Beginner AmigaOS 4 based Programming Language

I have asked a couple friends in IRC the same question but thought I would ask here too. I want to explore programming. I own only Next Gen Amigas. X5000 is my main system. Looking for a programming language and software kit that is easy to buy if still a valid product, or download if now public domain, but need to make sure it is well documented for a beginner.

Would like that the language is more english as that makes it easier for me to understand. Want it to have a software kit that has all I need to get started. A nice IDE would be nice.

Also, since I last programmed on a Mac like in 2005 using Applescript and XCode, I wonder if there is something in Amigaland that allows for easy way to create the user interface for an application I may make, kind of drag and drop and then tell the button what to do... kinda like Xcode suite allowed me to do.

Ultimately being able to make a very basic game, say a scrolling game or a small shoot M up, would be neat.

I know there is Python, Hollywood, and others.

Guessing Hollywood may be the easiest most complete way to start since it is still a current selling product, but open to other options.

Thanks
TJ

To tell you the truth the Amiga developer environment is terrible.

Hyperion and A-EON need to take development as first priority and hire GNU GCC toolchain experts and get all Amiga programming software up to date ASAP, its so serious its not funny anymore.

But it looks like they dont even have a clue.

This includes C, C++ to C++ standard 11+ so we can have some standardised programming platform.

We also need all other languages up to date to eg perl, python, Golang, C#, Java, Javascript, haskell , Clojure, asm.

Developers with many language experience moving on to Pure Functional Programming languages eg Clojure as it speeds up development time without extra keystrokes.

We also need a good IDE suite for debugging all above programming languages in one suite, so much work to be done.

AmigaOS does not even have a source code management & dependency system like on most linux systems.

One cannot create programs and games if the owners cannot provide the tools to do the job, digging a garden with a fork is not fun.

If I were an investor I would not be happy at all.

@AmigaSociety

Easiest languages to use on AmigaOS are probably

ARexx, Python and Hollywod

GUIS can br created with my ProAction tool, but it does require aquiring some skill at Reaction. There are plenty of examples on my wesbite and within SketchBlocks script directory if you have it.

There isn't a drag and drop GUI generator I know, certainly not one with script lenguage suppport.

Start simple, ask lots of questions.

@angelheart

Quote:

perl for AmigaOS 4 is currently at version 5.22 which is onoly two realse stops behind 'bleed' (bleed is 5.27 but only even numbers count as public releases)

I will probably upgrade the official distro to 5.26 at some point or 5.28 if it takes me longer to get there, but I don't see the point of upgrading perl every release for our relativey small user base, when any binary modules would then need rebuilding due to contuinual API breaks.

If you need perl 5.26 features as matter of urgency you can build it yourself, the amigaos patches are upstream and it's literal a matter of typing

./configure
make

@AmigaSociety

Right now I'm not sure what to recommend. Hollywood looks like it'd be the best, since it allows you to get nice results quickly. However, I haven't found much in the way of tutorials , so you end up having to learn by looking at examples & deciphering the reference manual.

For now, I'd say, give Hollywood a go. Let us know how things go.

@angelheart
The situation isn't that bad. Yes, it would be very useful to have C++ updated to C++11 or newer. However, the GCC toolchain is good for C and C++08 or older. CodeBench is a pretty decent editor & development environment. I'm looking forward to Jamie getting back to developing his AVD suite. We could very much use a GUI designer like AVD.

Stonecracker has created good instructions for building a cross-compiler setup & even how to use Visual Studio with the cross-compiler. That lowers the barrier for people who are used to those tools.

Quote:
Better stick to C/C++, and support them well. Trying to support everything will just spread limited development resources too thin.

Quote:
We have svn, and sgit is getting there as a git client. Hopefully sgit will get all polished up, and then you can set up a private repository on bitbucket (or some other service). Managing your own svn/git repository on a private server can be tedious.

I'd like to see more tutorials for AmigaOS development. I've created a few for Warp3D Nova. My GLES2 tutorials haven't yet been adapted for AmigaOS (been too busy, sorry), but someone who knows what they're doing could figure it out. We need a lot more tutorials to help people get started.

It would also be useful to have more middleware (e.g., game engines). Years ago, someone was working on a Torque Game Engine port, but it was never finished. Something like that would be very useful.

Hans

@AmigaSociety
Especially since you mention "more english like", I shall have to mention my own programming language, PortablE:
http://cshandley.co.uk/portable/

I've tried to make it as easy to use as possible, without compromising it's power or speed. It's heavily based on (and mostly compatible with) a famous & once-very-popular programming language called AmigaE.

You can see a lot of simpler examples here:
http://cshandley.co.uk/portable/examples/

There are also a couple of forums you can ask questions on, although I have less time these days for answering questions than I used to:
http://www.amigacoding.de/index.php?board=80.0
http://aros-exec.org/modules/newbb/vi ... me&sortorder=DESC&since=0

Here is Hello World in PortablE:


It sadly lacks tutorials aimed at beginners, but it does have fairly comprehensive documentation of all the standard functions:
http://cshandley.co.uk/portable/StandardFunctionality.html

There is also more general documentation on how it differs from AmigaE:
http://cshandley.co.uk/portable/PortablE.html

While you can find tutorials & the original manual for AmigaE here:
http://cshandley.co.uk/JasonHulance
http://cshandley.co.uk/amigae/

There is no drag'n'drop GUI creator, but it has a IMHO very easy GUI system, which I think is better than a GUI creator, because GUI creators tend to create hard-to-read (and hard-to-edit) GUI code.

BTW, while Hollywood is an interpreted language, PortablE is a compiled language. This makes PortablE blazingly fast, and very efficient in general. While compilation can take a little while on a Sam440, on a X1000 it's almost instant for most programs, and I imagine X5000 is even better.

PortablE also works on MorphOS & OS3 (& AROS for the moment), albiet with less testing on my part, and there is even basic support for Windows (no graphics or GUI, just Command Prompt stuff).

Annotate is a nice editor with syntax highlighting:
http://aminet.net/package/text/edit/Annotate_usr or http://os4depot.net/index.php?functio ... ty/text/edit/annotate.lha

I have written an add-on for Annotate, which allows you to compile & run PortablE code from inside Annotate:
http://cshandley.co.uk/temp/AnnPEGCC_r1.lha

@AmigaSociety

If i only had more time i would love to set up a beginners coding session with guys like you.
Where one teaches the other and we all learn (especially me) and poor sods like Chris would get bombed with beginners questions

Alas...sadly not happening...

@Raziel

I wish you a lot of time as a Christmas present!

@Hans

We also have cvs, which we used to use as our repository tool before we changed to svn. We don't use cvs any more for that purpose, but it still is useful for other sites.

@Amigo1

I've got nightshifts to do...but thanks anyway

@AmigaSociety

Depends on your ambitions
The easiest language to make a workable GUI
is Gui4Cli, it has a visual copy a paste possbiity for gui gadgets, is basiclike, is wel documented comes with lots of examples
Start here:

http://users.online.be/AD/

@AmigaSociety

You should be able to run AMOS PRO under EUAE. It's freeware now and I managed to find the manual.

http://www.classicamiga.com/content/view/5027/176/

You should also checkout Red Pill. It's another piece of software you'll have to run under EUAE but it's game creator that requires no programming skills so you can just concentrate on graphics and game design.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bzh_OIZAPOZocEkyNm9VZWJscjQ/view

There are various videos on Youtube. At least one of them should serve as a tutorial.

It would be nice if there was something like Red Pill for OS4.

@Rob

AMOSPro under E-UAE is slow pig, I'm looking into ways to port AMOS code to C, and or work with Amiga code under AmigaOS4.

RetroMode.library provides some graphic functions similar to AMOS Pro grpahic command.

AMOS2ASC provides a way to convert AMOS code into ASCII.

@Rob

Basic was the first language I learned.
so SDLBasic is maybe a good beginners language.

I think the first language you should be easy to learn, should be safe language.

* No risk crashing your computer. (The extra frustration, is some thing you don't need, and your bound make lots mistakes in the start)
* Give you basic understanding of different kinds of loops, tables and variables.
* Should be fun to program.

Python is nice beginner language, documentation is good, and language is powerful beast, pyhgames shows even possible make small games.

There is also a Modula2 compiler at OS4Depot: agletm2ppc.lha

@LiveForIt

I was excited to say the least when I stumbled across Pygames.... so I watched some videos on YouTube and some of the programming made sense to me... So I planned on exploring Python.... but....

I asked in a separate thread if anyone was using Pygames with Python on Amiga OS 4 and was told some changes in Amiga OS has made it where Pygames no longer works.

So appears I am SOL on exploring that and using Pygames for simple games, at the moment.

http://www.amigans.net/modules/xforum ... hp?topic_id=7677&forum=25

TJ

@Rob

If we're looking at 68k BASIC environments under OS4, at least look at AmiBlitz3, which doesn't need E-UAE to run, and thus feels native (even if it isn't truly). It also has extensive support for the OS, so the executables can be run on OS4 as well, including support for large screen resolutions, RTG, AHI, MUI and so on. The environment is also much nicer, being able to open a full-screen, multi-window editor on any public screen, context-sensitive help, and helpful highlighting of commands that need the native chipset so you can avoid them. It's also a very fast environment to use in general (at least on an A1-XE).

@Daedalus

Good point about Blitz. I shouldn't have overlooked that. Amiga.net.pl are also translating their Blitz Basic book to English.

https://amiga.net.pl/index.php?lng=eng&kwt=10010&tms=185

@Daedalus

Very cool. I will look into that.

I think my IRC friend Severin uses this.

TJ

@Rob

Thanks for the book link,

TJ