Atari Mega Archive 2/Atari Mega Archive CD - Volume 2.iso/utils/omen/omenher2.txt

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From: Steve Wells <[e-mail]>
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Subject: OMENHER2.TXT - OMEn Herald, Issue #2, Volume #1.  (Goes with
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  _______________________             _____________________________
 /  ___________________  \           / Esquimalt Digital Logic Inc \
 | /                   \ |           | 820 Dunsmuir Road           |
 | |    OMEn Herald    | |           | Victoria, BC                |
 | | Volume 1 Number 2 | |           | Canada       V9A 5B7        |
 | |   February 1994   | |           |    Phone: [phone]    |
 | \___________________/ |           |    Fax:   [phone]    |
 \_______________________/           \_____________________________/

This newsletter keeps you up to date with developments of the OMEn
cross-platform operating system. We invite your comments and
suggestions so that we can improve usability for programmers and
users. Newsletter #1 is available in the Atari RT library on GENIE,
or request it from us.
 ___________________________________________________________________
/                           What Is OMEn?                           \
|                                                                   |
| The Open Multitasking Environment (OMEn) is an open architecture, |
| true preemptive multitasking operating system based on the 680x0  |
| processor family. It is also a graphical environment where the    |
| user has free access to all commands and features, even while     |
| running multiple programs simultaneously.                         |
|                                                                   |
| OMEn is a modular system in which I/O function files are created  |
| and configured without reference to the system core. It can thus  |
| be interfaced with ease, and BY ANY DEVELOPER, to any type of     |
| hardware and to any type of software protocol, existing or new.   |
| This includes printers, disk drives and file systems, networks,   |
| input devices, displays, industrial controls, MIDI, multi-media   |
| and so on.                                                        |
|                                                                   |
| OMEn is intended to run on most current 680x0 based computers     |
| (Macintosh, Atari, Amiga) including older low end models; PC via  |
| a 680x0 card; and new machines such as Power PC, Alpha IPX and    |
| Pentium by 68000 emulation and other techniques. Implementation   |
| progress for individual machines is detailed in issues of the     |
| OMEn Herald.                                                      |
|                                                                   |
| OMEn interface operation is nearer to UNIX X-Windows than to any  |
| other interface, but OMEn's size is a fraction of UNIX, and the   |
| generic object oriented drag-&-drop interface is unique. In       |
| addition, A SINGLE VERSION of an OMEn application program or I/O  |
| protocol interface will run on ALL COMPUTERS, making OMEn a much  |
| more open system than UNIX in this critical area.                 |
\___________________________________________________________________/

             Two Good Reasons To Write Software For OMEn

1. It is plain that under current market conditions, Atari and Amiga
have become dead-end systems, and even Apple is failing to gain its
share of the expanding market. The pool of 680x0 programmers is split
into incompatible camps based on each proprietary brand of computer,
while the pool of Intel programmers are all writing for the same non-
proprietary systems.
     OMEn will run on all 680x0 machines (including PCs with the
680x0 card, and RISC machines by emulation) independently of the
fortunes of any one particular computer company. It is the only
system conceptually capable of reversing the well-developed trend
toward a closed Intel-Windows marketplace, and bringing good market
share to 680x0 based and open architecture systems.
     OMEn will be viable on almost the entire installed base of
existing computers, from the oldest 7 MHz monochrome Macs without
hard drives to the latest mega-feature machines. The potential market
area for OMEn software is thus set to the widest possible limits, and
developers who start early will have a head start on penetration of
the platforms not covered by early releases. This could propel small
companies from fringe markets to advantageous positions in major
markets.

2. There's just one operating system to know for any and all
machines, and it's a straightforward, easy to learn and use system.
     OMEn software makers will not have to know a variety of systems
to hit all the potential markets for a program.

                         OMEn General Progress

Conceptually, only configurable bootup remains to be tackled for a
complete open architecture operating system. It is intended that a
text based "Boot Script" somewhat akin to DOS'es CONFIG.SYS and
AUTOEXEC.BAT will be used to install desired I/O drivers,
preferences, startup applications and miscellaneous at boot time.

A scaleable font handling system is now in place. It currently
manages certain Postscript Type Three fonts which use a simple text
based definition system editable with a text editor. These fonts are
easy to add extended character definitions to. They mesh neatly with
the rest of the scaleable graphics system, which uses the same
definition format, which we call "ZipScrip". An example of an object
defined by ZipScrip is:

n                           New object
0 200 m                     Move to co-ordinates 0,200 (X,Y)
0 700 l                     Draw a line (from 0,200) up to 0,700
100 700 l                   From there, line right to 100
500 700 500 200 100 200 c   Then a big curve back to the bottom
e                           End polygon with a line back to the start
f                           Fill it in. It's a filled in "D" shape.

On a similar note, the "code page 437" character set (the IBM
extended character set) has been adopted as characters 256 to 383
(hex 100 to 17F) of the OMEn character set. Character codes 384 to
1023 (hex 180 to 3FF) are currently reserved. The single byte defined
character set is:
 0 to 15: Control Characters (End of File, NewLine, Wordwrap, etc)
 16 to 31: Extra OMEn printing characters (arrows, checkmark, etc)
 32 to 127: Regular ASCII printing character set
 128 to 255: Various non-printing commands (SetColors, bold, italics,
             SetTabs/Margins, PrintExtendedChar(>256), SetFont, ...)

                             Release Dates

The OMEn release for ATARI with development tools and documentation
is still planned for 2nd quarter '94, probably in April. Please reply
to receive your copy!

A preliminary MACINTOSH release for 512K, Plus, SE, Classic, SE 30
and Classic II will also be available upon request at that time. (The
Classic III hasn't been tested.) Monochrome displays ONLY, of any
size, will work, and Mac hard drives are not accessable. 68030 based
machines with color or shades-of-grey displays are currenly not
working, even if set to two-color mode in the "Monitors" control
panel. OMEn starts up fine, and applications run okay, but everything
"freezes" after about 20 to 30 seconds. (Ideas are welcome.)

The same OMEn software runs on both the Atari and the Mac. Since Mac
Plusses can't use standard format DOS disks, a special feature called
"DOSsify" has been added to convert an 800K Mac disk into an 8