[News] OS4 progress since pre-release | ANN.lu |
Posted on 08-Jun-2004 21:47 GMT by Peter Gordon | 228 comments View flat View list |
Hans-Jorg Frieden has posted a detailed status update on the progress of OS4 to Amigaworld.net.
Brief summary:
· Picasso96 and MUI PPC native
· Kernel supports PPC performance monitor and Altivec
· Moovid (released with OS3.9 as "action") is now running native, and can play DivX and other common formats
· GCC 3.4.0 is ported
· The C libraries are much faster. As a result AmiPDF is up to 60 times faster.
· Serial and floppy drivers coming soon
· USB is working and supports HID devices like keyboards and mice as well as HID joysticks and steering wheels, and USB mass storage devices like USB sticks, flash card readers, 7-in-1 card readers and cameras
· A1 IDE device now has working UDMA support. Also, interrupts are no longer polled but delivered properly. This means that the device does not require any CPU time for transfers.
This material will in due course be released for download to registered users of the Developer Pre-release on our web site at:
http://www.hyperion-entertainment.biz
There is more detail in the original AW.net posting.
|
|
List of all comments to this article |
OS4 progress since pre-release : Comment 162 of 228 | ANN.lu |
Posted by Anonymous on 09-Jun-2004 21:14 GMT | In reply to Comment 158 (Stefan Burström): > Then I don't think you got the whole picture. First of all. A modern OS should not be limited by its legacy
That's correct but AmigaOS4 isn't a modern OS, it's a transitional OS. It is AmigaOS3 ported to PPC. This is a branch that has reached its end, it crashes into design barriers left and right: file name length, 8 bit codeset, shared address space, resources tracking, stability (aka memory protection) etc. It is clearly limited by it's legacy, so saying it should not be is a bit silly. To put it in a nutshell, I think it is the wrong time and the wrong occasion to introduce major new concepts. Waste a cycle, put the m68k->PPC switch into the beginning of PPC code, and we can live with that for two years. We shouldn't have to learn a completely new library interace that does not look as if it was designed for a long time (it's unthinkable that something like that will be in OS5 and not an object-oriented API).
> Anything that slows the system down to support legacy applications is a bad thing.
Programmers shouldn't be dogmatic about such issues, if it's a trade-off between simplicity and less speed, it depends on the gain in simplicity and the loss of speed. If the loss is neglegible (as in a millionth second) and the gain in simplicity of design is substantial, you do the rest. |
|
List of all comments to this article (continued) |
|
- User Menu
-
- About ANN archives
- The ANN archives is powered by #AmigaZeux. It was updated daily (news last: 22-Oct-2004; comments last: 18-May-2005).
ANN.lu was created, previously owned and maintained by Christian Kemp, www.ckemp.com.
- Contribute
- Not possible at this time!
- Search ANN archives
- Advanced search
- Hosting
- ANN.lu was hosted by Dreamhost. Sign up through this link, mention "ckemp" as referrer and he will get a 10% commission on any account you purchase.
Please show your appreciation for any past, present and future work on ANN.lu by making a contribution via PayPal.
|