Exactly, I was always a workbench + VincED + Dirwork user and I prefer OS4 Workbench over MOS Ambient. That's also why I think an unbiased comparison is impossible.
From the other side I do think MOS has some better technical lower level implementations compared to OS4 so as the latters use of .so objects.
@Fats, Ambient in MorphOS3.7 can be set up to look like and function almost exactly like Workbench of any version, and vice versa. AmigaOS4.x's Workbench can be set up to look like, and work more like Ambient. Neither would be 100% the same as the environment they were trying to copy, but this argument alone should never be the sole reason for choosing one OS above the other to use as their preferred platform. When I see this statement used for the reason a user chooses one platform instead of the other, it makes me cringe and think that these users have not researched either choice very well, or even tried to customize either OS setup, which used to be one of the first things that most Amiga users did to their own systems. Where has that old Amiga trait of customizing and tweaking the user interface to their liking gone, or have most of us just become too lazy to do that kind of customization these days? I think that most Amiga users are smarter than that and should use other comparisons of features, performance and available hardware to run the OS on, as better reasons why to choose one OS instead of the other. The "Look and Feel" justification is one of the easiest differences to point to though, so it is often mentioned. I just hope it is not really true that users are making their choice on the "Look & Feel" factor, when it can be adjusted so easily on either OS to "Look and Feel" any way they like, even almost exactly like the other OS they are turning away from by making that decision. I prefer to read that a user has chosen one OS or the other for reasons of cost, or new vs used hardware, or free and Open Source vs commercial and Closed Source. At least those reasons make more sense to me, but not because of the "Look and Feel" of the user interface when it can be so easily changed. This little rant about the "Look & Feel" of either OS is not meant just for you and I am not assuming that you made your choices for that reason, but I have seen other users who have made specific statements like that before and your mention of "Look & Feel" just reminded me.
It is refreshing to see some reasonable discussion about the differences between AmigaOS4.x, MorphOS3.x, AROS (don't know what version range it is currently at these days) and AmigaOS3.x (emulated or native). Spirantho and I just had a great and rather lengthy discussion about the same topic (differences) via email, where he suggested we copy and paste our pages of discussion into a forum thread as an example of how to express different opinions, without becoming hostile or fighting with each other. His and my opinions are similar in a few areas, but it was apparent that we had many different opinions and experiences. His preference is to use and support AmigaOS4.x, while my preference is clearly MorphOS3.x, though I support all flavors of the Amiga/Amiga-Like experiences.
His perception of the pros & cons of each were very different than my own and I learned some new things about both platforms from the things he wrote. He also reinforced some of my perceptions on some of the more technical aspects of both, as his knowledge and expertise in coding and understanding the under lying structures of the OS itself exceed my current understanding.
(Edited out part of our private communication that should not have been paraphrased by me, out of context)
Some of the most interesting discussion I had with Spirantho (Ian Gledhill) was his perspective on the amount of low level infrastructure work that the Hyperion developers have been focusing on, to allow AmigaOS4.x to move forward to the goals of being able to implement the Protected Memory and SMP features promised for AmigaOS4.2. Since the MorphOS Dev. Team members have openly stated that those two features are not possible without breaking the legacy support for Amiga 68k software (or at least without undesirable consequences, due to the number or nature of compromises that would need to occur to allow such features to be added to MorphOS, or any platform which has an AmigaOS 68k software compatibility built-in)[/SIZE],
Since the MorphOS Dev. Team members apparently don't think those features are feasible without unwanted side effects, they probably are not doing any work to add Memory Protection and SMP to MorphOS, and instead their plan is to wait until they are forced to make an architecture switch, at which time they will abandon Amiga 68k legacy support, or "Sand-Box" such legacy support and use UAE to provide it, or some similar path forward.
I won't debate which path is better or worse, because I don't think such an argument can be won or lost, but there is no denying that the path that Hyperion programmers have chosen has taken (and will continue to take) hundreds, if not thousands of programming man-hours to work on implementing these features into AmigaOS4.x, without sacrificing too much of their own legacy support. We won't know how successful they will be, until AmigaOS4.2, or what ever version number they decide to use for the release version that includes these long awaited features, is finished and available for purchase and testing.
Memory Protection & SMP support are two features that would be very nice to have for lots of obvious reasons, but I am not sure that they are "Make or Break" features for me, with regard to my decision to continue supporting the development of AmigaOS4.x and using my X1000.
I got along very well for years on AmigaOS3.x and MorphOS without those features, so as long as I can still get some newer and more modern software applications (and a few new games) to enjoy on my X1000 running AmigaOS4.x, I probably will never complain if full Memory Protection and SMP support does not work, or never gets finished. If/When they do get finished, for me, that will be a big bonus, as it should increase the speed a few applications will be able to run at, will allow some applications to work, that currently can't be ported or written without SMP & Memory Protection, and it should reduce the number of fatal crashes we see, though I don't notice many crashes anyway right now.
MorphOS3.x appears to be making good progress without any plans to add full Memory Protection or SMP support, so my expectations aren't really any different for AmigaOS4.x.
Spirantho mentioned that he perceives an "End of the Road" for MorphOS development on PPC hardware, when they have completed support for the last few Mac PPC hardware choices that are not currently supported. My perspective is very different, and I actually look forward to the day when the MorphOS Dev. Team members are finished with trying to port MorphOS3.x to any other models of PPC hardware, as that will mean that they will have more time to focus on creating or porting more interesting and essential software applications and/or games to MorphOS3.x, as well as further optimizations of the OS itself instead of working on new drivers for hardware which will not improve performance or functionality, but only let us install MorphOS on one more model of existing PPC hardware.
This is one area where I think that A-Eon and AmigaKit have hit a "home-run". They see the value of now focusing their efforts on supporting the creation of more and better software to run on AmigaOS4.x, is their most important task. Having the software you need or want is what makes using any computer useful.
I hope that the MorphOS Dev. Team members will soon have more time to work on new, or newly ported software. More and better content/software applications and games, will probably do more for getting people excited and interested in using their Amiga, and/or Amiga inspired systems, than anything else.
I also hope that Soft-Core Motorola 680x0 CPU's running at speeds equal to, or exceeding 400MHz, loaded into FPGA chips on accelerator boards, inside of original Commodore Amiga computers, or stand alone FPGA Amiga clones, will spur on an increase of 68k software development. That kind of jump in performance should be able to allow software tasks that could never before be accomplished on any Motorola 68k based computer.
AROS and all of it's variants appear to have some really sharp programmers working on it over the past few years and great progress seems to have been made, with more just around the corner, that will eclipse all of the first 10+ years of work on AROS combined.
What a great time it is to be involved in any part of our remaining community! Certainly not a time to perpetuate the silly and childish fighting we see all too often.
