple continues arguing whose car is some, say, Ford Scorpio of theirs. The radio in the car is broken. Meanwhile, I simply break into it (not crashing anything) and fix the radio. Then I knock at the door and say "Hey, I fixed Your radio. You can sell it on ebay now 'cause it's highly profitable. If not, keep it, fine, I'll just tell my friends how to fix such problem if occurs..."

Laws are probably different for computer files, but you being in my car without permission is tresspassing. Someone went through my car a couple months ago when I forgot to lock it. Don't care that nothing was taken (maybe a dollar in cash, not sure), I do not want strangers in my car again. Maybe it's a repair task I'm waiting to have time to enjoy tinkering myself, and you just took that opportunity away from me. You do not know that entering my car and doing ANYTHING truely is the right thing to do in my peculiar circumstances, maybe I WANT it that way or have a need for it to be that way. You don't need to understand, just leave my stuff alone, and risk my wrath should you do more harm than good. Don' tbelieve there is no chance of you doing harm in your example. Simply telling someone you've just violated their personal space may give them psychological issues for years to come. Or doing it and not telling them. Just being there at all can have bad effects on some people. My dad is unreasonably obsessed with guns and doesn't like to be beyond arms reach of one since someone was in his home a while ago, and he wasn't even there at the time. I'm now a little afraid of my dad.

On to computers, there's places where laws allow reverse engineering, and places that do not. If you live someplace that does, then do what you think needs done.

[billt]

You dont need the source code to write drivers.

If you're going to make a good quality driver, it helps to know and understand the API.

[billt]

depends on the driver. The graphics API is not public for example. Not sure about which ones are or are not.

[billt]

Also, there exists a hardware for OS4 already so actually why bother porting the OS to some discontinued and non-supported platform?

Because there exists not a freakin laptop for OS4.*

[billt]

Why portable?  MacMini is really small so you can grab it and bear wherever you want. Roughly...

Laptop sales now outnumber desktop sales in consumer market.

I don't want to be tethered to a monitor or outlet. I want to be able to use it on a bus or at the airport or at my parents' place without having to lug a pile of equipment with me. Mini ain't much useful without monitor, keyboard, etc. I don't see it as an acceptable portable solution, the small size is only a slight improvement to portability over an average sized desktop box.

So there's not really much point investing some year or so in order to have half-legal AOS4 version working on abandoned Mac "Frankenstein" PPCs (if you're lucky).

?? It is your thread & suggestion to get it completed ?? Why the sudden change of heart?

Even these old obsolete PPC Macs offer far superior performance than any "Amiga hardware" ever made even currently today. More features, more choices, PCI-Express in some, convenient portability in laptops. I'm really sick of wondering how long we'll have hardware available, and if there will ever be anything I want to buy (laptop).

I don't understand why making an embedded business model, because there's less demand that everything is Windows that way and thus some potential for a market outside of us, excludes chance of a laptop. All those trendy PC subnotebooks are running embedded chips. Linux is in mor eembedded stuff that not, yet is also quite usable on desktop/laptop, feature set allows that. Why should OS4 not want to scale that way too?

[billt]

My ibook is broken also. The LCD backlight went dark, and it became tethered to a desktop monitor for a couple months. This weekend I finally bothered to copy my stuff over to my PC laptop, so I do nto require the iBook for email right now. Since I do not require to use the iBook for things liek that, I can now set my sights on fixing the thing. I've replaced LCD lamps before. It's a pain, it's tedious, and I need to dig very deeply into it to find out what replacement lamp to order. Ugh... But I will get it fixed. It's a nice laptop. I recently put a much larger hard drive into it. (that was a tedious pain too)

Surely you can make time and save money to fix your Mini as well someday?

[billt]

Well... To be honest... My Mac Mini CD drive got broken finally yet yesterday

cheap Mini combo drive
http://cgi.ebay.com/Apple-iBook-Mac-Mini-G4-CD-RW-DVD-ROM-Combo-8123A-New_W0QQitemZ350081236512QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0

or cheap superdrive
http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Apple-Mac-Mini-Super-Drive-Apple-part-678-0555A_W0QQitemZ260333485184QQcmdZViewItemQQptZApple_Drives_and_Media

How to change it out
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Mac/Mac-Mini-PowerPC-/Optical-Drive/82/5/Page-1

All you need is a little money, some time and motivation.