| From: | Donovan Reeve |
| Date: | 18 Sep 99 at 05:12:28 |
| Subject: | Ahhh LETS GET MOVING!!! |
On 18-Sep-99, Sandy Brownlee flashed:
>Hello Rick
>All I can say to that is:
>*AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!*
>Well, at least we might be getting Sun behind us, but will it be too late?
It's NEVER to late. Markets change all the time. People are fickle
and get bored. There is nothing stopping people from buying more than
one platform and many do. Also, just because microbrain dominates the
pc market doesn't mean they will dominate the console market. There,
it will be them that are the newcomer and the underdog. By the way,
Sony is BIGGER than microsofthead. As for Amiga, people LIKE something
new and different, and in the multi-media, vidio and games fields micro
you-know-who has NOT shown themselves to be all that competent.
Amiga are making a mistake by not proceeding with their plans for
the MCC, even if they had to have a third party make it for them.
However, if third partys get on the ball and come out with new machines
soon it will be no big problem. In the long run, the plan was always for
third partys to make the hardware. Amiga definately needs to define
standards for the new hardware though, else there will be kaos and
little progress.
The best road forward untill and unless Amiga get the NG system going
is to advance the present generation into state-of-the-art which is
allready being done. AmigaOS3.5 is a good start, and machinery like
Iwin is proposing and the Boxer will bring the hardware up to present
state of the art. We won't be ahead of the competition hardware-wise
but we won't be behind either. I have a Boxer on order, and I will
buy an Iwin or two also if they actually appear. With the nice, clean
and efficient Amiga OS the machenery will perform better than the same
equiptment under windoze (losedoze) or MacOS so will will still be ahead
on performance and system resources effeciency (ram, storeage, etc).
As far as productivity software goes, we allready have some of the most
effecient, easy to use and stable software in the industry thanks to
some wonderful people who have stuck with us. Art software on the
Amiga is the BEST in many areas, and Amiga DTP and word-processing
software are some of the easiest and fastest to use in existance.
Put this stuff on a modern, powerful Amiga and you won't want anything
else. Also, Mac emulation is easy on an Amiga for those who have lots
of money for Mac software and don't know what else to do with the money.
(By the way, if you are poor don't even bother to look at Mac or micro-
dink stuff as it is EXPENSIVE if your planning to do any serious work
and you have to keep replacing it every year or it won't work. Every
piece you upgrade means having to upgrade something else.) Even the
junk is expensive on Mac and weentell. You pay 5 or 10 dollors for
what is free on Amiga. Remember, if you are actually going to USE
your computer(s) for much the software is the major expense in the
long run, not the hardware. And also, for those of us here on the
Blitz-list software is something we can do something about. It is
considerably harder to write software for wintel than for Amiga as
there are so many more things which have to be taken into account
and the so-called "standards" are quite ambiguous and fluid when
programing for wintel stuff.
The Amiga is the best platform for those who are not rich.
(Also for those who are by the way, but for other reasons.)
If H&P continues to upgrade the present Amiga OS as they say they
will (and they are known for keeping their word), and some third party
companies continue their work on making and keeping the Amiga hardware
up-to-date if not ahead, then we will have a good future yet. Then
if Amiga actually come up with something which catches on well, the
present OS can be dove-tailed into it and we will move on. If not,
the present OS is still the best OS in many ways, and being improved
as we speak so all is still not lost. Allthough QNX is very good, it
is a totally different platform and must be considered as such. I
believe that an updated Amiga OS would be better. (Not knocking those
who wish to try QNX, but it's going to be a VERY expensive way to go
and software if it becomes available at all will be costly).
If Amiga still come out with a Linux-kernaled system that may well
be very atractive but it will still be a different platform. We shall
see what transpires.
For now though, for me it's Amiga OS3.5 and Boxer (Iwin if available).
I also plan to present my old, reliable A-3000 with a P5 G4 card if P5
don't screw things up with some propriatory rom crap and instead make it
so it just works under AmigaOS-3.5 on in standard Amigas with processor
slots. I WON'T be buying any P5 products if they continue to pull
mess-around crap like they were previously. We DON'T need another
company with a microbrain attitude.
Now... back to the software...
What does any and everybody think of the idea of having a universal Amiga
group for gathering information on and planning a major campaign to get
needed and desired software made for the Amiga. I invision many working
together on some worthwhile projects on an open-source basis, shareing
techniques as we often do here but with the goal of finishing some cool
pieces of major software. I also invision a web site where input from
the general public is invited to find out what types of software and/or
improvements are most desired. This info would be made available to
all Amiga programers, but would also be especially useful to those of us
in dedicated software groups in our planning. It would gather not only
ideas for various general types of software, but also specific features
to add to software. An expanding e-book (and maybe later a hard-copy
book) of programing tips, tricks, techniques, and topics geared especially
for the Amiga is another thing I invision. If I just start out to write
a book, it will never get done. But I it starts out as an E-book which
is layed out in logical sections and expanded by info from many sources,
it will happen and what there is of it will be imediately useful to
some people.
In other words, I am talking about the following:
1 - large-scale open-source programming efforts to accomplish some cool
software (coordinated, not unorganised). The sources would be open to
all Amiga programing efforts, further discussion is needed to decide
whether to open the source to any other groups.
2 - Gathering data on what is wanted and needed software-wise, both in
general and especially on the Amiga. Input would be open to all
persons but would be seperated as to Amigan and "other".
3 - Compiling information helpful to programmers for learning how to
do things on the Amiga. This would be copywrited with only one
provisio: that it all information would be freely distributable
only for use in creating software for Amigas or teaching others to
create software for Amigas.
We Blitzers are especially in a good position to start some coordinated
efforts in this direction. What do you all think?
cach y'all later,
Donovan Reeve (bubby.lnk@ispi.net)
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