Amiga OS 5 prediction

[amigadave]

@BooBoo1200 and Bamiga2002,

I must disagree.  What you are describing will be no different than what I and downix are suggesting.

Amiga Inc., or the Amiga Community via Open Source, or a combination of both should build a brand new AmigaOS on top of QNX.  QNX provides the glue to access at low level the graphics and sound card chips, the sata hd controller, usb, bluetooth, etc. Amiga Inc., and/or Amiga Community provide the look & feel, and compatibility to legacy Amiga programs, while making improvements to the overall OS functions where ever possible as well.  Like mentioned before, QNX already runs on so many different CPUs and it can scale from cell phone size devices, all the way up to network servers and beyond.

I can't for the life of me see an advantage for Amiga Inc., or the community to start from scratch in building a new OS.  Using QNX as a base starting point will speed development time by years, not just months of work.

[downix]

BooBoo1200 wrote:
Now that Amigas will not have any custom chip the Os is the only thing that remains Amiga and a Os based around the source code of Workbench - Os 4 -I would argue that is Amiga But an Os based around QNX,Linux or any other Os this is not Amiga
A simple Loop Hole to call a Linux Distro Amiga Because they own the Amiga name a real insult to the Amiga name.

We shall see what they do when the time comes.  

Curious, have you ever looked at Amithlon?

[ne_one]

@downix

Ironically that is something the AmigaOS riding on top of it would bring. While not huge support, it does bring enough which, when combined with what QNX already has, does make a viable, even if limited, platform.

In this scenario, I'm not convinced that existing applications or the remaining developer base would bring much to the fold. However, there would be compelling new opportunities.

It's tough to say if a new generation platform would retain any elements of the traditional Amiga. A replacement desktop and the CLI would likely adopt some conventions but who would be driving this process? To this point we haven't even heard a rumour of any major players being involved. So who's doing the development?

[ne_one]

@amigadave

QNX already runs on so many different CPUs and it can scale from cell phone size devices, all the way up to network servers and beyond.

Which does seem to fit with this scalability mandate.

However, at the same time we're hearing claims about outperforming OSX, which presumably relates more to the desktop environment. In this area QNX is obviously lacking. Thankfully, developing a user environment is much less formidable than taking on an entire OS.

I can't for the life of me see an advantage for Amiga Inc., or the community to start from scratch in building a new OS

Agreed. Which makes you wonder why they simply didn't do this in the beginning.

[jarroyo]

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dentunes wrote:
Just for the record, Jobs didn't BUY his own company when he returned. He returned because Apple, under Gil Amelio, bought NeXT and the employees to go with it. Gil being the guy with the famous quote
"Apple was a ship with the hole in the bottom, and my job was to point it in the right direction"
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You are correct, that last fact escaped me.

[jarroyo]

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iMacMiga wrote:

Why the hell not? If it's a good OS who cares who did it first, or what it's based on. The quality of the product and it's technological advantages are the key issue, not, as many Apple users would have you believe, who copied who. The entire industry spends it's whole time copying each other. Some companies still remain better.
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Why would anyone buy a what essentially amounts to a linux distro? I would get a Mac if this is what A Inc turns to.

In my opinion, A Inc as a company needs to provide a value proposition that takes them in a direction different than just another Linux distro.

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iMacMiga wrote:
UNIX is a robust and standardized base, and is widely trusted and respected. An OS with modern features based on that sort of reputation could propel the Amiga name back to the limelight. Good though I'm sure it is (I've never used it),
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I won't argue the success and robustness of Unix, but QNX is no slouch. It may not be a household name, but their software is running medical instrumentation and mission critical systems in a variety of markets. I do not know what you do for a living, but serious IT proffesions do respect and hold QNX in high regard.

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iMacMiga wrote:
QNX is niche OS with only a fraction of the reputation.
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A reputation and market penetration that is much greater and respected than what we Amigan's currently have....

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iMacMiga wrote:
writing off a UNIX variant-based Amiga OS on the basis of other companies getting there first is ridiculous.
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Why would anyone buy it? Apple got away with it because they sell "art", not computers. The crowd that follow the Apple products are generally not technologicaly savy when compared to this Amiga crowd. I believe this community cares, and would be disappointed if the Amiga turns out to be nothing more than a linux variant. I could see it now; "All these years and in the end I get a Linux distro?"

Just my 2 cents......

[jarroyo]

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Steril707 wrote:
But Apple had hardware as well to support their Unix driven OS, giving some identity to the whole thing.
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I encourage this crowd to look deeply into the platform A Inc has chosen to host OS 5 on. It is quite different than what is out there, extremely powerful, when you consider that a significant amount of typical PC components are integrated into this single chip solution. It is a very balanced piece of hardware with ability to scale beyond what what current PC solutions are able to achieve today.

Don't let the 2 GHZ speeds fool you. This processor was designed for low latency transactions from end to end. A significantly more efficient architecture than what the PC and Mac has out there today.
http://www.pasemi.com/downloads/PA_Semi_PA6T_1682M.pdf

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Steril707 wrote:
An Unix based Amiga OS is still uninteresting to the average Joe imo
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I 100% agree with you on this point.

[jarroyo]

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BooBoo1200 wrote:
Now that Amigas will not have any custom chip the Os is the only thing that remains Amiga and a Os based around the source code of Workbench - Os 4 -I would argue that is Amiga But an Os based around QNX,Linux or any other Os this is not Amiga
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QNX would represent the microkernel much the same way "Darwin / Mach?" represent the Mac kernel with OS X sitting on top. Atop QNX you could develop many of the same feature set the Amiga is known for, including the Workbench paradigm. Microkernels in fact lend themselves to this type of implementation.

As far as the custom chipset, the PA Semi processor is oddly enough a custom chipset in its own right. It has a feature called the "Conexium Interchange."

From their site you read about Conexium:
"Interconnects the two 64-bit superscalar CPUs, two DDR2 memory controllers, a dual-ported L2 cache and the ENVOI I/O subsystem to deliver on-chip symmetric multiprocessing with coherent I/O"

From a custom graphics and sound point of view, this would be nearly suicidal. Unless you are Nvidia or AMD/ATI, you would be hard pressed to come up with a comparable solution that the average joe would not think its inferior inside of an Amiga.

Amiga was built at a time when custom chipsets where required to have the platform do what it became famous for. Those days are long gone and the economic landscape does not support this model any longer.

My 2 cents....

[ne_one]

@jarroyo

I encourage this crowd to look deeply into the platform A Inc has chosen to host OS 5 on...

If I remember correctly, this was targetted for OS 4. OS5 of course, is supposed to be platform agnostic.

A significantly more efficient architecture than what the PC and Mac has out there today.

Which is great, if you have applications that demand these resources and the money to invest in one.

Steril707 wrote:
An Unix based Amiga OS is still uninteresting to the average Joe imo

I 100% agree with you on this point.

And who exactly falls into the demographic of an "Average Joe"? Most consumers don't know the difference between a computer chip and a potato chip let alone the core technology that the operating system is based on.

If by "Average Joe" you mean Amiga fanatic circa 1992 you're correct because they believe that all good operating systems and computing platforms are made by elves at the North Pole.

[Bamiga2002]

@amigadave
If QNX provides support for legacy programs then you're on the right track here. Like old & new together, it's a bit like i tried to explain on my post . But i'd suggest not to abandon development of OS 4 if this "hype" OS 5 is going to be built from scratch. It would be better to continue development from OS 4 and not start all over...or?  :-?

[dammy]

There is no law that says the community can't create an Amiga compatible new OS based on the open source QNX kernel, is there?

QNX is not open source.  It's shared source so please read their FAQ.

Dammy

[downix]

jarroyo wrote:

Amiga was built at a time when custom chipsets where required to have the platform do what it became famous for. Those days are long gone and the economic landscape does not support this model any longer.

My 2 cents....

Actually, you'd be wrong here.  While yes, on the graphics end there has been dramatic improvement, other areas of the system are downright anemic in performance.  Look at audio, dominated by a single vendor, there hasn't been any progress since Aureal was bought out by Creative Labs.  Or I/O, cheap junk 9 times out of 10 except on overpriced server mobo's.  

And since then we've had the rise of FPGA's, CPLD's and rapid low-cost fabrication of silicon chips, making custom solutions more viable than at any point previous.

The Amiga was a system, not just an OS, and not just fun graphics.

[dammy]

The Amiga was a system, not just an OS, and not just fun graphics.

That was 20+ years ago when hardware-OS had to be tight because of the lack of hardware resources for consumer priced devices.  Compare what we have now today to back then, it's a titalwave of devices and for the most part, at unbelievably cheap prices.  Cost what, $1K for A500 unexpanded plus a 1024s monitor?  In a few weeks, I can buy four ASUS mini laptops for $1K who's capabilities will just shame an A500.

I finally got my freedom from hardware, I'm not going back to that plantation ever again.  Hardware will always be a commodity from now on.  It's the OS that counts.

Dammy

[downix]

dammy wrote:

The Amiga was a system, not just an OS, and not just fun graphics.

That was 20+ years ago when hardware-OS had to be tight because of the lack of hardware resources for consumer priced devices.  Compare what we have now today to back then, it's a titalwave of devices and for the most part, at unbelievably cheap prices.  Cost what, $1K for A500 unexpanded plus a 1024s monitor?  In a few weeks, I can buy four ASUS mini laptops for $1K who's capabilities will just shame an A500.

I finally got my freedom from hardware, I'm not going back to that plantation ever again.  Hardware will always be a commodity from now on.  It's the OS that counts.

Dammy

To produce it today, that same A500 w/ monitor would run you, brand new around $100 (and that's with retail markup).  The market for integrated components is exploding, and growing, faster than the desktop PC market.  

And what freedom from hardware?  Can you go to your local computer store and buy something other than Intel or AMD?  You just traded one plantation for another, that's all.

[dammy]

And what freedom from hardware? Can you go to your local computer store and buy something other than Intel or AMD? You just traded one plantation for another, that's all.

I tend to buy from NewEgg.com but I could buy elsewhere:

Genesi EFIKA(2) (Mot)
VIA line of mobo/cpus (VIA)
ARM based mobo        (ARM)
Do they still sell Sparcs? (Sun)  
Athlon64              (AMD)
Core 2 Duo             (Intel)

That's enough for my plate. YMMV

Dammy

[MarkTime]

if I had to speculate:

He means better than Mac OS X because it runs on top of Mac OS X.   So it has Mac OS X + it has whatever crap he has written.

OS X plus 1, is greater than OS X alone.

just lawyer speak....doesn't mean anything at all.