Amiga Players: 1999 and Onwards
The announcement that Gateway-Amiga were
abandoning the Classic market had an electrifying effect upon the
Amiga community: some believed that this was the end of the Amiga,
some accepted the announcement with a shrug of acceptance, and some
attempted to take the Amiga's development into their own hands. It
the third group that prove the most interesting - their views and
solutions were diverse, yet they all wanted to 'save' the Amiga as
a computer platform.
This resulted in the mobilization of several political orientated
organizations whose goal was to provide a road map for the Amiga
that would allow it to continue its evolution during the 21st
century. This is the story of those groups:
Open Amiga Foundation
"The Amiga has a wealth of software and talent, whilst the
free software and GNU/Linux communities have a great deal of
political and financial clout. By combining the two we can leverage
each other's strengths, and have both communities gain, within an
atmosphere of mutual respect, understanding and
co-operation."
The Open Amiga Foundation began life as the Campaign to
Open source AmigaOS (COSA). As the name suggests, its aim was to
pressure Gateway into releasing the source code to the AmigaOS (at
the time Gateway had no further plans to develop the OS) and
formulate a developer network that would organize and rewrite the
GPL-ed AmigaOS. This would allow the users' to repair long-standing
bugs, remove the need for system illegal hacks, and make the OS
easier to compile. A large percentage of the Amiga community
supported the endeavour and they had opened negotiations with
Gateway. To this end, the organization had considerable success -
Gateway were prepared to open source significant parts of the
AmigaOS (the exception being ARexx and other items that were
licensed) as a goodwill gesture. Unfortunately for COSA, the
Amino purchase, forced the group to
abandon their previous efforts. In contrast to their predecessors,
the new Amiga Inc. had no interest in
open-sourcing the AmigaOS. Instead they would use it as a means of
focussing the community towards their Tao-derived operating system.
This must have been a moment of intense frustration for COSA.
While the Amino purchase was good for the Amiga, it had swept aside
the good work done by COSA and had invalidated the main goals of
the organization. COSA were forgotten in a sea of Amiga/Tao
announcements.....
After a few weeks of silence, COSA reappeared from its chrysalis
as the Open Amiga Foundation. This was followed by the announcement
that they had entered into a strategic relationship with the AROS
team. Under the new deal, OAF are responsible for public relations,
marketing, business and legal affairs of the open-source AmigaOS
project. This allows them to continue their original aim of
developing an open source AmigaOS, albeit an unofficial one.
Several former-Amiga developers have also been contacted to request
that they release their source code and allow further updates to be
made. However, the strain of defending themselves against various
corporate bodies have taken its toll upon founder and chairman,
Steve Crietzman, with the announcement that he will step down and a
transitional governing council will take his place.
Open Amiga Foundation and AROS announce
strategic relationship
John
Chandler's article on the OAF
Phoenix
Soon after Amiga's cancellation of the MCC, the Phoenix Platform
Consortium was created. The organization was set up as a direct
response to the failure of Gateway to develop a next generation
Amiga platform, while recognizing the failures of previous efforts
to create a developer forum (such as the Independent Council of
Open Amiga). They had already gathered an impressive list of names,
consisting of several Amiga celebrities, including Car; Sassenrath,
RJ Mical, Dave Haynie, Bill McEwen, Wolf Dietrich (Phase 5), Greg
Perry, and many others.
Like a number of projects before them, Phoenix aimed to provide a
clear upgrade path for current Amiga users'. Their intent, in the
words of their press release, is to,
"... assume responsibility for aid and recommendation
for reference platforms for the Amiga users who wish to upgrade
their present Amigas, as we establish an open migration path to a
new platform. That platform will in spirit and in feel be a new
Amiga experience while incorporating and surpassing the features
found on the desktop elsewhere today."
As a part of the establishment of a migration plan for new
platforms, Phoenix aimed to work with several hardware and software
developers to provide a reference point, consisting of certain
standards and user experiences', that would create a spiritual
descendent to the AmigaOS. During September 2000, QSSL offered the
use of their semi-completed Neutrino OS as a starting point. Key
members of the Phoenix Consortium would make suggestions, provide
testing, and write applications that would make the OS more
suitable for a desktop market. The organization played a key role
in the "Get QNX" programme during 2000.
Amino's purchase of the Amiga took much of the focus away from
the Phoenix Consortium's efforts. However, their core goal remained
the same - providing support for Amiga-like operating systems. Over
several months the Phoenix Platform Consortium changed their name
to Phoenix Developer Consortium and refocused efforts to create a
developer network and support structure for several operating
systems in the Amiga market. At the time of writing, five operating
systems are supported by members:
- Amiga DE - Next generation Amiga OS, based
upon Tao Group's Elate OS.
- AROS - Open source 'Amiga Research Operating
System'
- Dolphin OS - Amiga-like OS in development.
Written by Samuel A Falvo II
- MorphOS - Unofficial PPC-based Amiga
compatible OS
- QNX Realtime Platform (Neutrino) -
Spiritual descendent and former OS partner
The Phoenix Developer Consortium continues to make steady but solid
progress with its aims to provide multi-platform solutions and
developer support. It has recently announced Ideas2Reality as a
hardware partner who will construct a low-end 'A500'-style PPC unit
for potential developers' and users'.
Phoenix Developer
Consortium
Ideas2Reality
This Is
Reality Control - Suite101
A.Q.U.A (Amino Qnx United Architecture)
A short-lived partnership between QSSL, Rebol, and Amino. In the
absence of an official solution, the three companies intended to
create an Amiga-like experience using familiar Amiga developers.
All three seemed to be the living embodiment of the Amiga
spirit:
QSSL represented the past, the former OS partner to
Gateway-Amiga would provide the base OS.
Rebol were the present, a multi-platform language, described as a
next generation ARexx that provided simplistic, yet an incredibly
powerful language
Amino were the future. They would provide the business model for
organizing the disparate technologies and prepare it for market.
The alliance was abandoned when Amino bought the rights to the
Amiga. This made an unofficial successor unnecessary, allowing
Amino to rally the market around an official solution. AQUA was
used as a project name for the Amiga DE during the early stages of
development.
BACK
Last Update: 1/11/2001
|
