====================================================================== ________ _________ ____ _|__ __ __|_______ _________ __\ _____ \\\\ \_ _/ //___// _____//______\ _____ \\ // \\\\ /. \\\\__ \/ __// \\ \\____. /// \\\\ /. \\ \\___\¯ /___///___\ /___\ \\_________//\\___\¯ /___// ¯ \/ ¯ ¯ \/. |¯ ¯|z!o ¯ ¯ \/ ¯ A M I G A | 031130 | U P D A T E |________| "SO THE WORLD MAY KNOW" ====================================================================== AMIGA and the Amiga logo are trademarks of Amiga, Inc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G A T A K E S B A T H I N U K M I C R O - P A L O O Z A P A R T Y I N D E C E M B E R F R E E C I V T O U R N Y - A M I G A O N E P R I Z E ! C L A S S I C A M I G A B B S G R O U P F O R M E D T H E L A T E S T F R O M E Y E T E C H O S 4 . 0 D E M O I N N E W Y O R K C I T Y U P D A T E T O P O W E R I C O N S A V A I L A B L E N E W R E L E A S E - S F S F I L E S Y S T E M B A R S A N D P I P E S V 1 . 2 1 A V A I L A B L E Editor's Thoughts and Introduction: November has brought nothing very exciting to the Amiga community, but life goes on and the seemingly endless effort to get a production version of OS 4.0 to the world continues. In fact, it seems to be ongoing with a continuing sense of confidence on the part of those involved. That sense of confidence is what keeps me upbeat that we will get there, and it will be worth the trip. Read the excerpts we have from the interview with Alan Redhouse from Eyetech for a sample of what I mean. Still, don't you sometimes wonder what Amiga Inc. is doing to actually earn money? I would feel a lot more comfortable if I saw some Amiga product on the market and obviously selling. I suppose the important thing for now is they are still there, they are the only Amiga we have, and they are making progress on OS 4.0 at least. In fact, there's a lot of talk in the Community about getting OS 4.0 beta to users before Christmas. Beta, please note, not production, but that's still "beta" than nothing. We'd like to see that. Brad Webb, Editor ---------------------------------------------------------------------- E-mail to the E-ditor: 22 November, 2003 Hi Brad, I just downloaded the whole bunch of newsletters from your website, brilliant read (especially the old issues of course)! Thanks for your efforts. Btw., 980515 is missing, the link is broken. Regards Christoph ~~~~~~ Hello Christoph, We're pleased you thought enough of them to download them. Yes, that one has been missing for some time and I'm not entirely sure why. There have been a few ISP "snafus" over the years that have caused deletions from the archives, and that could be the case but it's missing from my personal archives as well. I've kept the link to indicate there was an issue on that date. If any reader has a copy, we'd love to have it for the archives. We put out a request a couple of years ago and got most of those that had gone missing replaced, but either we didn't spot this one at that time (don't have the list any longer) or no one could replace it for us. Perhaps it was all a dream? Regards, Brad =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- A M I G A T A K E S B A T H I N U K The South West Amiga Group are organising an OS4 on tour event in the picturesque city of Bath, in the South West of England. This is your chance to come along and see the new version of AmigaOS, running on the first new Amiga computer, the AmigaOne, for nearly a decade. The show will be held on Saturday the 13th of December, between 1pm and 5.30pm. The entrance fee will be £2.50. There will be tea and coffee available, as well as a licensed bar. As well as offering beautiful architecture and views, the heritage city of Bath has good rail and bus links. News 25th November Total Amiga and SEAL have confirmed that they will be exhibiting at the event. Also, the alternative directions from the M4 have been updated, so if you printed these directions off before, please take this version instead 21st November We have added two sets of directions, complete with pictures to our venue page. 16th November The entrance fee for the show will be £2.50. Aside from the bar, tea and coffee will be available. Finally, we've got a funky 'Amiga in Bath' logo from Bobson, so thanks for that! 10th November The show will definitely be at the Rockery, from 1pm to 5.30pm. Forematt Home Computing have confirmed their attendance. 6th November Fleecy has put us in touch with someone who can demonstrate OS4 on an Amiga 4000 with a Cyberstorm PowerPC card, so you will be able to see it running on this classic Amiga as well as the new AmigaONE machines. 4th November We've just received confirmation that Fleecy Moss from Amiga will be in attendance. 3rd November We have a venue booked, details of which are on the venue page. We are still waiting to hear back from the Bath University about holding the show there, but this venue has been booked and a deposit paid, so even if the university doesn't come through, we do have an absolutely definite venue. This venue is big enough for our original plan of a one day show. Detailed travel information will be provided shortly. http://www.petergordon.org.uk/os4 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- M I C R O - P A L O O Z A P A R T Y I N D E C E M B E R 23 Nov 2003 Ever since September 13, we've been in talks with Anthony Ramos, co-owner of Ground Kontrol in Portland, about having the first ever Commodore party in the Pacific Northwest. And now, the party is a "go"! The Micro-Palooza Party, is Tuesday, December 30 from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m. at Ground Kontrol, 610 SW 12th Avenue, in downtown Portland, Oregon, USA. Ground Kontrol is a retro-arcade establishment with all the good games from the past, like PacMan, Tempest, Star Trek pinball, etc.. http://www.groundkontrol.com Anthony Ramos has agreed for us to set up some Commodore/Amiga computers there and to invite computer bands to play music on the mini-stage. Anthony is also is quite a concert organizer. Four micro-computer bands will play live music at Micro-Palooza. Now confirmed, Seth Sternberger of 8Bit Weapon will fly all the way up from Los Angeles, and gotoXY is coming in from Eugene, Oregon. The other bands coming for the event are MOS-8 and Waxin' Wary, both from Eugene (the city must be a hot-bed of micro-computer music activity!). Seth is trying to get the band, BitShifters, to come all the way from New York! Some details on the bands. 8Bit Weapon uses Commodores and Amigas when playing their music. gotoXy uses a variety of 8-bit platforms including Commodore and Gameboy in playing their music. BitShifters is another Gameboy-inspired band. Seth of 8Bit Weapon will be selling his band's CD's in limited-edition "floppy disk holders" -- two CD's for $10. To find out more about 8Bit Weapon, go to http://www.brainscream.com/seth To find out more about gotoXY, go to http://zebox.com/gotoxy The bands are now scheduled to play music from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.. (If BitShifters come in, then that beginning time will change.) When the music starts, Commodore/Amiga users (or other computer devotees) will be asked to pay a $3 cover charge. The general public will be asked to pay a $4 cover charge. In attendance will be myself, Dave Moorman of Loadstar disk magazine, Jeri Ellsworth of CommodoreOne fame, and possibly, Dale Luck, Amiga programmer most famous for the Boing Demo. The following C=/Ami groups which have been invited and which have responded positively to the party are: the Amiga/Commodore User Group of Astoria, Oregon; the University Place Commodore Home User Group of Tacoma, Washington; and the Commodore User Association of Medford, Oregon. Of course, the public -- those who walk in through the door -- will be welcome to use our Commodores/Amigas as they go in to play with the arcade machines. The party will be a relaxed affair -- just playing C=/Ami games, eating pizza,drinking soda, listening to music, and lots of talk. On a side note, we're trying to get newspaper, radio, and television coverage of Micro-Palooza. Come and celebrate the holidays with us on December 30! Come to Micro-Palooza! Truly, Robert Bernardo Fresno Commodore User Group http://videocam.net.au/fcug ---------------------------------------------------------------------- F R E E C I V T O U R N Y - A M I G A O N E P R I Z E ! 24 November, 2003 To celebrate the launch of our FreeCiv tournament series the owners of the AmigaWorld.net FreeCiv server are offering a unique chance to win a New AmigaONE XE motherboard with 512Mb RAM! updated The prize will go to one lucky victor of the FreeCiv challenge league matches starting in January 2004 and concluding in March 2004! There are a limited number of places so register with your AmigaWorld.net identity on the AW FreeCiv Support Site ! To help you prepare for victory, AW will be running a series of 12 training matches throughout December 2003 at the weekend for different timezones across the globe to participate and learn the game. More details can be found on the AW FreeCiv Support Site or join us on IRC on server irc.amigaworld.net channel #awfreeciv. If you already have an A1XE and you don't need another, we offer an A1XE upgrades package to the same monetary value! Full terms an conditions that apply to the game will be posted on December 31st on freeciv.amigaworld.net. Update Last night (25th) we successfully tried out a brand of the settings we call "speedciv" which takes about 2 hours to play and is far more frenetic than the standard freeciv We expect games to take 2-3 hours maximum now! DaveP and IanS - AW FreeCiv Admins. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- C L A S S I C A M I G A B B S G R O U P F O R M E D 22 November, 2003 The Port Zero BBS Net, a group made up of Amiga BBS SysOps has joined together to get the word out that the old school BBSs that were highly popular before the internet are still alive and in use. For those that used to use these BBSs, it's a walk through nostalgia. For the unlucky that never heard of or used a BBS, it's a lesson in computer history. There are currently 5 member BBSs that are now all linked via a multi user chat system allowing users from all 5 systems to get together and just ragchew. Also, each BBS offers a different variety of files, and discussions, as well as classic online games and text files. For a list of member BBSs, info on the group, and links to connect to the BBSs, visit The Port0 BBS Net page at bbs.amigaz.org/port0 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- T H E L A T E S T F R O M E Y E T E C H {The following item is extracted from an interview available at http://amigaworld.net. If you're looking for the best website for Amiga, that is certainly the one we'd recommend at AU. Stop by and pay them a visit, and read the entire inteview. Brad} 21-Nov-2003 AW Staff: Hello Alan, thanks for sponsoring AmigaWorld and for taking the time to answer these questions! 1) Here at AmigaWorld we are now providing Eyetech's Official AmigaOne Forums, News and Updates. Can you share some of your future plans with regard to AmigaWorld? For instance, will Eyetech partcipate regularly within AmigaWorld's forums? Alan: Our main objective - and therefore the main focus of my time - is to promote the AmigaOne hardware and OS4 into broader markets. This means that, despite my best intentions and wishes, the time available for my direct participation in the forums (or is it fora? it's a long time since I did latin at school) will necessarily be limited. I'll continue to read the debates and put in selective comments where I think it is helpful, relevant and important to do so. Not having more time to actively participate in the forums is something I really regret, but the bigger picture is the most important thing to concentrate on right now. In the interests of the existing Amiga community we absolutely have to broaden the market for the A1 technology and for OS4, even if that involves using Linux as a trojan horse. And when I say 'we' - meaning the broad alliance of Amiga Inc., Hyperion and Eyetech - in practice the other commitments of Amiga Inc and Hyperion means that that responsibility is, for the moment at least, mainly falling on Eyetech's shoulders. This is fine by me as Eyetech's historical expertise is selling big-picture technology-based solutions at corporate and governmental level. This need to focus on these bigger markets is the main reason that we've handed over reins of the UK retail market to Sven Harvey's company, Stellar Dreams. 2) How many AmigaOne boards have been sold so far and what is your opinion on the demand for the current boards and upcoming Micro1A boards? Alan: From the publicly available figures it seems that we have delivered more AmigaOne boards than any other 'open' (ie not IBM or Apple) PPC-based standard PC form factor board supplier. And in terms of real sales for real money (which in my view is the ultimate measure of success - anyone can give boards away) we really seem to have no significant competition to date. The MicroA1 is aimed at a different marketplace entirely. It is - at the same time : - a potential (ie first it needs a stable OS4 + applications) entry level home computer and (initially retro-ish) games console - a modular embedded system/industrial controller board (with a variety of I/O and cpu options) running embedded OS4 or Linux from flash ROM - a very low power consumption, low cost of ownership thin client (running under OS4 or Linux as appropriate) for Windows or Linux application servers. The client software for Linux has already been written and will be ported to OS4 (allowing the same delivered performance for lower CPU specification/cost) in due course. Ultimately I believe that this market will develop to see the MicroA1 technology licenced to the big far-eastern LCD screen manufacturers to allow them to incorporate thin client (and OS4 capability) directly into their own products. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- O S 4 . 0 D E M O I N N E W Y O R K C I T Y 26 November. 2003 Mr. Hardware Computers is happy to announce the first showing of Amiga OS4.0 to run on the new AmigaOne computer in the USA. In conjuction with A.M.U.S.E (New York Amiga Users group)the showing will be next Tuesday December 2nd 8:00pm -10:00pm Room 706, Meyers Hall New York University Washington Place (Between Broadway and Washington Square East. The system will be running on a AmigaOne. This is Beta version. All are invited. Amiga, Back for the future. Other items for sale AmigaOne and Classic. Further info call Russ Norrby 631-821-2364 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- U P D A T E T O P O W E R I C O N S A V A I L A B L E ALWAYS DOWNLOAD AN UP TO DATE VERSION OF POWERICONS AND OTHER SOFTWARE OF MINE AT: http://www.elena-fractals.it/software.php PROGRAM HISTORY ---------------------------- 1.05 (21 Nov 03) -Added BETTEROUTLINE option to improve text outline effect. -Added SCROLLSPEEDUP option to optimize Workbench icon scrolling (thanks to a Georg Steger's idea). -In the case no default base type icon is found in ENV:Sys (drawer, tool, project, etc.) no icon was returned. Fixed. -Removed a subtle bug in the 68K version causing weird system slowdowns and crashes (register A4 in GetIconRectangleNew() was erroneously trashed by the code generator). Thanks to Tony Aksnes for the patient beta testing. -Some new example icons added ---------------------------------------------------------------------- N E W R E L E A S E - S F S F I L E S Y S T E M 11 NovEMBER, 2003 A new release for the replacement FileSystem SFS has been made. Changes since v1.195 include: WARNING: New default of entries in ".recycled" dir is 350! (was 35) 1.212 Fixed another old "findbnode() can't find key ..." bug in the defragmenter. Formatting a partition didn't reset all variables, fixed. Fixed some more removable disk bugs. Optimized 'safe writing'. Fixed some bugs in the removeable disk code. Now uses pools for small allocations. Better fragmentation prevention. Improved defragmenter. Found and fixed a major bug in the removable code. Fixed an enforcer hit. SFS now sets the time if there is no working battery clock. Recompiled PPC version with my ppc-amigaos-gcc. 1.206 Changes for OS4 PPC. Increased supported path size from 520 to 8192 chars, no longer trashes own structures if a path is longer as the supported size. Enforcer-hits for bad notification paths removed. Workaround for a bug in IDEFix added. Fixed a bug in the mask handling. Max. number of entries in ".recycled" dir is now configurable: #define ASS_MAX_RECYCLED_ENTRIES (ASSBASE+6001) #define ASQ_MAX_RECYCLED_ENTRIES (ASQBASE+6001) Min. 35, max. 3500, new default 350 (was 35). ROVING_SMALL_WRITE and ROVING_RESERVED_SPACE increased from 8 to 64 KB. Formating and serialize_disk is now refused if the partition is not inhibited. Support for write protected media added. ACTION_WRITE_PROTECT added. Support for removable media improved. Fixed a bug in ACTION_INFO. Improved multithreading. 1.198 Fixed a multithreading startup bug (volumenode dn_Task was wrong). Improved multithreading for partitions with "recycled" dir. 1.196 Changed reserved admin blocks to 1%. Workaround for the "partition too full to delete something" bug added. Support for removable media improved. Minimal multithreading added. You can find the latest version on Aminet. http://uk.aminet.net/pub/aminet/disk/misc/SFS_1.212.lha ---------------------------------------------------------------------- B A R S A N D P I P E S V 1 . 2 1 A V A I L A B L E 30 November, 2003 Midi Sequencer for Amiga based on older beta of Bars and Pipes Professional. Ver. 1.21 (30.11.2003) o bugs removed: 1. songlength-calculation now correct 2. In Transportwindow: 1/2 and 3/4 button - switching corrected (this doesn't work if "Synchronize to TempoMap" in Timing->Menu is on) 3. In Songconstructionwindow: o scrolling works better now o problems with the gadgets removed 4. MIDI Time Code in slave-mode works somewhat more reliable 5. Synchronization with MIDI-clock OR MIDI-Timecode in the Timing- Menu (not both at the same time, this makes no sense) 6. Arrows of the Knobs in the Mixwindow now proper drawn o new: Message, if BarsnPipes is just running, and started a second time. o new: Progressbar in the splash-window at startup (not in classic-version) o camd-handling somewhat simplified o new: CAMD-Tools ver.1.4 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Amiga Update on the net: All back issues available at: http://www.globaldialog.com/~amigaupdate/index.html Stop by and check out our archive! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2003 by Brad Webb. Freely distributable, if not modified. ====================================================================== _ __ _ <>_ __ _ A M I G A /\\ |\ /|| || / ` /\\ A M I G A U P D A T E /__\\ | \ / || || || ___ /__\\ U P D A T E / \\_ | \/ ||_ _||_ \__// / \\_ amigaupdate@globaldialog.com ======================================================================