19.Dec.2022
Andreas Falkenhahn (ANF)
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Hollywood: ZIP plugin 1.2 released
Version 1.2 of the ZIP plugin for Hollywood is now available for download. This is a minor update which mostly contains bugfixes and optimizations. The plugin is now available for free download from the official Hollywood portal. Thanks to Hollywood's cross-platform plugin system versions for AmigaOS3, AmigaOS4, MorphOS, WarpOS, AROS (x86), Linux (arm, ppc, x86, x64), macOS (ppc, x86, x64), Windows (x86, x64), Android and iOS are provided. (dr)
[News message: 19. Dec. 2022, 06:21] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
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Aminet uploads until 17.12.2022
The following files have been added until 17.12.2022 to Aminet:
AmiGemini.lha comm/net 152K 68k Gemini + Spartan + Gopher bro...
CloudDav_1.9.lha comm/net 990K MOS A WebDav client
rasm.lha dev/cross 890K MOS Roudoudou's Z80 Assembler
PatchWork.lha dev/debug 48K 68k Validate library calls with A...
libsamplerate.lha dev/lib 3.9M OS4 Library for sample rate conve...
c2plib.lha dev/misc 185K 68k chunky2planar as an Amiga sha...
Sensei.lha driver/oth 37K 68k Displays I2C Sensor informati...
nblood.lha game/shoot 1.0M 68k Blood Amiga Port
ham_convert.zip gfx/conv 4.2M HAM graphic converter
WhatIFF1.08.lha mags/misc 421K What IFF? #1.08-December-2022
AmiArcadia.lha misc/emu 4.6M 68k Signetics-based machines emul...
AmiArcadia-OS4.lha misc/emu 5.1M OS4 Signetics-based machines emul...
mednafen.lha misc/emu 12M OS4 Mednafen
Avalanche_FR.lha util/arc 7K French catalog for Avalanche 1.8
AvalancheDE.lha util/arc 1K German catalog for Avalanche 1.8
AmiSSL-5.6-OS3.lha util/libs 3.3M 68k OpenSSL as an Amiga shared li...
AmiSSL-5.6-OS4.lha util/libs 3.1M OS4 OpenSSL as an Amiga shared li...
AmiSSL-5.6-SDK.lha util/libs 2.3M AOS OpenSSL as an Amiga shared li...
DisLib.lha util/libs 19K 68k A library based MC68K disasse...
AmiKick.lha util/misc 45K Check Kickstart images under ...
Anno.lha util/time 291K 68k Reminder and calendar utility
newmeter.lha util/wb 28K 68k Shows free RAM and storage as...
(snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
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OS4Depot uploads until 17.12.2022
The following files have been added until 17.12.2022 to OS4Depot:
nes_8to1v2.lha aud/con 10kb 4.0 Converts 8-bit samples to NES�...
amissl-sdk.lha dev/mis 2Mb 4.0 SDK for AmiSSL
amiarcadia.lha emu/gam 5Mb 4.0 Signetics-based machines emulator
mednafen.lha emu/gam 12Mb 4.1 Mednafen Emulator
igame_fr.lha gam/uti 7kb 4.0 French catalog for iGame v2.2.0
amissl.lha lib/mis 3Mb 4.0 OpenSSL as an Amiga shared library
sshterm.lha net/mis 172kb 4.1 SSH client with builtin terminal...
(snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
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AROS Archives uploads until 17.12.2022
The following files have been added until 17.12.2022 to AROS Archives:
whatiff1.08.lha doc/mis 421kb Magazine on AmigaGuide Format
(snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
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MorphOS-Storage uploads until 17.12.2022
The following files have been added until 17.12.2022 to MorphOS-Storage:
RASM_1.8.lha Development/Cross Roudoudou's Z80 Assembler
TuxRacer_0.61.lha Games/Race TuxRacer_0.61.lha
SoulFu_1.5.2.lha Games/Role SoulFu port for MorphOS
BeastieWorker_0.4.lha Games/Think 3D Sokoban
AmiSSL_5.6-68k.lha Network/SSL OpenSSL as an Amiga sha...
CloudDav_1.9.lha Network/Streaming A WebDav client
TinyGL-Update-2022-12-... System/Update This is the sixth publi...
(snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
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WHDLoad: New installers until 17.12.2022
Using WHDLoad, games, scene demos and intros by cracking groups, which were originally designed to run only from floppy disks, can be installed on harddisk. The following installers have been added until 17.12.2022:
- 2022-12-17 updated: Back To The Future 2 (Imageworks/Images) patch rewritten, keyboard routine rewritten, game does not freeze anymore, trainer options added, highscore load/save added, DMA wait in replayer fixed, source code included (Info)
- 2022-12-16 fixed: Escape from Colditz (Digital Magic Software) random crashes fixed, debugkey handling removed from keyboard interrupt (Info)
- 2022-12-16 new: Wrong Way Driver (pink^abyss) done by JOTD (Info)
- 2022-12-16 improved: Fighter Bomber (Activision) uses fast memory, new install script, added manual, hints, cheats (Info)
- 2022-12-16 improved: Escape from the Planet of the Robot Monsters (Tengen/Teque) fire button 2 can be used for bombs, manual included (Info)
- 2022-12-14 improved: Edd the Duck 2 (Zeppelin Games) support for SPS 1726 added, 68000 quitkey support (Info, Image)
- 2022-12-14 improved: Solid Gold (Night Owl Design) ButtonWait support for level info screens added (Info, Image)
- 2022-12-13 improved: Akira (ICE) supports another OCS version (Info)
- 2022-12-13 improved: Venus the Flytrap (Gremlin) crash on 68000 machines fixed (happened if CUSTOM2 was not used), support for fire button 2 added (Info)
- 2022-12-13 fixed: Assassin (Team 17) graphics problem in title screen fixed (caused by wrong Bplcon0 color bit fix) (Info)
- 2022-12-13 fixed: The Power (Demonware) new approach for random generator fixes, no more access faults (Info)
- 2022-12-13 updated: Edd the Duck (BBC) patch rewritten, replayer bugs fixed, keyboard bugs fixed, trainer options added, highscore load/save added, source code included (Info, Image)
- 2022-12-11 improved: Hellrun Machine (Amiga Fun) keyboard interrupt rewritten to work on 68000 machines, 68000 quitkey support (Info)
- 2022-12-11 updated: The Power (Demonware) patch rewritten, trainer options added, 68000 quitkey support, CPU dependent delays fixed, source code included, OS stuff patched (Info)
(snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
Andreas Magerl (ANF)
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Print magazine: Amiga Future, issue 160 - 25 years - preview and excerpts
Preview and excerpts of Amiga Future issue 160 (January/February 2023) have been published online meanwhile at the title link. Content includes a preview of Reshooot Proxima 3, a review of Apollo Manticore and an event report from Amiga37.
Amiga Future magazine is available as an English and a German printed magazine and can be bought directly from the magazine's editorial office as well as several Amiga dealers. (snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
Amiga Future (website)
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German Amiga Podcast: Issue 10
The tenth edition of the "German Amiga Podcast" (GAP) reports from the Amiga Meeting in Neumünster and looks ahead to the Amiga Ruhrpott Convention 2023. (snx)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 07:40] [Comments: 0]
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18.Dec.2022
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Advent Calendar: Door 18 - Marcus Sackrow
For the fourth Advent, Marcus 'ALB42' Sackrow is our storyteller.
Marcus is a Free Pascal programmer and has managed a lot of projects over the years, which he regularly informs about in his blog.
In 2014, he started porting Free Pascal first to AROS and later also to AmigaOS 3.1. Most recently, he released Free Pascal 3.2.2 for all Amiga systems in May 2021.
Likewise, in 2015 he started working on his text editor EdiSyn with syntax highlighting for AROS (latest version 0.54.
In mid-2016, he began working on his OpenStreetMap viewer Mapparium, which he further developed to version 0.8 and also made available again for all Amiga systems. His extensive creative output also includes his free Pascal programme Leu for loading and limited editing of Excel (xlsx), OpenOffice and LibreOffice (ods), TurboCalc (tcd) and ASCII (csv) files.
The list could go on, but of course his current project AmiTube must be mentioned: a YouTube client for all Amiga systems that makes it possible to watch YouTube videos on an Amiga. To do this, they are converted into Commodore's CDXL format and downloaded.
To shorten the time until Christmas a little, he has kindly put another game behind his 18th door: his "Amigale" is a conversion of the well-known "Mastermind" (or logic trainer) with words for Amigas from Kickstart 1.3, which is currently popping up everywhere as "Wordle". The task is to guess a word, whereby the programme tells you whether a letter is included or even in the right place. "Amigale" (download at the end of the story) contains both a German and an English dictionary:
(I should definitely have some more lessons in English...: what is "Spahi"??)
Thank you very much, Marcus, and keep up the good work on your projects! And with his anecdote, we wish him and all our readers a happy fourth Advent:
Amiga, Chemistry and Internet
In 1997 I started studying chemistry at the University of Siegen. My professor in the General Chemistry lecture (Prof. Meixner) was quite new at this university and had a lot of interest in computers and the internet.
He had a nice new idea for a new website and a student for it. But since he was new at the university, he only knew us first-year students and someone from my fellow students probably gave him my name when asked. So I introduced myself for the job.
The general chemistry lecture I had with him is a very basic lecture on chemistry, a bit of repetition from chemistry classes (so that everyone is on the same level) but also new things quickly so that it doesn't get too boring. One feature in contrast to later lectures was that it contained a lot of chemical experiments as a presentation on the professor's desk. And there were really many, sometimes 5-6 per lecture hour.
Especially popular, of course, were all the experiments that had something to do with fire or explosions. (The phophore explosion left a deep memory, after the whole lecture hall had a whistling in their ears for 20 minutes, not healthy).
Professor Meixner's idea was to give the students a better way to prepare or review the lecture, which works best via the experiments. Of course, films work much better than simple pictures and text, so the idea was to record the experiments and put them on the internet with an explanation.
I was to be responsible for the technical implementation, i.e. creating the films, converting them and creating the HTML pages. To show that I can do this well, I should first create the website for his research group.
At that time I only had my Amiga 1200, at that time still with modem as connection to the university's network. So I created and tested the whole page on my Amiga and then uploaded it via FTP to the university's server. The HTML texts themselves were all created with a plain text editor (GoldED), I tried some of the HTML editors but wasn't that satisfied. Especially since I tested the pages against the online HTML validator (HTML 3.2 was still quite new back then). Professor Meixner had such a key phrase for his research, "Espionage in the world of molecules", for which I had designed a logo: a water molecule with a magnifying glass in front of it. And since I had just read some 3D course in an Amiga magazine, I implemented the logo as a 3D animation (Lightwave for the 3D, ADPro for converting/shrinking images, MainActor for the GIF animation). I was satisfied and the professor was thrilled.
Later versions of the page are still available on archive.org (a little warning: 90s wepage-overload ;))
For the actual project, money was now requested, a computer with frame grabber card and a very cheap (PAL) camera were bought - cheap USB cameras did not exist yet, hence this combination. The camera was chosen because some of the experiments were very dangerous and we had to expect that the camera would be destroyed or at least damaged. However, this did not happen, as we were always quite careful and protected the camera extra, partly with its own, additionally protective housing.
There were three people involved in total, a technical assistant who prepared and carried out the experiments (she had a lot of experience there as she also did this for the lecture). An advanced student (I think he was about to graduate) for the technical support and texts on the website and me as the person responsible for the technology and the actual website "programming".
The basic idea was to record the experiments, then put pictures of them and descriptions on the web, and if possible even the videos themselves. But we quickly ran into the problem that almost all students only had access to the internet via modem (like me with my 33,600 modem). This meant that the films could not be too big.
On the other hand, there were hardly any video formats that could be played universally. So we decided on MPEG, because you can almost always find a player there (even on the Amiga) and, as a stopgap, GIF-Anim.
Professor Meixner set the file size limit at 500 Kb. The Amiga was again used to create the web pages and especially the GIF animations (including the background image, which was also created on the Amiga with PPaint).
The recording and processing of the experiments took several months, and later the descriptions of the experiments were translated into Spanish and French and supplemented with small quiz questions.
A funny anecdote at the end: when the site went online, the university was very worried because it described how to make explosives (black powder is one of the experiments, but also phosphorus or termite; they are pretty violent experiments). So they didn't want to see these experiments on the free internet, we had to install an IP filter so that only students of the University of Siegen could see these experiments. A few years later, nobody was interested any more.
The website still exists today, on archive.org, but also as a copy on my own site.
Download: Amigale1c.zip (88 Kb) (dr)
[News message: 18. Dec. 2022, 06:57] [Comments: 1 - 18. Dec. 2022, 18:43]
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17.Dec.2022
Twitter
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Web browser: IBrowse 2.5.8 for Amiga OS 3/4 and MorphOS
Press release: Happy Christmas to all our loyal IBrowse users and thank you for the continued support. In 2023, we hope to share some exciting plans for the future of IBrowse. In the meantime, we are pleased to announce the immediate availability of IBrowse 2.5.8, which may be here downloaded (OS4 users may use AmiUpdate instead). This is the eighth free update for registered owners of IBrowse 2.5. IBrowse 2.1-2.4 and 1.x owners may upgrade to IBrowse 2.5.8 via our store at discounted rates.
Please note: IBrowse 2.5.8 requires AmiSSL 5.5 as minimum, with AmiSSL 5.6 being the latest version at the time of writing, so you are advised to download it before updating IBrowse, otherwise you will be left without HTTPS access.
Due to the bugs that unfortunately crept into the initial 2.5.7 release (although these were quickly resolved with hotfixes) we decided to make a full new stable release. This release contains the previous hotfixes, plus a few more fixes and improvements:
- Unescape the URL before showing it in the popup bubble when the mouse is over links
- Fixed crash that occurs if the info window failed to allocate memory when updating the URL
- Fixed crash that can happen when specifying a non-existent filename on the command line when starting from the shell
- OS4: Reversed the protocol and codec modules file lock change in 25.108, unless at least elf.library 53.35 is detected, due to a relocation issue in older versions
- Fixed Gemini support which stopped working in 25.108
- Include updated Greek catalogs from Aminet
(dr)
[News message: 17. Dec. 2022, 16:08] [Comments: 0]
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17.Dec.2022
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Advent Calendar: Door 17 - Thomas Claus
Behind the 17th Advent calendar door awaits the anecdote of Thomas 'imagodespira' Claus, who as a graphic designer forms the duo of EntwicklerX together with the programmer Frank Menzel.
When one thinks of EntwicklerX, two things come to mind: the commercial media player Emotion and elaborately written games for AmigaOS 4. And there is something for everyone. A small list:
They started the development of their media player Emotion in 2016 and released a first alpha version soon after. The official version then was released at the beginning of 2017. An update to version 1.9 is available on the developer page. As Thomas told us, more games and remastered versions are planned - but since they are not pure Amiga developers, of course always depending on other projects. We wish good luck and look forward to today's anecdote:
"My first computer was an Atari 130XE. At the time of the German reunification, there was a "welcome money" for GDR citizens and my brother and I begged "our" money from our parents to be allowed to buy a computer in the Intershop. Of course, we had no idea about computers, we just wanted one. When we were standing in the Intershop, there was only one option for the 200 DM (100,- per child). An Atari 130XE for 192,- (the value is burnt into my memory, I hope it's right ;)). So we bought this one. Of course, there were also C64 computers and Amigas in the corner, but financially unattainable.
Once home, the device was connected to the Raduga TV (Russian brand, very explosive). A blue screen came up with the text "Ready". That was it. By trial and error we got into a screen where notes could be seen. Our English skills were close to zero, so we couldn't even translate "Self Test" (I was 13 and we were learning Russian at school). However, Self Test brought us a tune and made us want to hear more. After that, there was some digging in the manual and we found out that we couldn't go on without external media. We needed a "datasette". We begged and pleaded with parents again and were able to dust off my little sister's money for our Atari and thus buy a Datasette XC12 and a game (Kikstart). That was the entry into my computer world. In the course of time we found out that our neighbour had an Atari 800XL and so we got some software. My favourite game at the time was Montezuma's Revenge. Actually, it's still my favourite game. In the meantime I have an Atari 130XE again, Datasette and every now and then I give myself a round of Montezuma...
Back to my youth. As a happy Atari fan, I dreamed of the Atari ST, MegaST and other Atari devices that were also in our computer shops at some point. Amiga didn't interest me at all. But one day my cousin who lived one street over called. "Come over, I want to show you something". No sooner said than done. Now I was standing in his room. There was an old TV on the floor, an Amiga 500 in front of it and Rick Dangerous was playing. I've never seen such graphic splendour, it looked like the real thing. The sound was amazing, especially the dying in the game. You heard that a lot... Yeah, what can I say. It was a quick conversion. After that afternoon, I didn't even know how to spell Atari anymore. I wanted an AMIGA! Some time later I was able to sell the Atari, my brother was in training and gave money for an Amiga 500 and I shovelled out my aunt's coal cellar to be able to buy a memory expansion... From here on there was no turning back.
To get a reference to today: as some may know, I develop small games with Frank Menzel at the EntwicklerX. Also for AmigaOS 4. I already dreamt of this with the first Atari. Here I drew simple pixel pictures in Basic with the commands "Plot" and "DrawTo" (I didn't have a drawing programme). Later I pixelated in Deluxe Paint, mostly small game scenes for platformers. So running levels and obstacles. Montezuma's Revenge but also Rick Dangerous never really let me go and so we were able to finish our "Pyramid Quest" in early 2021 and release it on Windows, Playstation, Nintendo Switch and Xbox. My 14-year-old Atari self had already dreamed of this, but would never have thought it possible to pull something like this off. We're not well-known developers, don't have a hit, but get by and still dream of new projects that are viable for 2 people. Often our games are interpretations of old games and game principles that we used to love on the Amiga and still love and enjoy playing.
You can find our projects on various platforms, for example itch.io. You will certainly recognise one or two of the game principles, even if the realisations are often somewhat different and the templates usually remain unattainable...". (dr)
[News message: 17. Dec. 2022, 09:45] [Comments: 0]
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17.Dec.2022
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Puzzle game: AmiBlock
After the Amiga conversion of the game "Wood Block Puzzle" by the Polish developer 'Tukinem' (amiga-news.de reported), 'Szafir' has now released his variant under the name "AmiBlock". It is also written in Blitz Basic 2 and requires an Amiga 500. (dr)
[News message: 17. Dec. 2022, 06:22] [Comments: 0]
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17.Dec.2022
Passione Amiga (ANF)
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Italian Print/PDF magazine: Passione Amiga, issue 11
Press release: With great joy and a bit of excitement we are pleased to announce that the new issue of Passione Amiga, where we celebrate two years of publishing, is now available for purchase!
The entire editorial team has worked hard to get this issue out slightly ahead of the official date, so that Amazon can deliver it under the tree to anyone who wants to read it or give it as a Christmas present. Content:
- Video games: Devil's Temple: Son of Kung Fu Master, Aquabyss, Black Dawn: Technomage, Wonderboy, Wrong Way Back, Chaos Arena, Wood Block Puzzle, Luma
- Reviews: Amiga Duel, Amiga Forever 10
- Special Amiga Blitz Basic Game Jam 2022
- Special Amiga games in physical version
- Blender course, part 3
- AmigaOS 3.2 R4 NDK
- And also: Games news, Tech news, THEA500 Mini news, Tricks and Solutions, Demo scene, New Talents, Mailbox
The magazine is available as digital (3 Euro) or printed version (7,50 Euro, via Amazon). Its current issue consists of 48 A4 color pages. (dr)
[News message: 17. Dec. 2022, 06:19] [Comments: 0]
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17.Dec.2022
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Text adventure: The Daring Rescue of Pacuvia the Sheep
Domenico 'Diduz' Misciagna has released his very first game, The Daring Rescue of Pacuvia the Sheep, a text adventure written in Amos Professional 2.0 that can be played in English and Italian.
As an employee of a mysterious "agency", you find yourself on a dangerous mission: the biotechnically bred sheep Pacuvia must be freed from the clutches of a man who has no idea what he has stolen. For security reasons, all digital tools have been taken away from you and you are limited to purely analogue equipment. And Pacuvia doesn't seem to be quite so helpless either...
The game is available for C64, Amiga, MS-DOS and Tandy M100. The Amiga version requires 512Kb RAM and Kickstart 1.3.
As Misciagna writes, he suddenly realised during the 2020 Corona Lockdown that he had never written a video game before. He has been following and commenting on audio-visual art all his life. His bachelor thesis in 2020 was an academic study on video games. In the same year, he launched his website Lucasdelirium, dedicated to LucasArts adventure games. Moreover, since he had been playing computer games since childhood, it was time to write one himself. And the result is this text adventure. (dr)
[News message: 17. Dec. 2022, 06:08] [Comments: 0]
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16.Dec.2022
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Blog: Review of RadeonHD V5 driver with a X1000
While 'Epsilon' had taken a look back at 40 years of English-language Amiga magazine history in his blog "Epsilon's World" two days ago, he now devotes himself to his AmigaOne X1000 and AmigaOS 4: Thus he acquired the latest Enhancer Software 2.2, the new RadeonHD V5 driver and finally the latest version of DvPlayer in order to test all this on his AmigaOne X1000 under his previous graphics card Southern Island's R7 250X, as well as a newly acquired Radeon HD R9 ASUS 270X PCI-E. (dr)
[News message: 16. Dec. 2022, 20:03] [Comments: 0]
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16.Dec.2022
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MorphOS: Sixth beta version of TinyGL
MorphOS team developer Mark 'Bigfoot' Olsen had offered a bounty project for improved OpenGL support as well as drivers for more Radeon graphics cards under the title link, which has been successfully funded (amiga-news.de reported). Now the developer has released the sixth public beta version of his TinyGL update. He wrote:
"The main change in this update is the completion of project 1: Implement the fixed-function OpenGL pipeline as shaders. This change fixes a variety of rendering problems in various apps and games on hardware that currently supports shaders, meaning R300 and newer.
Unfortunately there are a couple of known regressions in this update as well, but at this point they've reached a number and severity that is low enough that I didn't want to hold off this update any longer before getting it out to you all.
The known problems all affect R300 and newer hardware and are:
- Virtual Grand Prix 2 runs noticeably slower than before, and the rear view mirrors no longer render correctly.
- FooBillard has rendering glitches it didn't have before. However this update also does fix some rendering issues that were previously broken, so this one is a mixed bag.
- Descent Freespace is completely broken.
- Reportedly there's an issue with the plasma blanker, but I'm not entirely sure of the details at this point.
I will probably release one more TinyGL update this year that hopefully addresses all of the above, plus any other regressions that might be reported by you." (dr)
[News message: 16. Dec. 2022, 18:00] [Comments: 0]
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16.Dec.2022
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Kickstarter camaign: Checkmate 19" IPS Retro Monitor successfully financed
Just three days ago, it did not look as if the Kickstarter campaign to finance the Checkmate 19" IPS Retro Monitor could be successfully completed with 138.938 of the required 239.785 Euro paid at that time. Now, about two days before the end of the campaign, 248.781 euros have been received, and the goal has thus been exceeded. (dr)
[News message: 16. Dec. 2022, 09:30] [Comments: 0]
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16.Dec.2022
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Boing Attitude: Interview with John Girvin (NIVRIG GAMES)
Boing Attitude, publisher of the quiz game Ask Me Up XXL and the file manager Dir Me Up, among others, published the fourth issue of the French print magazine "BOING" at the beginning of July. Among other things, it contained an interview with John Girvin, the developer of games like Turbo Santa (Deluxe) or Turbo Tomato, which is now available under the title link.
(dr)
[News message: 16. Dec. 2022, 09:01] [Comments: 0]
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16.Dec.2022
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Advent Calendar: Door 16 - Günter Bartsch
The 16th Advent calendar door is opened and we look forward to an anecdote Günter Bartsch.
At the end of August 2021, the developer had not only published the source code of his Amiga QuickBasic (AQB) compiler on GitHub, but also a first early version 0.7.0 and aroused great interest in the comments to our corresponding news item. With AQB, the author wants to provide a "modern, clean, OS-compliant and future-proof BASIC. An important feature of AQB are the modules: AQB has only relatively few built-in commands, but a - also syntactically - quite powerful module concept. The modules can be implemented fully transparently in BASIC (AQB) or also in C (GCC) or even mixed; AQB is fully link-compatible with GCC.
As the developer further explains, it should be possible to give AQB different "personalities" - currently only _aqb is implemented, which is intended as a default dialect and is oriented towards AmigaBASIC, QuickBASIC and FreeBASIC. But it should also be possible to give AQB a GFA, Blitz or Amos personality, for example. In general, the focus of AQB (at the moment) would be on system-compliant application development.
With version 0.8.0 he then introduced a source level debugger and since the last, current version 0.8.2 there are now instructions and functions for sound output, new tutorials and also a simple music demo programs.
Even though almost a year has passed since the last version, Günter continues to work on his project. As he tells us, there have already been quite a lot of further developments, which he "only" needs to finally bring into a release-ready state. We keep our fingers crossed for this and for the further development of his project and look forward to many more exciting discussions about it here. His anecdote or, in this case, short story :)
"The year is 1988. At the beginning of the year an event occurred that would
change my life forever: I had gotten an Amiga 500 for my birthday. Ever since
I had watched an episode of "ARD Computerzeit" on public TV in which the Amiga
was introduced I knew: I want that computer and no other. At that time (I was
12) my funds were very limited - but at some point my parents had had enough of
my whining so they fulfilled my wish.
Driven by a lot of euphoria and even more childish naivety and curiosity I had
spent every free minute of the year (and also many minutes in which I was
supposed to do other things) with this dream computer (I still couldn't really
wrap my head around the fact that now one of these actually was sitting in my
bedroom).
A lot of people would probably imagine that I mainly wanted to play games on
the Amiga - but that wasn't the case. In fact I didn't have any games for it
and being a true geek with no friends the temptation to drift into the gaming
world through private backup copies was rather small.
Instead, I did with the new computer what I had done - again in the absence of
other software - with my Commodore Plus/4 which I owned before the Amiga: I
wrote programs in BASIC. On the Amiga that meant coding in AmigaBASIC which was
supplied on the Extras disk.
Despite all the euphoria, I soon had doubts as to whether this really was the
greatest tool for the job. The execution speed of the Programs might have been
OK compared to my Plus/4, but the editor was extremely sluggish. Of course
those were thoughts that I first had never dared to say - after all, the Amiga
was the best and fastest computer in the entire universe and AmigaBASIC was the
official BASIC, which came directly from Commodore, the company where (in my
mind) those gods worked who had created this dream computer - how could there
be anything better?
Luckily I got my hands on a copy of the german magazine "Amiga Magazin". Even
though I certainly didn't understand all the articles in it, from studying it I
did learn that there were other programming environments for the Amiga that
could possibly represent an improvement over the AmigaBASIC.
And so it came about that, together with my mother, I trudged through the
Christmas-decorated downtown Stuttgart heading for department stores and
computer shops looking for a Christmas present. So I described to various
salespersons my troubles with AmigaBASIC and boldly asked them about compilers
and assemblers. Usually the last two terms confused the staff, but at least two
of them knew about the problems with AmigaBASIC so each offered their
respective in-house recommended solution for that. Luckily I had enough doubts
right there on the spot about the "True Basic" which was offered to me in the
local "Karstadt" department store that I encouraged my mother to let us try
again somewhere else. At smaller computer shop called "Schreiber Computer" I
was then offered a product called "GFA BASIC" and the saleswoman actually
succeeded in convincing both my mother as the sponsor and me as the user.
Compared to AmigaBASIC, GFA BASIC turned out to be a downright revelation -
speed, instruction set, documentation - all a difference like night and day, I
was amazed! If there were any last doubts in my mind whether this investment
was the right one (the label "Interpreter" on the box bothered me a bit, as I
much rather wanted to have a true compiler), these were finally scattered on
the day when I got my hands on a copy of the "Sonderheft 3: Basic und Spiele"
issue of "Amiga Magazin". It contained an article comparing various BASIC
implementations for the Amiga in which GFA BASIC did very well.
The first weeks with GFA BASIC were very productive indeed - all those small
sample programs from the manual worked fine, a small vocabulary training
program was implemented just as quickly as various small graphics and sound
experiments.
Accordingly, I felt well prepared and even more motivated, to tackle bigger
projects now. Among other things, I had a painting program in mind, a kind of
DeluxePaint clone in BASIC (now that I have this great programming environment,
I don't need to buy any more software, I can write everything myself - so I
thought). The beginnings of these projects were always done easily, first
successes came - opening screens and windows, drawing pixels using the mouse,
no problem.
However, as the programs grew in size, so did the number of bugs - not
surprising, I knew that even back then. However, those errors turned out to be
increasingly difficult to find: Program functions that just worked perfectly
suddenly refused to work at all, although the code in question was the same.
Yes, even the interpreter's built-in commands occasionally stopped working they
way I expected them to. I debugged deeper and deeper, wrote small test programs
- most of which worked fine - but as soon as I put the code back into my big
program, it suddenly behaved completely differently
or crashed completely.
Of course, that didn't deter me one bit - obviously there was just a lot to
learn for myself, obviously I just kept doing something wrong and that's why my
programs didn't work. I quickly realized that the commands apparently
interacted with each other in complex ways - with this insight I was then able
to solve many of my problems. "Ah, I have to first set the foreground and then
the background color, then it works" - that was the kind of discovery, which I
diligently noted in the manual.
Over time, my hypotheses, with which I tried to explain to myself the
behavior of the interpreter in particular and of the Amiga in general, grew
more and more complex. Apparently there was an enormous wealth of
secret knowledge there to discover about how these miracle machines actually worked.
Of course, such secret knowledge wasn't to be found in the manual, but could
only be acquired laboriously through many experiments and collected from many
sources. I wasn't discouraged - quite the opposite, I was fascinated by the
thought that there was apparently a mystical world to explore there and
motivated by the idea of me maybe someday too would belong to that secret
circle of people who possess this knowledge.
So, undeterred, I kept experimenting and consulted more and more literature.
"GFA BASIC 3.0 - Training for advanced users" was one of the books from which I
hoped for enlightenment. The book - published by GFA Systemtechnik GmbH
themselves, at least - actually opened up new horizons for me. Some of the
techniques in there I had never seen before, some of the commands never heard
of - that most of the example programs on the floppy that came with the book
didn't work for me unless I modified them astonished not me in the slightest.
For one, the programs I had previously typed in from books and magazines hadn't
usually worked right away either and on the other hand I was able to put all
that secret knowledge I had accumulated up to that point to good use to get the
programs running - which actually was successful for most of them.
Despite all these partial successes and insights - a real breakthrough never
seemed to happen for me. My larger programs tended to stay quite brittle and
so very slowly a feeling of frustration set in.
During my literature research I came across the book "AMIGA Programming with
MODULA-2" from Markt und Technik publishing company. There was even a matching
compiler available - though only a very limited demo version - on a fish disk.
That then was once again another revelation: a true compiler, I can write real
programs like the professionals - and they even worked! Everything so clear and
structured everything does what it should, just as it says? Should something
like this be possible should there exist a world without any mystical secret
knowledge?
At that point, GFA BASIC was quickly forgotten in my life - I was fascinated by
Wirth's languages, so I spent the following years happily coding in Modula-2,
Pascal and Oberon, but that's another story.
It was then more by chance that at some point during this period I found out
what was behind my experiences with GFA BASIC: in some magazine article GFA
BASIC 3.5 was reviewed and the author casually mentioned that while the first
versions of GFA BASIC for the Amiga were quite buggy, the situation seemed to
improve with each update. GFA BASIC had errors?! This product I purchased for
money that was packaged so neatly and made by absolute professionals
could have been not perfect? Those many surprising properties that I had so
painstakingly explored could it possibly be that they were not intended at all?
I can hardly put into words what I felt when the full dimension of these
insights slowly dawned on me: I simply had never considered that a bug could
not be my mistake! What's more, probably the only mistake I had made was that I
had never sent back this software registration card that came with the box - so
I was never informed about available updates.
Well, today I like to think back to those days with a smile - those were very
important lessons I learned back then, many of them still guide me to this day.
Without the Amiga, without these programming environments - I would have never
gotten to where I am today, I am very grateful for that." (dr)
[News message: 16. Dec. 2022, 06:51] [Comments: 0]
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16.Dec.2022
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Emulator: QEMU 7.2.0 released
QEMU is an open source computer emulator and virtualizer. QEMU is able to emulate a complete computer in software without the need of hardware virtualization. So it is possible to emulate Amiga operating systems like AROS, AmigaOS or MorphOS on QEMU. This support is provided by QEMU developer Zoltan Balaton, who gives lots of tips and info on a dedicated webseite (see also our Excursion of Amiga operating systems on non-native hardware).
According to Zoltan Balaton, the now released version 7.2.0 (PowerPC related commits) contains some changes that mainly affect newer Power CPUs, but also those that affect the entire PPC emulation: for example, the command decoding has been changed to decodetree. This is a generic method of describing commands, using general code for decoding instead of the custom code used before. As the developer kindly explained to us, this can lead to better performance, but it does not have to, as Decodetree is not optimised.
Similarly, there were also some changes to the implementation of AltiVec commands that could improve their speed, but it would depend on how it was used and what the host CPU supported. He had done some tests and found that in some cases it could be a few percent faster, but it did not really make a big change. Since sam460ex does not have AltiVec, it only benefits from the PPC instruction decoding changes, he said. Emulation via pegasos2 and mac99 could be slightly better with code that uses AltiVec. However, he says it is difficult to test this with AmigaOS 4, which has no graphics driver for the graphics cards emulated by QEMU in the pegasos2 version. For tinkerers, however, he has an idea that could be tried out:
One would have to copy some drivers to get the output on pegasos2. This means that one has to edit the boot CD or an installed version (which is not so easy, but feasible). You would have to copy the kernel from the AmigaOS-pegasos2 version and update the PCIGraphics.card and siliconmotion502.chip from the sam460ex version, as he erwähnt before. You would then have to create a CD from this. (dr)
[News message: 16. Dec. 2022, 06:08] [Comments: 0]
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15.Dec.2022
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Encryption protocol: AmiSSL 5.6 (AmigaOS 3/4)
The open source encryption protocol AmiSSL has been updated to version 5.6 and contains a fix for server applications and some other minor changes. The changes in detail:
- Fixed TLS 1.3 cipher lookup failure regression on OS4.
- The improvement from v5.4 that released file locks on the OS4 libraries is now only activated with elf.library 53.35 or higher.
- Minor build changes.
Download AmigaOS 3: AmiSSL-5.6-OS3.lha (3,3 MB)
Download AmigaOS 4: AmiSSL-5.6-OS4.lha (3,1 MB)
Download SDK: AmiSSL-5.6-SDK.lha (2,3 MB) (dr)
[News message: 15. Dec. 2022, 20:51] [Comments: 0]
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