Where is Amiga DE.

[Magic-Merl]

Many many moons ago, living in the UK, I decided to take a trip and visit Eyetech to aquire a brand new box with a dodgy looking CD inside called "Amiga Party Pack".

I had been waiting for this for a long time.  Eyetech were still developing the A1, at the time, and all was looking quite possitive on the Amiga scene.

After a 3 hour drive back home, I couldn't wait to install my new software.  It was great.  The documentaion was a little sparse and the DE was possibly a little strange, but what the hell.  We had a new piece of software to develop for - and for my money I could develop for ALL platforms at the same time (well....that was the impression).  Bliss.

I spent days and days learning to code, it was a pleasure.

Within a week I had the workings of a simple tile editor.  Within 2 I could scroll the tiles (very smoothly) around the screen in all directions.  I hooked up with a guy from America who had numerous 2d graphics that he wanted to see running in a game which moved the development of my tile editor into a mini game construction kit.  Our characters could slide down slopes.  Climb up steps, ropes and ladders.  Colide with enemies and selected background tiles, collect items, fire weapons - all the usual 2d platform stuff.

I was very impressed with my efforts.  But what happened to DE.  Amiga seemed to loose the plot.  I lost interest (as did many of us) and never programmed for DE again (after the first six months or so)

I liked the concept of DE,  but nothing has happened of any interest for a long time.  Does anyone know what has happened to Amiga DE.  Not so much what Tao want to do with Intent but specifically the Amiga.

How many copies of the Amiga Party Pack were sold?

Are there still active developers, if so how many?

[pjhutch]

Development for the platform seems to have died off. The Amiga Pack seems to be most popular for PDA users esp PocketPC but I haven`t seen any new software for DE for ages....
Wait and see...

[bloodline]

AmigaDE is DEad

[Magic-Merl]

Is the software still compatible with all the devices out there utilising Tao's Intent or Intent 2 for that matter.  Phones, PDA's, Set Top Boxes etc.

Not that I am interested in developing (don't have the time).  But I am curious.

[ikir]

Try to contact KMOS about DE
http://www.kmos.com/
Garry Hare is interested in DE:
http://amigaworld.net/modules/news/article.php?storyid=1617

On SWAUG website there was the text interview, but i can't find it.

Official Amiga website is being reworked (at least it seems) so expect some news about DE (?).
http://www.amiga.com/

(11-Feb-2005) Stay tuned for the new Amiga site, coming soon.

[redrumloa]

How many copies of the Amiga Party Pack were sold?

Bill McEwen had claimed there were 3000+ DE developers, so i would be willing to bet 3000 party packs were sold. Obviously the vast majority of those bought were simply for the $100 off / free OS4 scheme and were not really developers.

DE would appear to be DEad, as many would say. I doubt anyone left following the Amiga in any way still thinks there is any life left in DE.

[Housey]

I'd be interested to see if Hyperion still wants to integrate DE into OS 4.x.

Also, its seems ZeoNeo (http://www.zeoneo.com) are still active, do they still hold any regard for DE ?

[SamuraiCrow]

@Housey

I don't know the official line of Hyperion Entertainment, Inc. but the Freiden brothers seem pretty much against it due to the overhead of having Intent built on top of AmigaOS.

If the polls on AmigaWorld.net are any indication there is some interest in having a version of AmigaDE player supported by AmigaOS 4.  The SDK will probably be stuck on the PC for a long time.

If they come out with an Amiga version and still have their old Linux source code available they might be able to come out with a Mac version...

[Magic-Merl]

Cast your minds back.  Didn't Hyperion claim to have the DE totally integrated into the OS by OS5.  A long way away I know.

Another good idea ruined by Amiga Inc.  Another sunken ship which stands very little chance of being salvaged.

May it rest at the bottom of the Amiga abyss along with every other piece of hardware to date.  (With exception of A1 & OS4 Beta of course)

[Waccoon]

Didn't Hyperion claim to have the DE totally integrated into the OS by OS5. A long way away I know.

I believe that was the official timeline laid about by Amiga Inc.  I don't recall Hyperion making any real announcements about OS5.

As far as I'm concerned, the extreme neglegence of their legal documentation on their developer website tells me they haven't  kept anything up to date.

I'm curious as to what Amiga will say when they update their website.  It had better not be some "Planet Zed II" announcement or some crap.

[BloatedOtter]

Incidentally the only 2 games Zeoneo released for AmigaDE are listed as "not currently available" on their website, while the other games for regular PocketPC are. They seem to be skilled developers, I'm glad they did not waste any more time on AmigaDE so they're still around today.

[SamuraiCrow]

IIRC there was this post on AW.net that claimed that ZeoNeo's invasion program splashed the Amiga-Anywhere logo on the screen as it loaded independantly of DEPlayer.  Apparently AmigaDE is taking on a new shape independant of the DE-player and ZeoNeo is still involved heavily in it.

Gary Hare mentioned something about current versions of DE only working on Windows and WinCE and commented that it wasn't really worthwhile for portable code to only work on those platforms and nothing else.

I think Amiga Inc. is still fighting and kicking but not making much headway without the money they need to keep their code portable to all the platforms necessary.  They're losing to Java on the palmtops and .NET/Mono and Java on the desktops.  Yet another VHS vs. Betamax situation I'm afraid.

[EntilZha]

I don't know the official line of Hyperion Entertainment, Inc. but the Freiden brothers seem pretty much against it due to the overhead of having Intent built on top of AmigaOS.

That's not completely true. I don't have anything against adding intent/DE to OS4. I'm just opposing the idea (of Amiga, Inc) of basing AmigaOS on intent (as AmigaDE does).

However, it's probably no secret that I'm not particularily thrilled by the ideas behind intent... Don't get me wrong, I still think it's the best thing since sliced bread for VCR's, washing machines etc, but Tao never intended it to be anything but this. IMHO, Amiga went the completely wrong way adopting it as a foundation for "anything from cell phones to servers" (sic).

For anything above the mentioned devices (VCR etc), the possibility to "develop once, run everywhere" is pretty much moot (IMHO) since nowadays, PDA's are really going the StrongARM way. Intent is not suited (again IMHO) for anything beyond PDA's. But on the other hand, OS4 will also run perfectly on a PDA. Amiga just didn't notice...

[EntilZha]

Didn't Hyperion claim to have the DE totally integrated into the OS by OS5. A long way away I know

I don't think Hyperion ever claimed anything about OS5 (If I'm wrong, point me your source ;-) )

OS5 has always been Amiga's thing. Hyperion does OS4, they might or might not do OS5, with or without Hyperion's particiaption, based or not based on OS4.

[BigBenAussie]

Damn, I must be the only nutter who believes in DE!!! :nervous:

I am speculating that perhaps the only thing holding back DE is Tao not coming to an exclusivity agreement with KMOS. This may mean AmigaInc/KMOS are developing their own DE base system from scratch, thus the time it is taking(this seems a longshot). Surely Fleecy and co can't have done nothing all this time. Maybe there's some fancy smancy services or somthing.

Well, Garry believes you only have one chance to make a good impression. Errr...Ok...well, not counting DE's initial release......errrr...lets give him that chance.

So, how good will it be if OS4, a new Amiga and a new AmigaDE were released simultaneously?....You'll $hit yourself.

Garry said that we'd be amazed at DE's new features.
Garry said he's set up a developer network for AmigaDE.
Garry said AOS4 would have an AmigaDE development environment.
Garry said the T-shirts would come.

The T-shirts came. They were late but they arrived......and they were way bigger than you expected........which may not be a good thing I guess.....errr. :-(

Look...The 20th anniversary of the Amiga is in a couple of month's time....All involved would be nuts not to capitalise  on this momentous occasion. :whack:

So we'll know soon. :admonish:

Ok. Going back to my happy place now.