Just when you thought it couldn't get any better, couldn't get any faster, then MorphOS 3.0 is released!
And there are so many improvements!
Everything feels a little bit faster. Some people has measured faster memory speed in general, some people has measured a great improvement in 3D graphics speed, network feels faster, and the Odyssey browser is up to 40% faster in version 1.17! Speaking of which, the changelog for Odyssey 1.17 isn't available on the net, so for those interested, here it is:
- 14.05.2012: Odyssey Web Browser 1.17
- Updated to WebKit r114842 (April 2012).
- Updated to Cairo 1.12 and Pixman 0.24.4: gives about 40% speedup in rendering.
- Updated to ICU 4.9.1: the data files are now stored externally in
PROGDIR:resource/icudt49b/ to save some memory. Make sure to copy them if you
update (a requester will warn you if you don't).
- Updated to OpenSSL 1.0.0j.
- Updated to Curl 7.25.0.
- Updated to FFMPEG GIT from 13.05.2012.
- Updated to SQLite 3.7.11.
- Updated to libXML2 2.7.8 and libXSLT 1.1.26.
- History completion popup is now multithreaded, which fixes a latency issue when
typing the URL.
- Implemented form filling completion feature. It can be enabled in prefs->privacy settings.
Note that you calltips.mcc is required, which is included with MorphOS 3+ or 2.x SDK
with Scribble.
- The "add bookmark" button now has two states, to indicate whether the current
URL is already bookmarked or not.
- Adding a bookmark from the browser window now always adds it to the end of
the bookmarks, and no longer at the end of the currently selected group.
- Added Back/Forward/Reload/Stop in view menu.
- The password from the URL is now removed if present, when setting the comment
of a downloaded file.
- Fixed the "Open in new window" function that didn't work anymore in 1.16 due
to the new popup policy option.
- Fixed attachments not working anymore in GMail.
- Fixed again AltGr key handling for GoogleDocs.
- Fixed pasting from clipboard when multiple text chunks are used (YAM does it).
- Escape unwanted characters in bookmarks URLs, aliases and titles.
- Prune favicons database at startup, since it can really grow a lot over time.
- Tweaked cross origin access control to make youtube video upload work.
- Fixed some issue with 401 handling. Should fix some cPanel administration pages,
for instance (hello Christoph and Pampers 
.
- Fixed pagination in PDF export.
- Fixed HTML5 local storage.
- Fixed some WebSocket potential crash issue at disconnection.
- Attempt to fix some deadlock issue in mediaplayer at disposal under heavy stress.
- Avoid spawning an useless video decoder thread for audio-only files, and vice-versa.
There is a simple and easy to use disk burning/copying tool for CD's and DVD's that really should be enough for most peoples needs in this area!
There is also this tool - Flacapella - that rips CDDA (music CD's) to Flac/Waw format!
The OS features its own FTP/SFTP client now, works great. Now MorphOS has not only a great Web browser built in, but also a FTP client. A built-in mail client would make it kind of complete.
The new PDF viewer is great! It's very fast and handles more complex PDF files.
Scribble is a very nice text editor built on
Scintilla, in fact, scintilla is now part of the OS as a custom MUI class (Classes/MUI/Scintilla.mcc)! :cool: Scribble was previously part of the updated MorphOS SDK, but now it's available to everyone. You can see it in action here:
http://www.morphos-team.net/files/scribble.mp4 (it's one of the nicest ones ever seen on Amiga IMHO)!
The integrated crypto File System "Kryptos" (based on
TrueCrypt) was updated to TrueCrypt v7.0a.
*A lot* happened to Reggae (finally
):
Classes/Reggae/id3tag.demuxer - Basic handling of ID3v2 (2.2, 2.3, 2.4) tags.
Classes/Reggae/iffdeep.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for IFF DEEP images.
Classes/Reggae/iffdeep.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for IFF DEEP images.
Classes/Reggae/iffilbm.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for IFF ILBM images.
Classes/Reggae/iffilbm.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for IFF ILBM images.
Classes/Reggae/jpeg.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for JPEG images.
Classes/Reggae/jpeg.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for JPEG images.
Classes/Reggae/degas.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for Atari Degas/Neochrome images.
Classes/Reggae/degas.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for Atari Degas/Neochrome images.
Classes/Reggae/mpegaudio.demuxer - changes and fixes
Classes/Reggae/multiread.buffer - fixes
Classes/Reggae/pcx.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for PCX images.
Classes/Reggae/pcx.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for PCX images.
Classes/Reggae/png.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for PNG images.
Classes/Reggae/png.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for PNG images.
Classes/Reggae/rawaudio.filter - Added support for unsigned 16-bit PCM formats (both endians).
Classes/Reggae/rawvideo.filter [NEW] - Wrapper class for processing raw PCM video streams in different formats.
Classes/Reggae/sunraster.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for SunRaster images.
Classes/Reggae/sunraster.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for SunRaster images.
Classes/Reggae/targa.decoder [NEW] - Decoder for Targa images.
Classes/Reggae/targa.demuxer [NEW] - Demultiplexer for Targa images.
Classes/Reggae/videopcm.decoder - supports many formats, AltiVec accelerated
I think we see a "Datatypes NG" sailing up here, and this is very cool!
Jukebox is a simple but very nice music player based on Reggae!
The Lua scripting language is now part of the system, with an additional module that allows sending commands to applications in a way compatible with ARexx. This is great!
A netprinter.device was added, spellchecker.library was added, etc (you can use it in Odyssey for example). Lots of minor additions, fixes and improvements, all over the place! And the *Video Thumbnails*! How cool isn't that?!
MUI got more eyecandy, it's faster and more debugged. Ambient is very tight with MUI, and you notice small but important improvements in Ambient on many places! The best Amiga desktop just became better!
Another big thing about MorphOS 3.0 is that a lot of work has gone into supporting laptop technologies. As a result, MorphOS now features Battery sensor, temperature readings, setting backlight, power saving, multi finger touchpad support, etc. This resulted in:
Native PowerBook support!
And I guess that when much of the required laptop technology is in place, it gets much easier to
continue this path...
The price drop of the OS is very welcome I think:
MacMini
PowerMac
eMac
Pegasos1
Pegasos2
... they all down to
just €79 now!
And the Efika down to
€49! I registered MorphOS 2.0 back when it was released in 2008, and it has been a free ride ever since, all upgrades for free, even the jump to 3.x! Conclusion: Great value!
I am very impressed with MorphOS 3.0, and I'm very happy about it!
The best just became a hell of a lot better! Go get it! :pint:
