It seems OS4.1 will continue down the same path of legal issues, financial problems, management leaving, developers not getting paid and leaving, lack of core investment, 5 years between maintenance releases etc.
However to do something about this the Enhancer Software was created. It is now growing in new directions as the third party situation gets worse.
User can stick to using OS4 pure distribution or they can use the Enhancer Software components: it is their free choice.
Yes you already made clear that you wanted to continue on the stubborn shit move path. You know, the stuff this community really need so much more of. So please, do continue to be part of the problems. Kudos to you.
@orgin What is funny, is that does not matter how you explain issues to Mattew, he will answer anything, but not things we ask. I still can't understand where is the logic behind that. If Hyperion didn't update their commands, ok, be it! Then create your own NEW commands, with NEW names, and with NEW versioning, and everyone will use what they want. But instead, going that low that stealing their names and versioning, feels really a bit (or not a bit) bad.
If one wants to make things better, and starting from scratch as they say, then do everything independently! Create your own new commands, with new names, new stuff, but not stealing originals and trying to mimic them. It on all fronts just bad.
Like AROS, MorphOS, Scalos, DOpus 5 and various third party commands on Aminet ?
Hyperion went through 5 years of no updates. Who knows what the future will hold ? We rather not sit on our hands and wait patiently whilst the rest of the world moves on.
Is it realistic for 29 Euros retail price they will have enough money to invest in anything more substantial than house keeping updates to OS4 in future ? They are living off the hard (free) work of volunteers but that is not sustainable for more meaningful functionality.
@amigakit Because Hyperion currently can't do better, doesn't make you right on what you are doing. And people here question A-Eon's decisions and practices, not Hyperion's. So, be kind and reply on those and don't try to avoid clear replies.
Those commands that Enhancer replaced on users' system, that as you said, are not mandatory for the rest of the software to run (drivers and apps) are going to be removed from the package? Are you going to apologise to users for contaminating their system with broken software? Are you going to make a better effort in the future to inform them WHAT Enhancer Installer replaces and WHY? Will you find some time to be more transparent to users and give them information through the Amiga Developers Team blog? Are you going to sell the drivers as a separated package for those that want to get only those, in lower price?
I am afraid that what I see here happening, and amigakit and A-Eon are both responsible for that, is one more split of the AmigaOS 4 community, to those that prefer original AmigaOS 4 and to those who prefer Enhancer package. Or if you like those who support Hyperion and those who despise them. And amigakit is doing it's best to speak bad about Hyperion, without doing their best to help the situation. It might be my idea. Hope I am wrong.
Other communities lough out loud on our situation and A-Eon and AmigaKit are so shut in in their own microcosm that they don't see it. AmigaKit is not close to the community any more. They don't listen to the community. They don't know what the community needs.
Like AROS, MorphOS, Scalos, DOpus 5 and various third party commands on Aminet ?
AROS and MorphOS are totally different distributions. They don't target the same hardware, they don't use AmigaOS 4 parts and they don't look like AmigaOS 4, not even slightly. They do not copy themes and icons for example.
About Scalos, I checked the download at https://aminet.net/package/util/wb/Scalos and haven't seen any C folder in there. Checked the Prefs, Devs, Libs, Tools etc, and haven't seen any replacement or anything with the same name as the system's components.
About DOpus 5 I checked the download at https://aminet.net/package/util/dopus/Dopus5_91_os4 and although it has a C folder, no file conflicts there. Nor in any other folders. Kas1e is also very capable to confirm if DOpus replaces anything on the system or not.
About the third party commands on Aminet, they are in users' decision to use them or not. At least those are coming with full documentation for the user's to understand why they should use these than the system's ones. If you have something specific in mind, please share it with us.
So, amigakit, from the above is clear that either you don't have any idea what you are talking about or you try to make some impression here by telling lies.
Those commands that Enhancer replaced on users' system, that as you said, are not mandatory for the rest of the software to run (drivers and apps) are going to be removed from the package?
User can continue to choose whether they want to install them or not. The Installer gives users the explicit choice.
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Are you going to apologise to users for contaminating their system with broken software?
It is always regretful when a command lacks a feature. Software development sometimes yields bugs and oversights but it is important how we respond. You will notice that there was a rapid new release of Copy and Version command to rectify the issues.
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Are you going to make a better effort in the future to inform them WHAT Enhancer Installer replaces and WHY?
Absolutely, I have already confirmed previously that is the intention.
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Will you find some time to be more transparent to users and give them information through the Amiga Developers Team blog?
Yes that will be coming in future months- lots to new developments to blog about.
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Are you going to sell the drivers as a separated package for those that want to get only those, in lower price?
Warp3D Nova is not a driver. Do you mean RadeonHD or RadeonRX as a standalone? We have already done that.
The entire cost of the Enhancer Software pays for only the graphics sub system (including drivers). No funds from the retail price go to pay for replacement system commands. So if we unbundled the system commands the price would be the same.
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to those that prefer original AmigaOS 4 and to those who prefer Enhancer package.
Its a free world and customers can make up their own minds. They can buy the software or not. It is up to them what they choose to install on their systems, whether they use A-EON hardware platforms or other manufacturer's machines.
We will carry on listening to customers feature requests, investing in software development, and see where it leads in future.
Updating existing software or writing new components is certainly positive .. but inevitably overwriting already existing components is a big big risk ..
Apart for the incredible waste of resources in developing a component that already exists what will happen if a given software will end to work only with a component present into the Ehencher package or only with an Hyperion component?
The risk is that in a relatively (short) time we as users could find ourselves in having two different systems partially incompatible with each other .. at this point it would be much better to invest money in continue to purchase individual components of AmigaOS4 and develop only from these ... or better still obtain from Hyperion the entire operative system or find an agreement with them in order to integrate the entire Enhancer package into AmigaOS4
I am a regular user, not a beta tester or developer.
I purchased my MicroA1 motherboard (bundled with Pre-release version of AmigaOS 4.0) near the end of 2004 and built my own computer. Since then, I have installed every version of OS4 released to the public.
During the 5 year period of no updates from Hyperion, I purchased the Enhancer Software Special Edition V1.5 and installed most of the software on the CD.
So, I had the A-EON version of Clock, Calendar, Format, notification server, etc. I remember that it took some effort to wake up the new sound software on my system. I liked the Clock and Calendar, but rarely used them. Since the MicroA1 has only 256 MB of RAM and 32 MB of graphics/video RAM, I try to limit the amount of "eye-candy" on my system.
So December 2020 Hyperion releases AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Update 2. I downloaded and installed this overtop of my existing OS4 FE Update 1 + Enhancer system. Format and Clock were overwritten with OS4 version. I can't remember if the sound package was changed.
Since I wasn't sure what else was changed, I did a clean install. I formatted my SYS: partition, installed OS4.1 FE, installed Update 1 and installed Update 2.
Of course, this wiped out my Enhancer Software.
Sometime after I installed the Hotfix for Update 2, I decided to install selected portions of the Enhancer Sotware package. I had some issues with the Updater program. Unkown to me, the Ringhio Notification server provided with OS4.1 was not compatible with Updater.
Eventually, I installed MultiEdit, MultiViewer, all the classes and gadgets and clipviewer.
I did not reinstall Enhancer Clock, Format or Sound package.
Also, I don't like to mix and match system commands with OS4 and Enhancer versions, because I don't want to keep track of which command came from which distribution. So, for example, I have not replaced List, Copy or Version commands with the A-EON versions.
--- redfox
Edited by redfox on 2021/6/7 19:20:55 Edited by redfox on 2021/6/7 19:25:36 Edited by redfox on 2021/6/7 19:37:27 Edited by redfox on 2021/6/7 19:41:32 Edited by redfox on 2021/6/7 19:46:51
I commend A-EON and your development team on the achievements you have made, such as 3D Shaders, Video Acceleration, OpenGL ES 2, Sensor API, Power Management, 2D Radeon RX and HD drivers.
IMHO, you guys have done a fabulous job in this regard.
New applications? Sure, very welcome.
But, I don't see the point of cloning commands that already exist in the OS4 distribution.
I can understand Matthew's plan: it is to progressively replace the Amiga commands and utilities with new versions that offer the same or better features, but with the advantage that they are free of the Amiga curse.
For that reason, it is preferable (even essential?) to replace the old "tainted" versions with the new "clean" versions, by using the same names. As Matthew has said several times, it is up to us whether we install the new versions over the old, or rename them to something new.
As long as we know the situation, we can avoid a problem when we install Enhancer.
1. The user chooses not to install your commands/components of the same name but then want to install some software of yours in the future that requires those? There is no choice then?
2. The user chooses to install your commands/components of the same name but then Hyperion update os 4.1 and that clobbers your installed components, where both now have different capabilities? Worse, programmers expect that opening a version number of a library will ensure that a particular API exists (I am thinking of your datatypes.library here, now and in the future) and so programs will start crashing unexpectedly. You can't expect Hyperion to respect any API additions you make when releasing a new version because your API is not part of AmigaOS, yet masquerades as such by using the same name and versioning.
For those reasons they simply should be different names. Then programmers can choose to support your (possibly superior) library functionality optionally by attempting to open your library, call your command, etc.
I know there doesn't seem to be any chance, but I really wish this could be addressed.
I do also understand that you are trying to move development forward without being tied to lawsuit results et al but that can definitely happen with different names.
I agree "clean" implementations are essential and critical to the project. The only downside, as we have found to date, is they sometimes spawn totally different bugs to the older components of the same name due to different coding styles. In some instances that has proved to be an unexpected benefit in routing out longstanding hidden bugs in the older component.
@Steady
Some interesting points.
With respect to commands, we will continue to ensure that they are fully compatible with other implementations to keep a set standard across the Amiga world. For example, recently the OS3.2 team decided to add GROUP to the List command. However in OS4 and our command it is GROUPS (plural). They also changed FORMAT to NOLONGNAMES whereas on our command and OS4 is is LONGNAME. So for completeness we add FORMAT NOLONGNAMES=LONGNAME to keep compatiblity across the board. It seems teams working for Hyperion do not keep to the same standards themselves.
We have had components such as our Sound datatype released to public for some time and it is API compatible with older components. However the streaming functions enhancement are specific to the our version. We have kept the versioning higher so developers can ascertain which version they are calling.
Later this year all of these components will be together in a larger body of work which will make it much easier to segregate from older components and not conflict with OS4.
Since day one, programmers have always had the choice to develop for the Enhancer Software baseline or not. We released the free of charge Enhancer Software Core so they can do this. Further updates are due for that. So rather than they specifying it needs version x of some component, they can more broadly simply state that the Enhancer Software Core should be installed.
I can understand Matthew's plan: it is to progressively replace the Amiga commands and utilities with new versions that offer the same or better features, but with the advantage that they are free of the Amiga curse.
Wait wait Tony, you saying it like Mattew create opensource replacements ? Its another close sourced stuff tied to another company and the benefit of it only saying "hyperion update it bad, we will update it better?" Who can be sure that Mattew and developers who working on replacing commands will be there with us in the next , let's say, 5 years ? I not sure. No one can be sure. So, it can end up just the same as with Hyperion : no updates by any of reassons in future. I can understand if that is opensourced fully, then if AEON gone, or Mattew stop worry about, things is here, open, free from Ben's ownership. But as it of now, its the just another company, which also may have issues later with updating those components.
And anyway, if replace things, let's start from graphics.library & amigainput to make them modern enough. But those "Simple" but not that simple commands ..
@Mattew Quote:
The only downside, as we have found to date, is they sometimes spawn totally different bugs to the older components of the same name due to different coding styles.
No, the only downside its calling your commands with the same name as Ben's ones. It create mess. Thanks god you dind't call gadgets and classes with the same name, but i fear you will do so soon or later and then it will be complete mess. It will be just 2 different OS : AmigaOS4 and EnhancerOS.
And not "older" components, you again play words, but "original amigaos4 components", some of which are updated and will updated soon or later. Just call names as it, not need to pretend to be a successor of a whole OS.
In end of all, just create EnhancerOS, but then rewrite all necessary components then and not use AmigaOS4 ones.
With respect to commands, we will continue to ensure that they are fully compatible with other implementations to keep a set standard across the Amiga world. For example, recently the OS3.2 team decided to add GROUP to the List command. However in OS4 and our command it is GROUPS (plural).
Why do you care about what AmigaOS 3.2 guys did? Will the Enhancer 68K, that you announced in the past, going to replace AmigaOS 3.2 components as well? This version is actively maintained, isn't it? So, why would you do that?
A concern raised was about our new commands being consistent in functionality and features with the older Hyperion command set. The OS3.2 product comes from the same source as OS4.1 so you would think that the commands set would be consistent. If the "official" AmigaOS Wiki documents commands shouldn't they work the same on both 3.2 and 4.1 where ever possible?
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Will the Enhancer 68K, that you announced in the past, going to replace AmigaOS 3.2 components as well?
As you know our 68K project is self-booting so does not need to have any licenced commands from third-parties. There are a few things still to do. Our IPrefs is work-in-progress and partially operable. There is still a lot of work fathoming that out.
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This version is actively maintained, isn't it? So, why would you do that?
It seems that OS3.2 is subject to legal entanglements (see recent statements from Cloanto). We do not want to get involved with any product that has an uncertain future. We prefer to sell our own software that can be actively maintained, can be updated when our customers demand. If we pay licence fees for OS3.2 where does the money go? At least when we pay our developers to create our own software we know that the money is going back into the community.
@Kas1e
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And anyway, if replace things, let's start from graphics.library & amigainput to make them modern enough
Yes I agree with you - they are long overdue replacing. However the same arguments that you have levied against replacing other components should be equally valid against your eagerness to replace these components. There does not seem to be any consistency- either you are against replacing Hyperion components completely or you are not. I suspect you are only in favour when there is no prospect of Hyperion being able to do it.
This was originally Amiga Developer blog. Please, please, less offence...
I know that make command replacement with the same name may not be the best solution and can make difficulties or mess. But without Enhancer our AmigaNGs have only half of the abilities. What to do with my AmigaOne X1000 or now Sam440ep-flex without Enhancer?
The command names are serious issue. Is it possible to solve it in peace ? Or at least via PM. There is too many controversies in Amiga world...
AmigaOS3: Amiga 1200 AmigaOS4: Micro A1-C, AmigaOne XE, Pegasos II, Sam440ep, Sam440ep-flex, AmigaOne X1000 MorphOS: Efika 5200b, Pegasos I, Pegasos II, Powerbook, Mac Mini, iMac, Powermac Quad
@sailor You are probably right. We ask too many questions to someone who doesn't care to listen and nothing will come out of this. But those questions are relevant with the blog that started because of a similar discussion. Amigakit promised that they would update it with posts about what they are doing and plans, but they left it for 6 months with no updates.
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But without Enhancer our AmigaNGs have only half of the abilities. What to do with my AmigaOne X1000 or now Sam440ep-flex without Enhancer?
I totally agree with you, but are you happy with Enhancer replacing components of your system without any need? Are you happy that someone changes parts of your setup, without any reason?
I am asking because I am not. And the reason those discussion happen is to raise awareness and also to get information, that A-Eon didn't share anywhere else (wiki, blog, press releases etc.) about their plans.
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The command names are serious issue. Is it possible to solve it in peace ? Or at least via PM.
It is a discussion in peace here. PMs doesn't make sense because there is no benefit for the whole community if this happen in PMs, don't you think? I believe that everyone should be able to see and read A-Eon's and AmigaKit's plans, don't you think?
@amigakit Quote:
It seems that OS3.2 is subject to legal entanglements (see recent statements from Cloanto). We do not want to get involved with any product that has an uncertain future. We prefer to sell our own software that can be actively maintained, can be updated when our customers demand. If we pay licence fees for OS3.2 where does the money go? At least when we pay our developers to create our own software we know that the money is going back into the community.
As much as I know there is a trial on that. You speak like you know that Hyperion will lose and will soon be dead. Do you have any inside info on that? Also, the last time I checked AmigaOS 3.x has active development and is not obsolete. So, why someone would like to recreate the same wheel. And if he does, why people would prefer that wheel against the original one? Why don't you put your effort to make the original project better? Why don't you cooperate with Hyperion? And why do you care where the license fees go? You pay to get access to a product, right?
Anyway, good luck with your plans. Wish you success. Hope that the community will not be divided once more because of your actions.
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