twice the fun - double the trouble!

in this case:

quad the fun - four times the trouble!

_________________
Charly says always tell your mummy before you go off use some other os!

@DiscreetFX

Quote:

Berry (a DiscreetFX contractor) also called Opra Software a few times and left messages. Opra makes a nice browser and it would great to have a port. They are welcome to contact DiscreetFX if they want to discuss.

I very much doubt that Opera will be taking the initiative here and they shouldn't.

As with all things of any importance, if you want to get anywhere the principal has to be the point of contact and then delegate accordingly.

Calling is certainly better than sending e-mails but did anyone establish who was responsible for licensing or able to address the questions of prospective clients? If so, why were messages left rather than asking when this person would be available and if they weren't who would be as an alternate?

No offense, but I bet $50 that this information could be gathered in a single call.

@ne_one:


I'll call them myself next week.

_________________
Sent from my Quantum Computer.

IMHO this is a stupid move.

While it is about time something happens this is not going to make it more likely. It doesn't make it much easier to do the port IMHO.
We should rather have split the bounty up in dependencies and smaller bounties.

Also this should be changed to separate bounties now that money you paid to support a port to your preferred system might end up elsewhere.

I think this not well planned.

_________________

Quote:

While it is about time something happens this is not going to make it more likely. It doesn't make it much easier to do the port IMHO. We should rather have split the bounty up in dependencies and smaller bounties. Also this should be changed to separate bounties now that money you paid to support a port to your preferred system might end up elsewhere.

I agree with you. Separate bountys for separate dependencies sounds like a smart idea. But changing the rules for Amizilla again is probably not so smart.

Since this announcement was made I was actually thinking about what to do with the dependencies. One idea is to make new bountys and not use the money from the Amizilla bounty. Maybe something you can do on www.amigabounty.net ?

On larger projects like Firefox and OpenOffice it might be smarter to start from the bottom with the dependencies.

I think a change was needed, to spur on some sort of progress. But unfortunately, I dont think theres any new solution that everyone will be 100% happy with. i.e. if you ask 10 different people how the bounty should be structured, you'll get 10 different responses. The situation is a bit messed up, but we had to move forward somehow. And it'll probably be months before we can see if this gamble will pay off.

@seer

doh!

_________________
Yes I own an Amiga. A non-upgraded A500 that is unpacked once every 3 years.

If you are going to quote me, do so fully or not at all.
/Ins

@DiscreetFX

Ah, Opera. It's the mother of all browsers! Lightweight, fast, easy to use and still packed with features. It's the only browser I use when i have to use a window$ system. If you manage to get that ported I'll name my first born after you (or buy you a beer).

I agree with @Trolls and @Mood.
Lets get the DEPENDENCIES LIBRARY/s up and running with new bounties.
So can we create a new forum just to purely identify libraries and fatalities and frameworks
and API's etc that are widely used in the UNIX / LINUX wold and get some requirements analysis built around them.

We would need the following for each.

1) API level or version + name
2) One (1) Bounty for writing test cases - this can be virtual, doing this would support the test driven development approach.
3) One (1) Bounty for the implantation on OS 4.
4)Three (3) other Bounties for other implementations

Repeat steps 1-4 for each library or framework identifies from the groups analysis.
We could use Google Spreadsheets and Document collaboration tools to define these specs
properly.

_________________
Quote:

Easy Pocket Money, Freelancers & Experts Online

MiniMig FPGA, Sam440 Flex 733Mhz PPC, Amiga OS 4.1 Update 2, MorphOS 2.4, Other - AmiKit + Cloanto Amiga Forever 2008 + E-UAE, AmigaSYS

The way I see it there's nothing stopping anyone from getting at least half the bounty straight away, AROS and AmigaOS aren't that much dissimilar, and the platform needed to develop for both of them is easy to achieve, not to say that most have a PC already..

_________________
Indigo 3D Lounge, my second home.
The Illusion of Choice | Am*ga

Quote:

1) API level or version + name 2) One (1) Bounty for writing test cases - this can be virtual, doing this would support the test driven development approach. 3) One (1) Bounty for the implantation on OS 4. 4)Three (3) other Bounties for other implementations

Change this to :

1) API level or version + name
2) One (1) Bounty for writing test cases - this can be virtual, doing this would support the test driven development approach.
3) Four (4) Bounties for the implementations on all AmigaOS's.

And you're right. The bounty never was AmigaOS4-specific and it is not going to become one, period.

_________________

I say go further and forget about porting Linux-like APIs.

I don't think this or the money will make any difference.

I think a browser is too big to develop for one team and I think the Firefox browser is too alien for one team to hope to port to Amiga-like OSs.

I think it would be better to have a series of AROS bounties aimed at making the underlying technologies available through an API;

Eg: HTML and rendering
CSS
Javascript
Java
HTTPS

etc etc

This way each implementation would make it trivial to develop a browser with that functionality.

With this API we could finally, as a community, stick a finger up to all the buffoons and racketeers who revel in embarrassing us on a monthly basis on OSNews etc.

Good point! @Colin_Camper

A component based approach would make more sense.

So apply all previous steps 1-3-4 as per @meet.mrgnrg and @Zardoz
for each of those components. Adding any other components that may be required.
Each with a series of test cases.

Let the evaluation begin. We will need to find acceptable open source versions of each of these as a base foundation. Avoiding adding an optimizations at this stage unless its implemented with a sub-component interface or call back methods of some kind.
An OO override and overload approach with GOF or JEE style patterns in C/C++ of course.

_________________
Quote:

Easy Pocket Money, Freelancers & Experts Online

MiniMig FPGA, Sam440 Flex 733Mhz PPC, Amiga OS 4.1 Update 2, MorphOS 2.4, Other - AmiKit + Cloanto Amiga Forever 2008 + E-UAE, AmigaSYS

@Colin_Camper

Quote:

Eg: HTML and rendering CSS Javascript Java HTTPS etc etc This way each implementation would make it trivial to develop a browser with that functionality.

I'm bemused to note that in one of his 20 questions fantasies Fleecy advocated this kind of modular approach too.

Noel

Good, its been advocated / recommended before best get it done then.

_________________
Quote:

Easy Pocket Money, Freelancers & Experts Online

MiniMig FPGA, Sam440 Flex 733Mhz PPC, Amiga OS 4.1 Update 2, MorphOS 2.4, Other - AmiKit + Cloanto Amiga Forever 2008 + E-UAE, AmigaSYS

Quote:

I'm bemused to note that in one of his 20 questions fantasies Fleecy advocated this kind of modular approach too.

Wow!

I feel like a newbie Linux kernel hacker getting a pat on the back from Linus Torvalds himself












NOT!

@DiscreetFX

Quote:

I'll call them myself next week.

I think it's a wise move. It may not be feasible to license the code or to contract out a port but unless we ask we'll never know.

I wonder if it's also worth asking for some assistance from the Mozilla group as well?

I get the feeling that it's proper organization and commitment that's the problem with all of these efforts. There are a lot of talented resources out there and if properly coordinated this shouldn't be so painful.

Quote:

Tigger: On the other hand, if its split in quarters, the guy doing the AROS version doesnt hurt his effort at all by sending pieces to the OS 4 people and vice versa as they each get sections done.

Yeah, this is a very good point!

Quote:

Pleng: Double the bounty or even HIRE people to do an AROS port of the browser

I would think that's DiscreetFX's plan- they're doing a movie to raise money for just this sort of thing!

Quote:

meet.mrnrg: If the first person to port FireFox to any ONE (1 only) of the 1-4 Amiga OS's gets the entire bounty of $10,000+ then we will have a solid race

I doubt that- as has been discussed here, most people thought the Bounty was just for OS3 (and have only just found out it was for all 4 OSes)- and so far that hasn't encouraged people to go for the Bounty! IMO the Bounty hasn't been a motivating factor for OS4 devs- recent devs have just preferred to support OS4 not OS3, as I think they didn't want to support the opposition (AROS and MOS), so we had a stale-mate- a 4 way split will solve that problem!

If the entire Bounty goes to the first port (which at this stage looks like OS4), then I (and any others still interested in helping) would probably give up any involvement in the AmiZilla project for OS3, and all my knowledge would go with me (and you can also probably assume no ports for AROS or MOS either then)! Then the accusations will fly on it being intentional bias against MOS etc ...

Quote:

What might be a better options it create a VM environment, actually we need an X86 or UNIX code library emulator bounty anyway.

Well, for Mozilla there's probably no point, as the whole program has an abstraction layer, and as far as I can tell it's mostly done for OS3. We do need X11 and GDK/GTK libs ported to OS3 though.

As far as splitting up the Bounty into component parts- it's not a bad idea- I've thought about this myself- ie: how were we going to pay people when Bounty was completed. Specifiying specific bounties for different parts is good, as is saves possible headaches later! Some would be easy- ie: X11/GDK/GTK on OS3 etc- but some maybe more difficult- ie: the NSPR, as it is hard to figure out how much work it'll end up being in the end!

HTML etc OS components- great idea, but there'll be no-one to do the work at this stage. You can't get devs to port Mozilla, let alone all that OS programming!


-Ants
AmiZilla Coordinator

_________________
- Ants

@Ants

some very good points and summary.
So we need to co-ordinate at the moment the most simplest of all of the work ahead.
And that is to create as many relevant bounties as possible. On the bounty web sites.

Even a ZERO $0.0 bounty can turn into a funding or reward gathering stage if someone completes and can demonstrate it fully working.

What do people think?

_________________
Quote:

Easy Pocket Money, Freelancers & Experts Online

MiniMig FPGA, Sam440 Flex 733Mhz PPC, Amiga OS 4.1 Update 2, MorphOS 2.4, Other - AmiKit + Cloanto Amiga Forever 2008 + E-UAE, AmigaSYS