[News] AmigaOne Update from Alan Redhouse | ANN.lu |
Posted on 24-Jul-2002 22:17 GMT by Douglas McLaughlin | 106 comments View flat View list |
On the AmigaOne mailing list, Alan Redhouse from Eyetech posted the following update:
Many dev board purchasers were clearly motivated by the 10% discount
rather than their ability to contribute to the developer process. The
initial boards were therefore shipped to those who could make a real
contribution to developing drivers etc, and porting Linux/UAE
distributions. Their progress has been astounding IMO with no less
than 5 different linux distributions (SuSE, Debian, Mandrake, Yellow
Dog and TurboLinux) being ported within a couple of weeks. More...
Many dev board purchasers were clearly motivated by the 10% discount
rather than their ability to contribute to the developer process. The
initial boards were therefore shipped to those who could make a real
contribution to developing drivers etc, and porting Linux/UAE
distributions. Their progress has been astounding IMO with no less
than 5 different linux distributions (SuSE, Debian, Mandrake, Yellow
Dog and TurboLinux) being ported within a couple of weeks.
However the Softex open firmware we had originally shipped with the
dev boards (incidently as seen on the Pegasos video) has several
shortcomings (although this has been used to boot the 5 linux
distributions and the OS4 kernel) and we are currently
developing/extending the alternative PPCBoot open firmware for use on
the production AmigaOne boards. This will allow us to build in Amiga-
specific boot etc options, a well as a more comprehensive multi-boot
environment.
We are not shipping the remainder of the dev boards (or any of the
user boards) until this code is complete because of the expense of
shipping update ROMs and chip changing tools. This is anticipated to
be towards the end of August.
This revision to the boot ROM is being undertaken by Hyperion as part
of the work necessary for booting OS4 on the A1.
Meanwhile the Amiga Inc club membership/coupon program results
(coupled with our own market extrapolation processes) means that the
future of the AmigaOne is in no doubt.
Finally several people have asked us why we are not delivering the A1
board to Linux users in advance of the release of OS4. Well there are
two main reasons:
1 - This is a product we are producing for the Amiga market and IMO
it is proper that the Amiga community get their hands on it first.
2 - I still cannot see why there would be a significant market for
Linux on the A1 given that the main focus of Linux is the x86
platform, which - because of sheer sales volumes - will always be an
order of magnitude cheaper than a ppc-based product.
Hope this helps
Alan
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AmigaOne Update from Alan Redhouse : Comment 87 of 106 | ANN.lu |
Posted by Donovan Reeve on 27-Jul-2002 16:38 GMT | In reply to Comment 15 (Anonymous): OK mister "anon", since you are the apex of inteligence and integrety, and
have such complete and perfect knowledge of how a business should be run
and relate to its potential customers, I have a proposal for you...
Here are the rules, taken from your various comments and flames.
Your part is to re-start Atari computer OS, following the guide-lines
you yourself have set for Amiga. You must purchase the Atari assets from
the owner and then do everything nessessary to promote the platform and
revive the user-base, but you cannot do any of the following things:
- You may NOT mention any of the products you hope to develope to the
public untill the product is actually shipping. If you DO mention anything
and even one person construes that you have made a promise and failed tbe able
to keep it, then you must give whatever assets you have left away to the
public for free and go out of business.
- You MUST satisy every person on earth with your plans or give everything
you have developed away free and go out of business.
- Your products MUST push the envelope, i e be beyond state-of-the-art, but
yet sell for prices lower than toys.
- Your products MUST be totally open and free. Your software must run on
every hardware in the world, even those which do not exist yet, and your
hardware MUST run every software in the world, even those which do not
exist yet.
- You may NOT...repeat NOT make, advertise or sell any promotional items
nor may you attempt to raise capital in any other way. This includes not
attempting to form any partnerships with other companies or seeking financial
backing from other companies.
- If anyone tries to compete with you or take advantage of you, you MUST
submit to their every whim and demand. You must provide everything you have
purchased or developed to them for free, even to the point of developing
special drivers for them to use your software and hardware with their
competing products.
- If developement time is longer than two months, you must appologise for
living, give away all of your assets to your competitors for free, and
starve yourself to death.
- When supporters of competing products flame you plans or products before
they are even available for review, you must keep totally silent, or else
agree with them.
- If anything goes wrong or takes longer than you planned, you must give
everything away free, appologise for living and drown yourself.
- You may NOT be optimistic nor hopefull about the future of your products
or plans. If you say anything at all, you must say that your products are
crap and will never exist and even if they did would not be worth buying
or even taking for free.
On the other hand, MY part (and the part of anyone else who cares to join in,
will be as follows:
- We will counter you at every turn and do our best to see you fail.
- We will flame everything you do and say, and say your products are crap
when we havent even seen them, and we will say to EVERYONE that you and your
company are crap too, and dishonest and lazy and stupid.
- We will spread so much fud that you won't be able to get a word in edgewise.
- If you are able to make any progress, we will do our best to tear it down.
- If you finally succeed, we will fanatically spread the world in every
possible way that you have actually failed.
Fair enough? After all, they're YOUR RULES. You formed them every time
you opened your mouth, and with every word you typed!
So, let's try it! Let's have YOU play the game by YOUR rules!
Donovan Reeve (bubby@inebraska.com) |
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