| From: | Uffe Holst |
| Date: | 12 Jan 2000 at 14:54:43 |
| Subject: | Re: MUI, having nothing to do with OS3.5 |
From: Uffe Holst <uhc@post6.tele.dk>
In a message of 12-Jan-00 Xavier Messersmith wrote:
>> just to make a font-sensitive GUI requires so much more than
>> the simple non-sensitive GUI.
> This is assumed. Though I expect adding up pixel widths in a row
> formatted GUI and spacing accordingly isn't amazingly more involved. It
> just involves a less static approach.
Okay, I guess you are more or less right. But is is naturally bound to take
a lot longer, because OpenWindow(400,200) is bound to be a lot faster than
OpenWindow(Xmax,Ymax) where Xmax and Ymax are based on finding the maximum
value of several calculations for each row/column. And if Xmax is greater
than the screenwidth, then you will have to switch to another font and
recalculate again. And when you then has found Xmax and Ymax you will
have to make calculations to space the various elements appropriately. And
especially with a GUI like the MUI GUI that is very dynamic I guess it
involves even more.
I am not stupid, so I could probably make such a GUI myself, and most
other Amiga programmers probably could too, but it would extend the
development time a lot - even with the biggest application that I have
written I think it would at least double the development time to achive
the same GUI - and it only had a Triton GUI.
Futhermore I have to admit that the GUI creation doesn't interest me. When
I make programs I generally make them to achieve a purpose. When I have
reached the purpose I really don't want to spend months creating a GUI
for the application - especially not when I can use one of the available
GUI engines and make it in a few hours and even give it a better GUI than
what I could have accomplished myself.
> I'm curious about where that email library they were talking about is.
> It wasn't installed with the rest of the OS3.5, and there don't seem to
> be any autodocs on it or anything.
I guess it is kind of appropriate to talk a bit about OS3.5. I haven't
dared install it myself yet, because my system is extremely stable
at the moment, so... But I took a look at the OS3.5 CD, and I would imagine
that the email library is the one named aml.library.
AmigaOS3.5:OS-Version3.5/Workbench/Libs/aml.library
and within
AmigaOS3.5:OS-Version3.5/Internet/AmigaMail/AmigaMail
you can find: "aml.library (c) 1999 by Christopher E. Aldi, Paul
Schiffere".
>> But I am not able to make my own
>> font-sensitive configurable GUI for it, because this is very difficult.
> I'm sure you could hack your way through and smooth it out on the
> rebound. If you can manage email filters you could probably do this...
I think e-mail filters are a lot easier than creating a font-sensitive GUI.
>> This is actually the main problem in our discussion that you have that
>> attitude. More processor power gives you a much more free environment
>> to run your applications under opening up for possibilities not available
>> on slower processors.
> I agree that faster processors open up new opportunities. But I don't
> think it should all be blown towards managing a mediocre interface for a
> shoddily built program.
Hard to disagree with this. Personally I don't find MUI to be a mediocre
interface, though it probably could be optimized a lot. But like most
software on this platform we have got to use what is available, because
very few Amiga programmers can work full-time for the Amiga. Considering
the limited time available to our programmers then I can surely understand
that the take the line of least resistance - in general meaning to huge
optimization is being done because that takes a lot of time.
>> As you perhaps have heard, Steve Koren decided to stop developing NewsRog
>> due to several reason a week or so ago - main reason being that it is
>> being pirated and nobody is really registering it any more.
> Indeed, and as one of the registered I'm kinda ticked since there are still
> outstanding bugs. (mainly in the MUI handling)
Show me a larger application without bugs. I think it is a bit sad that
the Amiga community is so little and so little inclined toward registering
software.
>> Amiga users demand that things run on a 68020 with 4 Mb of memory and AGA
>> graphics."
> I hate AGA dependancy, but I do think that NewsRog should swap out the
> data in newsgroups that aren't being looked at. Common sense here.
> (I'd hope)
But still a lot of people are dependant upon AGA. If an application doesn't
support AGA, then it wont sell. Most applications are luckily today not
dependant upon AGA - e.g. all MUI applications work under CGX or similar.
>> The only ClassAct application I am using now and then is AWeb, and it
>> crashes happily.
> Theres the problem, I never touch AWeb. Its a sickly little web browser...
Never liked it myself, but it is still the available browser with the best
JavaScript support. Even 3.2demo manages to display http://www.dds.dk
(although it displays 100 or so JS errors). IBrowse 2.1 simply displays
a grey page. Voyager improved a bit from 3.0 pre-release 5 to 3.0 final,
because it now displays two JS error requesters before the grey page.
Before it only displayed the grey page :-)
> I think if there are easy optimimizations that drasticly improve performance
> then they should be done. No point in a program that drools on itsself. If I
> wanted something big and stupid, I'd do it myself in ARexx.
Naturally I agree with you, but before making such claims I think one has
to review the developer base on the Amiga platform. And the developer base
is quite small and has a lot to do - and they don't get paid for it,
because nobody bothers registering when they can obtain a pirated copy. And
optimizations and bug hunting are slow and boring. Bug hunting is
necessary, but I can definitely understand if they cut a few corners and
skip some of the optimization.
>> Personally I think it is a bit sad that we are stuck with all that old
>> crap, because it puts so many restraints on the programmers. The user
>> base is so little and if they programmers want to earn a little they
>> have to support a processor that goes more than a decade back.
> Its a great way to learn programming though. You can feel the program
> executing. My line is that if you want to learn or do something important in
> programming then you should develop it on a computer slightly slower than
> you'd optimally want to run it on.
One of my friends is a programmer and his is currently working that will
be released by Eidos in nine months or so. He has told me that they in
general program aimed for the next generation of processors, e.g. they might
be working on 300 MHz processors, but they are aiming the game at 700 MHz,
because if they don't do so they wont succeed and will be out of
competition. In this way you sort of get a nice evolving environment where
both programmers and hardware developers try to be better and faster all
the time. My friend is more or less programming for the computers of 2001.
On the Amiga the programmer is working on an Amiga equipped with graphics
card and 060, and he has to aim his work at 020 AGA's. I find the
development environment on the Amiga platform to be very stagnant. Amiga
programmers are programming for the computers from 1992 (and let us not
forget that even in 1992 the 020 was old, 040's were available in 1992).
So many Amiga users want this or that - and why shouldn't they want it?
It is available under Windows and more or less necessary if you have to
live along with Windows users (and today we have to live among Windows
users), but still they don't bother upgrading their equipment or
registering the software. Sad, oh so sad.
Uffe Holst
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