Should we really crack IBrowse 2.4???

[takemehomegrandma]

@CritAnime

How long does a developer/publisher have to not give a notice of discontinuation before software enters that grey area of Abandonware?

If your own moral compass is broken and doesn't show these things to you, then I'd say that when a great numbers of years has passed without product being on sale, without development, when the IP owner obviously doesn't care and has simply left the scene many years ago, and all means of communications and support that previously worked does no work since many years (reseller chain, product web page, developers e-mail, etc). Then after many years (is it a decade in this case?) when people (more than a few) independently of each others starts talking about "is it abandonware" because of one or more reasons above, then it probably is. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, chances are it's a duck...

Personally I would be inclined to say not to crack it. You never know if the development is in some form of hibernation.

The discussion is about v2.4 and nothing else, and this version is not sold and hasn't been sold for years and years. Should they release a v3.0 or something in the future (not very likely at all, I am certain it's pretty solidly abandoned now), then of course you should re-evaluate its features (CSS3? HTML4/XHTML? HTML5? Javascript engine? etc, etc) against its price, and buy that one if you want it and like it. But again, that's not what this discussion was about...

I don't think we'll ever see a viable browser for 68k Amigas with the *essential* features like those I mentioned above. It's completely unrealistic. It will be way too complex and heavy SW for way too limited, under-powered and old HW to handle. It will probably be worse than "Timberwolf" on a Sam440 by a factor of 50 or more, it will be unusable. If you are into retro Amiga (which many people here are), then use it for what it is, i.e. having fun with your museum objects, playing the old games on floppies, using the old apps, etc. Don't expect it to become modern, because it won't. That's why we have the "NG" systems like MorphOS. And on MorphOS you can run the Odyssey browser, which is heavily inspired by how IBrowse looked and functioned. It has all the essential features I mentioned above (it even beats Internet Explorer 9 in both CSS3/HTML5 features and overall performance), on top of that it has all the features you could wish for, and everything completely in the IBrowse style, so I'd dare to say that had IBrowse ever been evolved into a 2012 level browser, it would be pretty close (even an exact match) to what Odyssey is on MorphOS today.

Odyssey is IBrowse done right!


@Colmiga

I registered my copy of MUI in May 2010 and Stefan replied to me in a few days with a key

But MUI is anything but dead, it's very much under development, so it can't be compared to Ibrowse in any way...

[utri007]

Netsurf is almost useable, with native gui it would be nice browser for REAL 68k amigas.

Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc. It has developed to work very low spec machines.

Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.

[desiv]

Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc.

Interesting, but I always heard you needed a really fast/lots of RAM Amiga to run it?

It has developed to work very low spec machines.

OK..  So, what's your definition of "low spec?"

From what I can see on Aminet:

Requirements:
=============    
* AmigaOS 3.x  
* Picasso / CGX compatible graphic card.  
* 64 MB Ram (128MB for complex sites).  
* 68020+ CPU with FPU, for usable speed 68060 or emulator is required.  

With the ACAs and others out there, 64M RAM isn't out of the question (although saying an 060 for "usable speed" concerns me).
But that 2nd one on the list is going to be a killer.  I don't think many people would consider RTG low spec...  Lots of AGA (and OCS) only Amigas out there...

desiv

[a-pex]

iBrowse is still THE SOLUTION to visit Amiga forums, Aminet or other Amiga made pages on a machine like an A1200. This is the reason why there are still request for an legal key left.

Netsurf is nice, but needs a GFX card, very much RAM and a fast CPU.

[mfilos]

I run NetSurf on my beefed CSPPC/GREX with Voodoo3 and it's not the best experience at all.
It's running okeish (if you have the time to wait for it starting).
I can't imagine it running in specs less than 040 (which even 040 would be really unpleasant experience imho), so it's certainly not meant for low specc Amigas.

As Apex said, iBrowse is still the best way of surfing old content like Aminet, A.org's proxy, or old version of forums

[takemehomegrandma]

any coding effort would be better aimed at an open-source alternative. When it comes to spending money, a bounty for a small and fast open-source browser would be better spent. This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software

Writing a browser from scratch (to support all these modern features and standards), open source or not, isn't going to happen. Not on Amiga at least. The resources this will take would be enormous, even for a large company. Proposing an Amiga-bounty(!) to produce a browser for 68k from scratch is a little naive, it simply won't happen. So it would have to be based on either Firefox (bloated, slow and bulky) or Webkit (like Google Chrome, Apple's Safari and MorphOS's Odyssey), and *neither of these* (especially Firefox) running on a 68k processor wouldn't be very fun, even if you *could* make it running.

This community needs to realise that open source is the way to go if there's to be any hope of decent up-to-date software at a somewhat reasonable price.

Fab has generously opened up and provided his Odyssey sources to developers on both AROS and OS4, and also gave a lot of advice to help them. However, neither the AROS or OS4 version are matching the MorphOS Odyssey 1.17 browsing esperience (especially not the OS4 version). So that didn't help much, despite the sources being handed out, with aid and advice to go with them. Although the main problems on those platforms has a lot to do with the OS themselves lacking features that you can't solve easily as an *application developer*, instead it's up to the OS developers to to improve the OS in various areas. Or you simply use MorphOS!

Netsurf is almost useable, with native gui it would be nice browser for REAL 68k amigas.

Netsurf isn't perfect, but at least it displays most of www pages right and would be realistic goal, unlike OWB etc. It has developed to work very low spec machines.

Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.

Interesting, but I always heard you needed a really fast/lots of RAM Amiga to run it?

OK..  So, what's your definition of "low spec?"

From what I can see on Aminet:

Requirements:
=============    
* AmigaOS 3.x  
* Picasso / CGX compatible graphic card.  
* 64 MB Ram (128MB for complex sites).  
* 68020+ CPU with FPU, for usable speed 68060 or emulator is required.  

With the ACAs and others out there, 64M RAM isn't out of the question (although saying an 060 for "usable speed" concerns me).
But that 2nd one on the list is going to be a killer.  I don't think many people would consider RTG low spec...  Lots of AGA (and OCS) only Amigas out there...

Oh you think RTG is too high spec?

I don't agree, I'd even say those requirements were a bit optimistic. At least for *real* use (instead of "can be used on some sites").

For the common, every-day, media-rich 2012 level browsing people are used to today, a semi modern RTG card (like Radeon R200/R300) would be kind of essential, 128MB RAM an *absolute minimum* (ask the Efika users), the double is preferred. I doubt it would be very usable on a 68060 as well, it would stagger under a normal web page with lots of div's, more than the most rudimentary css, and one or a few javascripts.

Look at this page (it's a Swedish newspaper):
http://www.dn.se/

It's a normal, every-day page, just one of the several of its kind we encounter when we do our daily browsing routine. It has more than 750 separate div's, most of those has their own styles attached to them, its css has more than 3000 entities, it has some 20 javascripts, it has close to 100 images, several other media objects.

I'd like to see a browser do this on a 680x0 CPU on an AGA screen. And why not some tabbed browsing as well?

Or no, I'd rather not.

There is a limit to what "It has developed to work very low spec machines" can do for you. After that, you simply need more resources under your engine hood.

I don't think webkit is considered bloated or bulky. It has been used on hand-helds for a long time for instance, which is what most people use as a *definition* for "very low spec machines".

Last generation handhelds stomped the Sam computer into the ground. The current generation handhelds stomps the entire PPC architecture into the ground (except perhaps the highest specced G5's). And you are talking about 680x0, where you think 68060 is a bit over the top?

Yeah...

:lol:

[utri007]

Netusurf requirements for RiscOs is 030 equalent machine with 16mb ram and yes it works 8bit screens also. 16bit screens are because SDL.

Because of SDL, wich is meant to be debuggin only by the way, it wouldn't even start.

SDL removes "amiga feeling" from it and it is bog slow with any 68k amigas. Never used any SDL game that is actually useable with 68k.

AGA is possible

Here is what needs to be done to get NATIVE, not SDL frontend of netsurf to 68k Amigas.

http://vlists.pepperfish.net/pipermail/netsurf-dev-netsurf-browser.org/2011-January/002304.html

Chris is also promised to help if somebody could take a task

[desiv]

Oh you think RTG is too high spec?

I'm not saying it's "too high spec" for the task.
I'm saying there are a LOT of Amiga owners that don't have RTG, and they would consider RTG high spec.

For the common, every-day, media-rich 2012 level browsing people are used to today,..

And I don't expect that...
What I think would be nice would be a browser (new or modified code) that renders existing pages in a much better way, so that more modern sites would be usable.

That doesn't mean that all the features would be supported.
This is a 68000 series architecture...  That's not realistic.

But something that handles the web "better" than the current gen of browsers would be great.

Now, maybe it's not realistic.  It's possible...

And again, I'm not saying RTG and an 060 is "over the top."
I'm only saying that, for a lot of Amiga users, it's not considered "low-spec"...

Jeesh..  Relax!  :-)

desiv

[takemehomegrandma]

I have actually seen someone browsing the web on a C64. It's true!

Doesn't make much sense though, other than for "gimmick" reasons, or to prove some nerdy point.

You can have *lots* of fun with a C64, even in 2012, if you take it for what it is. But if you want to browse the web in 2012 (for *real*), then you'll have more fun using enough modern equipment for modern browsers to run.

IMHO of course.

[utri007]

Browsing web with 68k amiga could be pleasant surprise, but not with current software. You cant compare amigas to c64.

For me some download pages would be essential, maybe some news pages, like amiga.org

Netsurf could do it useable way.

At this point, somebody usually start to talking to firefox/owb for 68k amigas. Those are not options.

[NovaCoder]

Chris who has ported netsurf to OS4 has made quite lot work to make backporting to 68k/OS3.X possible and little easier.

When I last spoke to Chris about porting to 68k he said that Netsurf renders internally in 16bit, converting that to 8bit for AGA would kill performance.   If Jens ever gets around to releasing the *fabled* 16bit chunky mode for the Mrk2 then a port to AGA 68k starts to become more realistic.

[whabang]

Writing a browser from scratch (to support all these modern features and standards), open source or not, isn't going to happen. Not on Amiga at least. The resources this will take would be enormous, even for a large company. Proposing an Amiga-bounty(!) to produce a browser for 68k from scratch is a little naive, it simply won't happen. So it would have to be based on either Firefox (bloated, slow and bulky) or Webkit (like Google Chrome, Apple's Safari and MorphOS's Odyssey), and *neither of these* (especially Firefox) running on a 68k processor wouldn't be very fun, even if you *could* make it running.

Indeed, a port of Dillo would be much more useful.

[wawrzon]

Indeed, a port of Dillo would be much more useful.

indeed, indeed.
afair radoslaw, the netbsd coder, has compiled it to run on his amiga hardware under netbsd.
porting it to over to amiga or aros demands one essential dependency which is a simple gui library afair. i looked at it some time ago.

[utri007]

Not bad, but would still I prefer Netsurf. It is also for low spec machines and some work has already done.

Requirements are  30MHz ARM 6 computer with 16MB of RAM, wich is equalent to 68030

When Amiga OS3.x version is just SDL frontend, originally intendent to debuggin, requrements are totaly different. With 16mb ram it wouldn't even start.

BUT it can considered to proof of consept those who have tested it knows it is almost useable. Just build proper reaction gui, get rid of true type fonts etc. and it would useable.

TO DO LIST :

http://vlists.pepperfish.net/piperma...ry/002304.html

[takemehomegrandma]

Indeed, a port of Dillo would be much more useful.

Sounds about as useful as IBrowse 2.4 is today?

[whabang]

Sounds about as useful as IBrowse 2.4 is today?

Pretty much - with the major exception being that Dillo is an active project and that porting it would be legal and benificial for the entire community.