MorphOS question

[mikeymike]

I've had a read around the morphos.net site out of interest, but not really found an answer to my question, and please, no flaming/bitchy comments.  What does MorphOS offer in particular that attracts people to it?

Point me to a webpage to read if that is easier.

[Amiga1200PPC]

It is an Amiga type OS.
I can run m68k, PowerUP and WarpUP Amiga Software on a modern PowerPC machine.
It allows recompiling Amiga software to run PowerPC native afterwards, e.g. Frogger, YAM, Voyager, AWeb, etc.
It is not a Wintel machine.
It has Ixemul PPC, so that many GNU programs are already ported.
New features in addition to the AmigaOS3 ones will be added.

[takemehomegrandma]

@ mikeymike

Simple! It's a clean and PPC native reimplementation of the system we all are interested in - Amiga! :-)

[itix]

What does MorphOS offer in particular that attracts people to it?

The future.

[mikeymike]

It sounds like the 'compatibility option' - what about natively run stuff, any advantages there?


@ itix

Whoa...
:-)

[takemehomegrandma]

mikeymike wrote:
It sounds like the 'compatibility option' - what about natively run stuff, any advantages there?

Speed!!! :-D

And the fact that it runs on the Pegasos hardware, without the need for all kinds of add-ons like expensive ethernet cards, IDE controllers, etc, just to be able to use modern standard equipment (I am comparing it to the classic Amiga here). It's simply a modern and incredibly snappy Amiga system! :-)

[itix]

Must admit when I had MorphOS 0.8 running on my BlizzardPPC it was cool :-D

--

[bloodline]

mikeymike wrote:
What does MorphOS offer in particular that attracts people to it?

It uses sources AROS... Obviously that's going to make people interested in it :lol:

[Lando]

mikeymike wrote:
I've had a read around the morphos.net site out of interest, but not really found an answer to my question, and please, no flaming/bitchy comments.  What does MorphOS offer in particular that attracts people to it?

It's fast, good-looking, modern, yet retains the Amiga "feel".  Does everything my old A4000/PPC did and more, only 20x faster.  I can't wait to see what its gonna be like when we get MOS 1.4 with JIT enabled.

[KennyR]

MOS on Pegasos is faster and more responsive than anything currently available on any home computer of any type anywhere. I can't exaggerate how fast it is. It makes using win2000 2ghz PCs in uni a hair-pulling experience in comparison. MOS has a built in sandglass busy pointer, but I've never seen it for more than a fraction of a second.

So it has all the original Amiga look and feel with this amazing speed... who could say no to that?

[Madgun68]

I've had a read around the morphos.net site out of interest, but not really found an answer to my question, and please, no flaming/bitchy comments. What does MorphOS offer in particular that attracts people to it?

Speaking for myself, it wasn't so much MorphOS as it was the company. With both operating systems offering really good features, I started looking at what future each of them had/has.

The last thing that I want to do is go through another Amiga failure. I've seen enough of them and I'm sick of the whole thing. The decision then was which one had a more sound vision for the future and I felt that Genesi had more going for them than the people involved with AmigaOS 4.

This isn't to say that I think that the AmigaOne or OS 4 is bound to failure, but looking at the bigger picture, I think they're going to have a harder climb upwards. Eyetech really need to get costs down because the current price is going to alienate a lot of potential customers from the product. Hyperion are anxious to get on with other things and that leaves Amiga Inc, whom I feel simply don't have the resources to give AmigaOS 4 the presence it needs beyond the community.

Genesi, on the other hand, have made just about every show out there.. Have a cheaper product and have a good vision of the future (and they're not afraid to tell you about it either. That's another plus in my book, because I'm sick and tired of all the "we have plans, but we can't go in to details" garbage too.)

Anyhoo, that's my dollars worth.

[gary_c]

What does MorphOS offer in particular that attracts people to it?

As for MorphOS itself, it's a really sleek Amiga-like system. For Amiga users, it seems to be the same thing as AmigaOS4 -- the classic OS on PPC. It's still incomplete, though, but getting there fast. The draw for Amiga users is the old OS -- or something functionally equivalent -- on new hardware. New users (in time) might like the responsiveness and other qualities of a modern alternative operating system. I don't know what the niche of MOS is supposed to be. In the AmiWest mp3s, not even the Genesi people could say what specifically it would be, other than a "geek platform". (Bill Buck did talk about home digital info handling, etc., looking long-term.)

I don't know yet how MOS and AOS will compare, as solutions for existing Amiga users. Maybe each  will have its own strengths and weaknesses. I imagine as time goes on, they'll diverge somehow. I'm looking forward to hearing about the plan for success from both sides.

One strength of Genesi is being in control of both the software and the hardware. This gives them a lot of flexibility, and more business options. I think the Pegasos hardware itself is really neat. I like the MicroATX form factor, with so much integrated already. I know this is the Pegasos, not MorphOS, but they come as a package for most people. Genesi is also pushing them together, not MorphOS alone, so I think the draw will be not only the OS, but the package, including other OSs that have been ported and are being ported. Personally I imagine I will be using other OSs as much as or more than MorphOS on my Pegasos.

It's fun being in on something new. There's a new community growing (kind of overlapping the "Amiga community" with people in both), and new infrastructure being built, new web sites, ftp sites, etc. Kind of rebuilding the wheel in a way, but trying to be future-oriented. Again, this isn't the OS itself directly, but is part of the appeal.

At this point, I couldn't "sell" MorphOS to anybody but a hardcore geek; it just isn't complete enough yet, and the OS/apps package isn't complete enough yet to draw people away from mainstream platforms. But things are moving quickly; in time, who knows? (I haven't gotten the SuperBundle yet or MorphOS 1.4 -- these look like a big step forward.)

-- gary_c

[Hooligan_DCS]

MUI PPC roxx0r

[Warface]

A link if you haven't tried yet: MorphOS feature list

As to me: my story has two sides. I had two dreams for the future: a realistic one, where AmigaOS gets some new hardware, with some minor advance in features (like OS3.5 and 3.9). I had a less realistic one as well though - I have dreamt of an AmigaOS being comptetitive with the state of the art OSes out there.

When I saw MorphOS 0.4 beta back in in 2000 august, I thought MorphOS will be the first. AmigaOS ported to PPC then that's it. I'd readily accept it even if I get nothing extra.

Then, (it's a real long story) getting my Pegasos in 2003 march, and MorphOS 1.2... I was gasping for breath.

MorphOS is not feature complete yet, but besides maintaining the responsiveness and incredible sides of AmigaOS sports state of the art features (I always envieed the RGBA icons of OSX/XP/Linux) and when it will be feature complete it will enable us to get rid of the drawbacks of the AmigaOS design.

There is still a lot to do to, but as they had to write everything from scratch, they rethinked the whole design, got rid of many nasty limitations (the 256 color pen system, etc.) and made it into something which doesn't looks/feels/performs like an OS from a decade ago.

Well, it's now called MorphOS, and I cannot call it AmigaOS. But I care little about that...

[mikeymike]

Does MorphOS primarily use MUI for GUI rendering, even for native apps?