Wither Natami?

[WotTheFook]

Amen, Persia, here endeth the first lesson.

 :bow:  :bow:  :bow:

 :cheers:

[bloodline]

TheDaddy wrote:
@bloodline

Come on, we are splitting the hair now.

Millions of cars share millions of parts but they are still Fords, Fiats, Opel, BMWs, Audis and so on.

Millions of Computers are built using the same capacitors, resistors, transistors, gates, 74xx ICs, etc... What matters is how they are put together! :-)

I would like to say that if the Minimig/Natami can, to a certain extent, be 90% compatible with old Amiga software then they are Amigas.

But If I need them for a specific Amiga feature... lets say the nonlinear audio reproduction... then with the MM or NA I'm stuffed... I wouldn't call it a real Amiga then.

I was also thinking would you call an Amiga a real Amiga if it couldn't use hardware add-ons designed for a specific Amiga model? I would still call it an Amiga.

Irrelavant... the clone may or may not have compatible interfaces, these are often the easiest part of a system to clone since the spec must be very detailed and tight!

If someone said to me: "From tomorrow we have three new Amiga models but they are not 100% compatible with old Amigas/Amiga software", I would be enourmosly happy and thankful. It wouldn't even cross my mind to check if and why they are not 100% compatible.

For me then it would be pointless as an Amiga... One of my favourite projects is posibly the least Amiga compatible Amiga Clone project... I don't think of it as a real Amiga though... I see it as a learning tool and a hobby!

[bloodline]

WotTheFook wrote:
Amen, Persia, here endeth the first lesson.

 :bow:  :bow:  :bow:

 :cheers:

While Persia is totally correct, that actually has nothing to do with my point :-)

Anyway, a computer platform is defined by it's software. The problem with the Amiga is that all serious software development ended once software houses realised the Amiga platform was in trouble... perhaps around 1995 at the very latest.

The Mac and PC, bear no resemblance to their historic ancestors, but that doesn't matter, because the software and applications grew with the platforms. New verisons of old software took advantage of the direction the platfomrs went in, so developers and users could grow with the platform.

The Amiga is now frozen in an early/mid 90s snapshot... the applications require technology that is now several generations behind anything we have now... and as such a modern Amiga would have to support a massive Gerneration bridge in order to make any sense... such a bridge would be pointless.

[TheDaddy]

>>For me then it would be pointless as an Amiga... One of my favourite projects is posibly the least Amiga compatible Amiga Clone project... I don't think of it as a real Amiga though... I see it as a learning tool and a hobby!


Ok let's end it like this then saying that I consider a Minimig/Natami a real Amiga and anything like the SAM with OS4.1 (hopefully) an Amiga and you don't. :-)

[Jakodemus]

bloodline wrote:

The Mac and PC, bear no resemblance to their historic ancestors, but that doesn't matter, because the software and applications grew with the platforms.

PC is still compatible with IBM PC. You still can boot to MS-dos 2.0. Your ultra-fast graphic card, with the latest pixelshaders and high speed GDDR5 memory chips, can still display CGA-graphics. Hardware has maintained its backward compatibility. Only thing that has changed is the OS. Microsoft has dropped support for 16bit programs, so nowdays you have to use dosbox.

[Hans_]

persia wrote:
For a decade and a half the Amiga has been leaderless, slowly losing it's user base.  WHy do we need to tear at each other?  We're all that's left, maybe a few thousand scattered across the globe.  We have different visions, different ideas  We disagree on what we want, but we don't disagree on what we don't want.  We don't want the Amiga relegated to history.

The different visions are exactly why people are tearing at each other. I wish that everyone would move to Amiga OS 4 (ignore the hardware availability issues for a second please) and help push that forward; MorphOS fans would prefer it if everyone switched to MOS and pushed that forward (also ignore limited hardware availability please, more is coming); Bloodline & co wish that everyone would join the AROS initiative; and, there are also those who would insist that a real Amiga has to have AGA compatible hardware. In fact, there's also a group that want Amiga to remain a retro machine.

What would be neat is if a next-gen API could be collectively agreed upon, and then implemented on all the next-gen Amiga systems. That is, however, unlikely to happen.

[bloodline]

Jakodemus wrote:

bloodline wrote:

The Mac and PC, bear no resemblance to their historic ancestors, but that doesn't matter, because the software and applications grew with the platforms.

PC is still compatible with IBM PC. You still can boot to MS-dos 2.0. Your ultra-fast graphic card, with the latest pixelshaders and high speed GDDR5 memory chips, can still display CGA-graphics. Hardware has maintained its backward compatibility. Only thing that has changed is the OS. Microsoft has dropped support for 16bit programs, so nowdays you have to use dosbox.

Yes you can run your old MS DOS 2 apps on a modern PC... but if youy read my post carefully... you will notice I am talking about the environment that has evolved.

If Commodore had kept going, every year the Amiga platform would have evolved to keep it in step with with latest generation of software and hardware technologies. But it didn't so now our next gen Amiga's are still stuck in the 1994 time warp... where really the Modern Amiga should be as different from AmigaOS 3.9 as MacOSX is from System 7... but we've missed those 15 years of dev time. In that regard "It's all over!" - MegaloMania 1991

[bloodline]

Hans_ wrote:

persia wrote:
For a decade and a half the Amiga has been leaderless, slowly losing it's user base.  WHy do we need to tear at each other?  We're all that's left, maybe a few thousand scattered across the globe.  We have different visions, different ideas  We disagree on what we want, but we don't disagree on what we don't want.  We don't want the Amiga relegated to history.

The different visions are exactly why people are tearing at each other. I wish that everyone would move to Amiga OS 4 (ignore the hardware availability issues for a second please) and help push that forward; MorphOS fans would prefer it if everyone switched to MOS and pushed that forward (also ignore limited hardware availability please, more is coming); Bloodline & co wish that everyone would join the AROS initiative; and, there are also those who would insist that a real Amiga has to have AGA compatible hardware.

Now we seriously have to think about what each project or rather what each group of people really want to achieve! please see below...

In fact, there's also a group that want Amiga to remain a retro machine.

And if we want to ensure that the Amiga's place in history is not forgotten forever, may be the best way to preserve what little dignity there is left. Please see below.

What would be neat is if a next-gen API could be collectively agreed upon, and then implemented on all the next-gen Amiga systems. That is, however, unlikely to happen.

But we already do have a common API, that is the collection of technologies that grew up over the period between 1993 and around 2001... We are now stuck with that forever. There is no reason to build a new "next-gen API", as it couldn't offer anything that an off the shelf solution could not provide... much like Apple in the late 90's it would make sense for the three exisisting clones to become the legacy layers on top of a new system. But while that is the only sensible solution, there is really no point since there is no vital Amiga only software anymore... no resaon for this legacy layer. :-(

[WotTheFook]

Just enjoy the ride while it lasts, nothing lasts forever. Until the last Amiga has died, it will always be remembered.....

It's who we are, it's a link to our childhood, who cares if it's MAME, Atari, Amiga, Spectrum, Mac, Oric-1 or whatever, if you have fond memories of it, it can't be bad.

Now, can we have a ceasefire please?

[Hans_]

What would be neat is if a next-gen API could be collectively agreed upon, and then implemented on all the next-gen Amiga systems. That is, however, unlikely to happen.

But we already do have a common API, that is the collection of technologies that grew up over the period between 1993 and around 2001... We are now stuck with that forever. There is no reason to build a new "next-gen API", as it couldn't offer anything that an off the shelf solution could not provide... much like Apple in the late 90's it would make sense for the three exisisting clones to become the legacy layers on top of a new system. But while that is the only sensible solution, there is really no point since there is no vital Amiga only software anymore... no resaon for this legacy layer. :-(

Whether you design a new API that is based on the existing one, or steal someone else's (e.g., use BSD as a base OS), it's still a new API as far as the Amiga is concerned. What needs changing is nowhere near as much as was required with Mac OS (which didn't even have pre-emptive multitasking).

I'm personally in favour of keeping what's good in the Amiga OS API, discarding the rest, and creating a new API that has all the modern essentials such as full memory protection, SMP, etc. I do not see the point in becoming another Linux distro.

I also think that enough people want to continue to use their old Amiga software to warrant having a legacy layer.

Hans

[Hans_]

WotTheFook wrote:
Just enjoy the ride while it lasts, nothing lasts forever. Until the last Amiga has died, it will always be remembered.....

It's who we are, it's a link to our childhood, who cares if it's MAME, Atari, Amiga, Spectrum, Mac, Oric-1 or whatever, if you have fond memories of it, it can't be bad.

Now, can we have a ceasefire please?

Hey, we're just firing paint balls. Now put your mask back on or you might get injured.  :lol:

Hans

[bloodline]

Hans_ wrote:

What would be neat is if a next-gen API could be collectively agreed upon, and then implemented on all the next-gen Amiga systems. That is, however, unlikely to happen.

But we already do have a common API, that is the collection of technologies that grew up over the period between 1993 and around 2001... We are now stuck with that forever. There is no reason to build a new "next-gen API", as it couldn't offer anything that an off the shelf solution could not provide... much like Apple in the late 90's it would make sense for the three exisisting clones to become the legacy layers on top of a new system. But while that is the only sensible solution, there is really no point since there is no vital Amiga only software anymore... no resaon for this legacy layer. :-(

Whether you design a new API that is based on the existing one, or steal someone else's (e.g., use BSD as a base OS), it's still a new API as far as the Amiga is concerned. What needs changing is nowhere near as much as was required with Mac OS (which didn't even have pre-emptive multitasking).

-Edit- I would say they had an easier task, since it's very easy to see that MacOS Pre OSX was not going to cut it... AmigaOS has the problem is that it can keep up with the big boys... just as long as it doesn't have to carry very much, and there are no hills, and there's no cross wind, and no one jumps up and shouts "Boo!", etc...

Basicly if conditions are good... AmigaOS is a great system, it just doesn't have to ability to deal with problems... and it is the robust nature of modern OSs that give them their strenght!

I'm personally in favour of keeping what's good in the Amiga OS API, discarding the rest, and creating a new API that has all the modern essentials such as full memory protection, SMP, etc. I do not see the point in becoming another Linux distro.

I've often considered this... but think about the implications of this... Once you give exec memory protection, SMP, and a nice new scheduler, some modern data sstructions not just endless linked lists... etc, etc... it's going to end up looking like a pretty ordninary Microkernel... and one that has taken quite a bit of work to get to and won't have the proven track history of modern Microkernels... and then quite a lot of the old Amiga subsystems are either outdated; graphics.library, layers.library, audio.device or wouldn't work with a modern MP/SMP exec; intuition.library and I think dos.library too...

So all that has to be replaced... leaving you with really very little reason to have chosen AmigaOS in the first place :-(

I also think that enough people want to continue to use their old Amiga software to warrant having a legacy layer.

I have the problem that 95% of the old Amiga software I would want to run needs the Amgia hardware... so even a legacy software layer is of little use.

[wawrzon]

bloodline, if you want to have 68k amiga compatible hardware then you should actually support such an approach as the natami team. they consider replacing amigaos kick and libs with 68k aros substitutes. in long therm this might be the solution for a-clone too at least to get rid of legal dependencies and to be freely distributable.

[bloodline]

wawrzon wrote:
bloodline, if you want to have 68k amiga compatible hardware then you should actually support such an approach as the natami team. they consider replacing amigaos kick and libs with 68k aros substitutes. in long therm this might be the solution for a-clone too at least to get rid of legal dependencies and to be freely distributable.

This idea that I don't like the Hardware clones can only come from people not reading my posts... Please reread them.

[wawrzon]

ur posts are too long to read. but i havnt accuse u of nothing. i just wanted to point out something that might interest u as aros supporter, remembering that u were critical about natami.

[jj]

@ wawrzon

If you can not bee bothered to fully read somone's posts, in my opinion you don't really have good grounding on which to comment on them.