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

[eliyahu]

@A2666

i guess i don't understand the unhappiness over whether the OS is open-source or not. we have AROS, which is open-source. and API-compatible. and portable. and more advanced. so why not contribute to that project and let the commercial guys keep doing their thing in parallel?

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

LMAO we are sooo scared. Its quite sad that the legacy of Amiga os is being held hostage by a Belgium lawyer.

it wasn't just hyperion which told folks not to link to the archive, by the way. hyperion is not the only claimant to the source copyright.

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

Oh, really? I see lots of references to license to distribute, I've seen no references anywhere saying Commodore's copyright to source was even transferred.

i have no idea if it was or not; thankfully i'm not a lawyer. but the emails and PM i got to not allow links to the archive didn't come from hyperion, and i think i'll leave it at that.

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

@thread

just a heads up that i've already received reports on a couple of posts in this thread. please keep the language appropriate and no personal attacks, please.

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

Thomas, I have to disagree with you here. :-) I think the best thing that could have happened to the Amiga is if the OS had been open sourced early on.  People could have forked it and then worked on whatever parts they wanted. Those changes then could be ported back into the main tree if deemed valuable.

I would even argue that had this occurred early on the Amiga might be in a better position today as there was far more interest in it years ago. Open sourcing the AmigaOS could have been an engine of change that sparked both software and hardware. There was a lot of interest in the late 90s and early 2000s when it was still considered viable.  The Amiga community was the most valuable asset the machine had.

AROS has been around since the mid-90s. doesn't that sort of deflate the argument a little? AROS is open-source, and as much as i like it, it hasn't exactly set the world on fire. in fact it's still 3rd in popularity in the amiga world behind the other two closed-source options.

However, open sourcing the code now is just too late. You are not going to draw anyone into the community now just because the OS is now open.  I can understand keeping your code locked up if you are doing development but just letting it stagnate for so long seems narcissistic. Sadly, it seems to be a recurring theme in the Amiga's history.

it isn't stagnant at all. it has been continually developed -- albeit not at the pace most of us would prefer -- by H&P and hyperion for more than a decade now.

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

@kolla

you're right; that's a fair point. i don't have any solid data to confirm that. i guess i assume that based on interest level on the common forums, third-party software development, number of developers, and interest level at the amiga meetings/shows i have attended. so it's just a subjective feeling. for all we know AROS could be massively popular and just have very quiet users.

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

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.

it wouldn't help hyperion since they already have the source; i don't know how it would help AROS or MOS -- and besides, if it's "available" as some posters suggest, then they already have access to it.

if you want updated kickstarts, again, check out the AROS project. open-source, compatible, and under continuous development. everything the crowd who keeps asking for OS3 to open-sourced wants. except the name and the history. and if that's what you want rather than 'open source,' upgrade to AOS4.

-- eliyahu

[eliyahu]

@thread

just to clarify something: if someone wants to create a 'regina' for z/OS, z/VM, or z/VSE, they are certainly welcome to. i can't imagine why anyone would want to replace the IBM environments for REXX on those operating systems, but the company certainly wouldn't sue. you couldn't call it 'REXX/VM' or anything like that, since that term is copyrighted, but nothing prevents anyone from creating a new interpreter. the one thing you wouldn't be able to do would be replace the hooks in TSO/E to use your software, but since that's not something someone outside of IBM can do anyway (for technical reasons), no issue there.

i'm not sure why this is even in question. the company has encouraged REXX development on a variety of platforms for the past three decades. indeed it even released the source code behind the object rexx runtime some years back. as a mainframer, the use of REXX to control applications was a major factor in my deciding to purchase my first amiga. i use it every day.

-- eliyahu