amiga-news.de - Fortnightly Q&A's with Fleecy Moss

20.Jul.2003
AmigaWorld (ANF) Fortnightly Q&A's with Fleecy Moss - episode 15
The English online magazine AmigaWorld has published episode 15 of the regular questions and answers session with Fleecy Moss, CTO at AMIGA, Inc. (Update 2012-03-15, cg: as the original document is no longer available, the following content was moved into our database):

1) amif1team: How about support for Russian and Ukrainian Amiga users? Do you support the Russian Amiga dealer 'Amiga Line' or do you have any other future plans to sell AmigaOne hardware in Russia and the Ukraine?

Fleecy: We have Russian and Ukranian language drivers in AmigaOS4.0 and although the Russian team seems to have disbanded, we have been told another is being formed.

The new Amiga Power Platform website will provide a forum for Amiga users and we will work with the ATO to make sure that it supports languages other than English. Our aim is to be able to work with local groups and dealers since they know their areas and markets far better than we do.

We are happy to sell AmigaOS and Amiga certified hardware such as the AmigaOne anywhere. The dealer you mention can send me a private email and I will try to get him/her set up.

2) Mojo-kun: AmigaOS needs modern applications. There is lots of very good free software which could be ported to AmigaOS if it had POSIX compatibility and some common GUI toolkits such as QT, GTK+ or GNU Step. What do you think of this and is an effort being made to support these technologies?

Fleecy: A great platform needs great applications. Our aim is to support and encourage the development of new applications on our platform so that we start to develop a unique and appealing software base that offers something over the other platforms.

Having said that, new applications take time and resources. AmigaOS4.0 will start off with a lot of older Amiga Generation 1 applications that are emulated, most of which are in serious need of updating. To increase the amount of AmigaOS4 specific software we have been looking closely at what is needed and what can be moved quickly from other platforms, such as Windows and Linux.

A strategy is underway to make such porting easier but, at the same time, we have to be careful not to turn AmigaOS4 into something else. POSIX, for example was created for very specific reasons, reasons that don't map one hundred percent onto the AmigaOS.

3) Turbo: According to the original Amiga One Zico Specification, several AmigaDE friendly processor types were to be supported. Are there still plans for a future Amiga OS to support x86? Is the future replacement for Amiga OS4.x coded on top of intent or is this going to be rehashed to run exclusively on a 64bit G5?

Fleecy: Our plan is still to make AmigaOS5 processor agnostic so eventually it will run on x86 but this is some time off, and would mark the completion of the Amiga Generation 2 project.

It will not be built on top of Intent. Intent will reside within the AmigaOS as a service, providing Amiga Anywhere and Java support.

The 64 bit AmigaOS implementation has always been a target, since we will be able to implement orthogonal persistence much more easily than on a 32 bit platform. There are still a lot of issues to sort out first however.

4) Yellow: I have Party Pack. I'm planning to buy AmigaOne with the latest AmigaOS perhaps after a year. Can I safely assume that I will get the $100 refund then? Does it matter what kind of AmigaOne model I buy; if there someday exists an AmigaOne model that uses 64-bit PPC processor, can one get the refund for buying that?

Fleecy: The voucher scheme is refundable against an AmigaOne (which is the Amiga certified Eyetech board and an OEM copy of AmigaOS that runs natively on it) so if you buy it a year after it comes out, then yes, you can claim the refund. The exact mechanism is still being discussed between ourselves and participating dealers but it will have to be in place before AmigaOS4.0 ships.

I don't see why it can't be used against a 64 bit Amiga but that is some time off.

5) alx: If you went back in time to before the A1/OS4 project began, what things would you have done differently and why?

Fleecy: I'd have put $1000 on the winner of the Grand National and I wouldn't have wasted $10 to see The Phantom Menace ;-)

With hindsight, we'd have started the AmigaOS4.0 project straight away, running it in parallel with the AmigaDE project. I also wouldn't have wasted 9 months trying to bring the various factions together for the sake of unity.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing though.

6) Samurai_Crow: What affect does Tao Group's release of Intent 2 have on the AmigaDE platform and the general plans for the future?

Fleecy: As with every revision of Intent, we assess it, move the AmigaDE code to it and then help the developers to move their content to it. We are both committed to creating a better and better product set and seeing both Intent and the AmigaDE and its content on more devices and in more markets.

7) Agafaster: Can we have a PPC Linux version of Amiga DE? Pretty please?

Fleecy: The first version of the AmigaDE on PPC will be for AmigaOS4. This has been stated publicly from the very beginning - AmigaOS first, then OS X and then any other opportunities that make business sense.

8) Asemoon: Some time ago Amiga's CEO demonstrated AmigaDE's 2D scaling abilities for TechTV. When available for AmigaOS will the users be able to open AmigaDE software in seperate user defined screenmodes? (Screens various resolutions, instead of just running on the desktop as demonstrated on Windows/Linux)

Fleecy: Yes.

9) Asemoon: The AmigaOne-lite is said to become an entry-level Amiga solution. Are there any plans for an A1200/A500-style or similar custom case for housing the AmigaOne-lite motherboard?

Fleecy: There are plans yes but plans aren't products until you can buy them. A few third parties have also contacted us about creating their own case designs so expect to see quite a bit of choice.

10) unclecurio: In a previous Q&A, you mentioned you were looking at the way Apple had used the audio units system in OSX. Can you tell us a little more about how the Amiga solution might operate?

Fleecy: The AG2 audio solution actually started life way back when the AmigaDE was going to replace AmigaOS, quite some time before the OS X audio system became public knowledge. Reading the Core Audio documentation made us smile quite a bit.

Once we decided that AmigaDE and AmigaOS would address different markets, this solution was retargeted at the AmigaOS.

The AG2 audio project uses elements called 'streamers' which are similar to Core Audio's 'audio units'. They can perform filter-like tasks like effect processing, format conversion, stream encoding/decoding, mixing or I/O related tasks like streaming a file from/to disk or network.

To make a distinction between streamers of different applications, streamers belong to a certain 'Audio Context'. Of course there can be communication and data flow between several contexts, so the audio output of one application (for example a software sampler) can be routed to the input of another application (for instance, a multi-track program).

There will be specific higher-level streamers to accomodate for games, to make use of DSP's for example, without the need for the programmer to program them directly. The goals of the architecture are to make use of multi-channel audio, DSP's, multiple CPU's, etc. when they are available and to make sure a lowest possible level of latency can be acquired by means of a Quality of Service system.

(Copyright © 2003 Amigaworld.net. All rights reserved.
Originally available at http://amigaworld.net/modules/fleecymoss/index.php?cat_id=16
You may freely redistribute this article, providing that a URL is provided to the original source,
and the copyright notices remain intact) (nba) (Translation: cb)

[News message: 20. Jul. 2003, 20:29] [Comments: 0]
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