You see the irony here? The hardware that should keep the machines running even on power failure, caused the power failure.

Thanks Orgin for the updates

@Raziel
I am sure they have a lot on their plate as well, but if someone who knows what is required could contact them and try to discuss what is needed. Since they develop the kernel, they might have the same issues, and they might have solutions there, or not.

@afxgroup
I completely understand what you say, and sorry for my ignorance on what porting software needs. What is needed to be done, in your opinion so to make your life easier, and others easier?

For example, when I saw that some people had issues to set up a cross development environment to build Odyssey, what I could do, and I did, was to create one that compiles Odyssey and uses Docker (https://github.com/walkero-gr/odysseyOnDocker). Good or bad solution that's an other matter and discussion, but that's what I could do.

With that mentality, do you believe that there is something we could do to change the situation? For example, the kernel is on ExecSG team hands, which seems more active than Hyperion. If we talk with them would there be a way to find some information or ask for some changes?

Would make sense to form a team of people, which will work on fixing this problem? Is it doable? Do we have those minds here that could contribute to this?

If I am not wrong, for VSCode there is an extension that uses a modified WinUAE to give debugging ability for AmigaOS 3 executables. Would there be a potential for us as well?

In general, instead of waiting Hyperion to do their part, is there a way we could work for a solution?

@BSzilli
Quote:

I am so happy to hear that, because it is true we have a healthy community at Amigans.net.

Quote:

That's what we need to communicate with him and anyone else if we want things to change. That's what we ask to change.

Personally I am glad that Matthew and Trevor spend time to sit down, read and reply to our posts. That means that they do care, and that's the first step to fix anything that doesn't work. And it is an opportunity for us to express ourselves and find solutions. We should not waste it. The benefit will be on both sides. Don't you agree?

What @trixie proposed is, IMO, a good way to do it, without having the weight fall on one person only. But @trixie, I would like to see technical posts as well. For example, what are the problems that the new datatypes.library tries to solve? Will there be new features, i.e. streaming capabilities? Why for A-Eon this is more crucial than something else?

This way not only A-Eon will inform people on what they are doing, but also why, and a more in depth overview on how they work. There is a plethora of topics that could be covered.

I enjoy a lot Trevor's blog posts and I would love to keep reading them, without change anything.

The way I understand it, and please correct me if I am wrong, based on all the comments here, is that users and customers of all the companies are not happy, not because of the amount of releases, but because of the communication. Because for someone these might be enough, but for someone else these might be not enough.

If A-Eon needs to delay a product for X reasons, IMO, should communicate with the users about the reasons. We are all old and mature (I hope) enough to understand the reasons.

Matthew is right that he, and the AmigaDeveloper.com team, delivered updates and released software. And I am sure he and A-Eon have their reasons on anything they do and the way they do it. Even that they are here, they read our posts and take the time to respond, shows that they care.

But Matthew, have in mind that if the users are not informed about the releases A-Eon does, then it seems the way it was done was not enough. Maybe something needs to change on the way you do it.

All of us, and this discussion, as much as I understand, is not against A-Eon, Hyperion and AmigaKit. This discussion is happening to show you guys that there is a problem and that something needs to change. And we are here to discuss what might be a good next step, not to play the blame game, because this never ends.

In my opinion, if A-Eon had a blog that once per month, or more frequently, could have posts based on every project (Enhancer, X5000, A1222 etc), their status, why there are delays, and what is going to happen, this would be great. If it is possible to express yourselves in a way that can show how you think, this would solve peoples doubts, and they would not accuse anyone that they do not care. And the posts do not need to be huge. Two paragraphs are enough to express the above.

Even for historical reasons, there is a need for some information to be out there. For example, I remember an announcement about A-Eon and ACube cooperation, but I don't remember I heard at any time what happened with that and what came out of it. I do not ask you to tell us high confidential information, but A-Eon needs to write about things like that. It shows that A-Eon didn't do an announcement just for the announcement, but came back and informed people about it, and the outcome.

The time were the companies were not talking with the community passed so long ago. Even really huge brands right now they find it crucial to have a communication with their customers, because like that they talk also with their potential customers. That's the way to show how honest they are, that they have a plan and they communicate it.

If I were A-Eon or Hyperion or AmigaKit I would feel angry with myself if people compared me with an other group, accusing me that I am not as good as they are. I would look what I do wrong and I would try to become better.

So, Matthew, Trevor and anyone that might read it from Hyperion (which I doubt), instead of trying to defend yourselves, ask people what they want. Do not assume what they want. Ask them to propose how you can become better and get their feedback, evaluate it and change where you need to change. Don't go to the counter attack. You have to understand that if one person thinks something, then hundreds of people might think the same.

@all
Instead of accusing and blaming, maybe we should try to propose solutions and help those companies. That goes for me as well. No one here is perfect, but Amigans.net is much better than the other websites, don't you think. Let's show that.

@afxgroup
I totally agree with you. Unfortunately, from our side what we can do is what we can do. We can't change the way the companies work and release software. We have that discussion there so to push a little bit further and make them realize the situation.

But we are developers, and what we do better is to always try to find a solution. What I am about to say might be stupid, because I don't know how to port software from other systems, but, have you tried with cross compiling? Is there a possibility that this would help to overcome the problems you mentioned?

That's great news and an awesome step. I would say, make it work even if it requires a lot of memory, and then optimize it as much as you can to work on low memory systems. Maybe others can recommend good solution on that. And since the code is open, they can also have a look and propose a solution.

Just my thoughts.

@afxgroup
What is the repo you use?

@afxgroup
I am waiting for this and thank you for started working on it. Are you going to push the changes on a git?

Keep it up there. I am watching you :D :D :D

@kas1e
Quote:

I don't believe that anyone says that they do not matter. Everyone would approve that.

A company that creates a product needs to listen to the customers and users. Listen what they need and if this is part of their vision, give it to them. If a company doesn't do that, doesn't have a future, along with the products.

And if a company cannot/doesn't want, to give to the users what they require, has to give an open and honest explanation to the users-customers. The users-customers will not wait for too long with not a single information in the dark. At the end they will abandon the company and it's products.

IMO, a company has to find a balance on delivery of what announced, and if there are delays/problems has to communicate.

@matthew
The point you miss from the whole discussion here is not the blame game. No one blames AmigaKit and A-Eon about Hyperion's incapability to release updates. We speak about the lack of communication to the community. And this is not enough when you release something, like a news item.

But there is a need of communicating on:
- why something takes time?
- why you didn't deliver when you announced that you would?
- what are the next plans?
- what happened with projects you announced? Are they dead or active?
- even why you do something the way you do it, i.e. people might like to know why you implement the new datatypes library? The reasons and your vision.

In my opinion that's how people are going to understand how a company works, thinks and breathes, and not consider it as a dead body. That's how AmigaKit, A-Eon and Hyperion will inspire the community, and will not have people leaving it. The announcements will not keep people waiting for too long, and we saw the results.

And if you care about the platform, and you can't or don't want to work on a project, it might be good idea to open source it, instead of sitting on it. This might bring people to work and update it. And this will show that you care about this platform to become better.

A-Eon, AmigaKit and Hyperion have to understand that the whole situation not only makes users angree, and discourage the last developers to continue creating applications for AmigaOS 4. In case you missed it, read what imagodespira writes at the following post, under the screenshot
https://www.amigans.net/modules/xforum ... id=120712#forumpost120712

I don't know if A-Eon, AmigaKit and Hyperion realize it, but the situation is really crucial, in my opinion. We can't lose developers from this platform. There are not many left. They need to change the way they work and communicate. No more excuses needed.

@samo79
Quote:

When the time comes to test AmigaOS 3.2 you will see the tremendous job they did there and how necessary, IMO, this is. The team behind the development of the new version of AmigaOS 3 does a great job there.

I wonder how this team keeps working and I hope soon they are going to release it, without get influenced by Covid. I wonder.

@kas1e
Wait. In my opinion all the people you mentioned do care about the platform and the community. They really do, otherwise they would do something else. What I believe is that they have a lot of things in their plate and the agony to support all of them and create new stuff as well. This is not easy task to maintain. And I agree that if there is a need of more people to get involved, let's do that.

But have in mind that no company can rely on the good will of people. They need professionals and they are not cheap. So, the issue here might be an infinite loop.

@all
We, as community and people have to be more open on helping, and discuss without attacking anyone. Some might say that they don't communicate much because of forum trolls and personal attacks. Thank God, this forum is not like that and I am sure we can all have a productive discussion here.

What I would like to see from A-Eon, Hyperion and AmigaKit, which are the main players behind AmigaOS 4 and AmigaOne hardware is:
- Release of A1222 before the end of the year, with working audio. For me this should be the number one priority for all the parties
- Release of the Enhancer v2 and the free package of the new classes before the end of the year
- Updates on software and hardware progress to the community at least once a month, with realistic timelines
- New updates of software and bug fixes on AmigaOS 4 through AmiUpdate. If this is not possible, I would like to know why and what are the plans for future OS update
- Updates from ExecSG team at least once per month on the progress and new ideas
- Release of a new SDK that will support compiling software for A1222
- Communication with people in technical matters, so to increase developers
- Document the knowledge that a few people have on creating stuff, so that this knowledge can be used from more people, i.e. how to create drivers or how to support USB hardware. If this needs to have access to closed software, create the tools so that anyone can use to create that software. If that information is already out there, then communicate better where people can find them and how to use it
- The ExecSG team has a lot of experience on development. I would expect them to have a Blog where at least once per month one of them would release a blog post with technical information on a matter he got involved, what difficulties he had and how he solved them. This would spread the information and inspire people. If they are X people, they would write a blog post every X months, that would take Y hours to do. The benefits would be great from that. And if they don't want to create a Blog, there are other websites to do so (OS4Coding.net, Amigans.net).

They have to realize that the Amiga community it's not only fan boys... They are customers that need people to talk with them. And this should be done by companies' websites - blogs - social networks and on third party forums like amigans.net.

Otherwise, I am sorry but "the party is already over".

I believe that what we discussed here is valid. The lack of communication from the main players and the lack of updates in software turns people away. Adding to that the price of the hardware that is supported by AmigaOS 4, it's not weird having the OS 4 users shrinking every month.

I believe that we shouldn't wait every year the AmiWest to hear news and plans. If every company, and team were giving updates to the community even once a month, people would be more happy. That's what keep them together. And keep them inspired.

Unfortunately, the platform dies and our shouts are not heard.

@kas1e
Don't get me wrong. Just, it would be better topics to not be derailed. Let's discuss about Hyperion on other thread.

@all
We should better stick on topic guys, and open a separate thread to discuss things about companies and communication.

Unfortunately, communication was never a strong ability of the companies behind OS4. Unless this long time silence hides something else. I don't know.

In my opinion, working on releasing a low cost, entry level motherboard that supports AmigaOS 4 should be the number 1 priority, because this will bring more users to the platform. And this could help companies and developers to continue support it more and make fixes and releases.

Back on topic, I don't see a way to have the Wayfarer supported in OS4 any time soon. But there could be a continued work on Odyssey. It seems that any updates are stopped. Are we going to see more updates on that? Is there someone working on newer webkit port?

@mritter0
Take care of yourself, do what makes you have fun and we are always gonna be here to welcome you back...

Frictional Games is a company creating very nice horror games like the Penumbra Overture trilogy.

Recently they open sourced the code of:
- Penubra Overture (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0EN3JIxYw4)
- Amnesia: The Dark Descent (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1nY_5-UrY4)
- Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZV6Fwx_Sf4)

From a look I had on them they seem to use SDL 1 or 2, OpenAL and a bunch of other stuff. It would be great if someone who did port games previously, could have a better look if they are possible to be ported.

Come on guys, don't be scared. :D :D :D

The code can be found at https://github.com/FrictionalGames