Ok guys, I will be doing a report on Commodore USA this week

[Amiga_Nut]

Well put. I agree on your points. Take Linux Mint for example it has it's own polished look, it's themed in a way that you see immidiately that it's Linux Mint. And it has been made easy to use. You could build an new Amiga like OS the same way. You will have to do much more work than just make a new skin but I now see why it can be done.

So here's how to build an Amiga, it can be done in two ways:

1)You take an old "Amiga" (AmigaOS,MorphOS,AROS) you repaint, polish it put some glitter on it (I mean all the coding of course and that takes let's say 10+ years) and then you look for apps to use. You then realize that all Amiga apps are atleast 15 years old and that there are many opens source variants that does the same job much better (Think: OO, Gimp, Blender, Inkscape etc.) You then start to port them to your "AmigaOS" (takes 10 years to get the most important).  So you got your renewed AmigaOS & apps in no time (20 years or so). ;-)

2)Take something already up todate (Linux distro) stuff away everything you don't need, repaint, polish, put some glitter on it. (takes 2+ years to go out of beta, maybe 4 to final polished version you're very proud of). Look for apps to use. You realize you don't need to port them because they where made to work for your chosen OS. You got your renewed AmigaOS in notime compared to the alternative (4 years or so)

Compare the two: Put the machines side by side they both look alike. You have made the CLI looks the same, all windows, screen dragging(TM) of course You think you can tell the difference but they both boot as fast, both has equally snappy UI. You look at the apps you use, yup they're the same all from the open source world. OK you have to run the old stuff in a emulator on one of the machines but hey that gets rarely used and emulation works good enough for that. ;-)

So which one is Amiga enough for you? The goals are the same it's only how you get there which is different. To me it doesn't matter but I'd pick the one that has the lowest entry level cost and the one that can get new apps more frequently. I'd dump the one that I'm missing out on. The one that makes me have yet another operating system and even worse yet another machine sitting next to it.

Yeah, reality is harsh but this is how I see it. And Carl,Dave, R&J, Dale isn't coming back to make me a "real" Amiga either ;-)

None of those two are Amiga, MoS/AOS4 are just Amiga OS boxes not Amigas as they all need UAE to run what made Amiga an Amiga (OCS/ECS/AGA) and don't read original Amiga floppy disks. And C= USA's PC Linux machines are definitely not Amiga at all, Amiga stickers+PC maybe

A new real Amiga at the very least =

1. Run Dpaint III without UAE on it
2. Save IFF pic onto floppy disk
3. Take floppy disk and put it inside A500 etc
4. Load pic from floppy into Dpaint running on A500 without cross dos etc
5. Incorporate the pic into a Blitzbasic demo running on A500

(the whole point of the exercise, use Dpaint on a virtual 040 via UAE, use the output on a real Amiga as intended)

That doesn't even allow for the whingers going on about banging the metal for games only

[JC]

Why are people paying this asshat any attention? Commodore & Amiga died in 1994 and anybody else claiming the name since then (with the exception of Escom) needs to be ignored into nonexistence.

I have to say that I pretty much agree with this statement. I mean if all they're doing is putting peecees in different cases, so what, who cares.
I am still interested in Amiga companies doings like Aeon, Acube, and Hyperion but not so much in these CommodoreClowns from outer space.

[Daedalus]

@Amiga_Nut

A new Amiga with a floppy drive? Come on, skinning Linux isn't going to give you a modern Amiga, but keeping the old internals and OS of a classic isn't either. I know some PCs which physically can't support a floppy drive (well, maybe a USB one), and even if they did, Windows probably wouldn't run the software on them without DOSBox or similar.

I don't know about DPaint, but I know that PPaint 68k works fine on my OS4.1 machine, can load and save IFF images which I can shuttle across the network to my AGA A1200, where they load perfectly into PPaint. And Multiview. Instead of floppy disks I can use an SD card and PCMCIA adaptor which works a treat. Also, my AmiBlitz software which doesn't hit the hardware directly works the very same under OS4.1 (but faster) as it does on my A1200.

[Manu]

@Manu

How to say this...Amiga OS functions nothing like Linux.

Trust me I was aware of that :-) But what if you could tweak Linux to work the same way, and the difference is something you can only prove by looking at the source code?

'they both boot as fast' -how do you know this? My Amiga boots up one hell of a lot faster than windows or my Ubuntu install.

I was of course hypothetically speaking. Boot time is one challenge with project 2) amongst many others.

'both has equally snappy UI' again it does not exist, so how do you know?

Same as above

'You think you can tell the difference' the difference is not just the skin, it's what is under it. I find linux file system inelegent, and the UI and fundamentals too technical. I do not find this with the Amiga.

I agree, if it's done in a sloppy way it won't be anything I desire either. But if it's done right you'd not notice the above either.

Another question is : just because it never has been done does that mean it can't be done?

[jorkany]

Saying things like, we own the name, we can do what we want, deal with, doesn't help matters.

Okay but:

You could at least say “we understand you concerns and some of the objections to the name, these products names are not final, and we will take you concerns into consideration” even if its a complete lie that what a proper PR or CTO would do.

Hyperion and Co. don't do this either but I don't see you up in arms about that.

[dammy]

Okay but:



Hyperion and Co. don't do this either but I don't see you up in arms about that.

Exactly, there were those of us who were up in arms over those dodgy rebadge Teron mobos being called an "Amiga" back in the day as well.  Did they listen to us or ask us about our concerns back then?  No, they didn't have to and they didn't, end of story.

[JC]

Outside of this community no one knows Sam, Pegasos, Minimig, Natami, Morphos, Aros exc... but you can bet you ass they know Commodore and Amiga !!![/QUOTE]

You forgot Efika.

[Franko]

end of story.

You kidding... this is just the preface to a whole new story in Life & Times Of The Amiga...

[Khephren]

Another question is : just because it never has been done does that mean it can't be done?

Dunno Manu, i'm not sure how much of gnu/linux you could change, and still have it run all that software. Where are the Linux gurus? (yeah, Runequester you!) can the fundamentals of linux be changed that heavily? or would ir cease to be linux? or just an akward hybrid of the two?

There was a project that aimed to be an amiga like linux, was it anubis? not sure.

Anyway, you'd be better off altering BeOs/Haiku, as it's Amiga like to start with.

[dammy]

You kidding... this is just the preface to a whole new story in Life & Times Of The Amiga...

True but I was referring to Hyperion/Eyetech not caring on what some of us thought at the time.

[desiv]

Yes, I prefer to think of Commodore (even just the name) not being owned by a ruthless cheater who would do almost anything just to make money...

er..  wait...  are we talking about Jack again???

desiv

[runequester]

Dunno Manu, i'm not sure how much of gnu/linux you could change, and still have it run all that software. Where are the Linux gurus? (yeah, Runequester you!) can the fundamentals of linux be changed that heavily? or would ir cease to be linux? or just an akward hybrid of the two?

There was a project that aimed to be an amiga like linux, was it anubis? not sure.

Anyway, you'd be better off altering BeOs/Haiku, as it's Amiga like to start with.

well, look at android, then look at KDE, then look at your wireless router. Linux is just a kernel, you can staple just about anything to it.

Changing the fundamental file system would be tricky, but honestly, I can't foresee that actually being a big deal. 99% of a users interactions is with stuff in his home folder, which is called whatever he wants it to be called.
A GUI that functions like amiga already exists, it just needs to be built out more and include a proper file browser etc.

Running native amiga apps can be done too, but it'd be a lot of work to recreate the api's. But it was done for WINE, it could be done for amiga too. Is it worth the effort compared to emulation? You tell me.


BeOS and Haiku are sweet, but then you are back at "limited range of hardware". Linux has it all, including stuff you wouldn't even imagine, and you get to tap into a lot of corporate support ensuring future hardware support as well.

[runequester]

@runequester
These are the sort of questions I have been more than happy to discuss on Commodore-Amiga.org for quite some time as the technology go to, and I have been quite open about many things. I invite interested parties to come and chat there. But please be civil.

trying to limit my internet time, so amiga.org will have to be my haunt for now.
I appreciate your responses though, thank you.

[Iggy]

Yes, I prefer to think of Commodore (even just the name) not being owned by a ruthless cheater who would do almost anything just to make money...

er..  wait...  are we talking about Jack again???

desiv

That is an unwarranted personal attack. I believe Red has already warned someone else against such actions.
So far no one  has been 'cheated'.
Further more, frequent posts have been made on this site favoring a move to X86 hardware.

You do realize your statement is blatant slander don't you?

[Bundi]

If "Workbench 5" is based on linux doesn't that mean that any changes Commode USA make to it will have to be open source due to the GPL or am I imagining things again?

O.T: Good to see you back Franko, am aye chuffed tae see some scoattish banter on the internet noo that am awah doon sooth, yi ken f'like.

Bunders

[jorkany]

If "Workbench 5" is based on linux doesn't that mean that any changes Commode USA make to it will have to be open source due to the GPL or am I imagining things again?

It depends if they modify any GPL'd code. Think of the relationship between Darwin and OS X - Darwin itself is open source, but many layers of OS X are not.