Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Path: sparky!uunet!europa.asd.contel.com!darwin.sura.net!mips!mips!munnari.oz.au!
bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!marlin.jcu.edu.au!cpca
From: c...@marlin.jcu.edu.au ()
Subject: Improving the Amiga (long, no not just long, massive)
Message-ID: <1992Jun4.142954.5321@marlin.jcu.edu.au>
Summary: wishful thinking
Sender: c...@marlin.jcu.edu.au (Colin Adams)
Organization: James Cook University of North Queensland
Date: Thu, 4 Jun 92 14:29:54 GMT
Lines: 97
Firstly, C= should supply a startup configuration program with the system.
It should allow people to do the following :
1) Choose what devices are mounted
2) Choose what programs are made resident (improve the system
so it trashes resident programs that aren't being used under low-memory
too).
3) Choose what programs are run
A program with a GUI could edit the startup-sequence in a manner
than ensured it didn't stuff up. People wouldn't need to know
the user-startup/startup-sequence existed.
People will say why not just put the stuff in the WBStartup Drawer.
Well I don't like the WBStartup Drawer. Why should you have to
move or have 2 copies of programs floating around? At least the
Mac has icon aliases.
While we're at it, we need a Task list program, to allow the
Priority of tasks to be changed (not a CLI program). Windows has
this. Windows also allows programs to be frozen/killed/etc. Obviously
there are problems with killing tasks on the Amiga, but the rest can
be done.
A WB program to do links would be good too. I know some of these
things exist on Fish, but C= should be supplying them, for the
WB. So many of the things on public domain which are written to supply
user's needs end up crashing the system constantly, if they work at
all. If C= were not so understaffed in the OS department, they
might be able to supply some of this software.
C= should :-
1) put a decent GUI on the HDToolBox program.
2) allow a clock in the WB title bar. Come on C=, this can't be
too hard.
3) make WB multi-threaded.
4) make it easier to create a icon for a program that doesn't have one.
5) give history scroll back on shells
6) make Ed usable (worst editor in existance, makes vi look user-friendly).
7) make it possible to save shell sessions to a file (ala UNIX script)
8) add basic necessities to allow people to do something with their
computer when they bring it home (comms/graphics/wordprocessor). Hell,
Olaf Barthel is crying out for C= to take Term.
9) add decent manual pages for cli commands.
10) make any sort of decent use of the Help button. Windows help under
all programs is excellent and standard.
11) add a builtin no-click. How about detecting the types of drives in
the system or something. Maybe a file that comes with the drive
telling the system what type of drive it is etc.
12) add a HD caching system. The one for Windows is intelligent.
13) dump MEmacs, or at least made it look like an Amiga program.
Maybe Andy could have done this if he was still at C=...
14) add a decent shell, with at least command history. It isn't hard
guys. Even MS-DOS has DosKey. Most people who use the shell
probably have a PD program. Type man tcsh for ideas.
15) scrap their stupid scripting language.
16) add a file manager like SID.
17) allow people to configure the mouse button functions like
X.
18) make some form of basic networking standard ala Parnet.
19) add a standard animation system and sound player (not just
for displaybeep). The Amiga has these abilities, why not use them?
Speech is also underused.
20) allow programs to save their settings upon shutting WB. Then the
next time you run a program it could appear in the same place/size etc.
Changing numbers in the Infomation window is hardly a good solution.
At least have an option in the shell to tell you the dimensions
for the tooltypes.
21) design a system to allow people to find out what tooltypes a
program takes easily. Ideally it should be possible from the Infomation
menu.
22) make it possible to get a file requester from the Execute
option on WB. How about a GUI file search while you're at it.
Hell, matt will give you his if you can't program one yourself
(he'd even fix it if you paid him :-)).
23) fix the icon editor to handle large icons. Scroll bars?
24) get BASIC back. Microsoft have fixed most of the bugs.
25) buy quiet disk drives!
26) drop the color program from the Tools directory. It is
rubbish.
27) add some of autocli's functionality.
28) add the shell as a menu option
29) allow people to startup with windows open on the desktop (like
a HD window)
30) implement tearoff menus (ala OpenWindows). They are *really* cool.
No wait, matt thinks they're awesome.
That should keep them busy.
This has been another in the continuing series of
"Improvements to the Amiga", by Matt Crowd and Colin Adams.
--
Colin Adams Honours Student - James Cook University of North Queensland
"In case of doubt, make it sound convincing
Path: sparky!uunet!ogicse!usenet.coe.montana.edu!decwrl!mcnc!unccvax!ta00mmc
From: ta00...@unccvax.uncc.edu (Michael McKnight)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Improving the Amiga (long, no not just long, massive)
Message-ID: <4755@unccvax.uncc.edu>
Date: 4 Jun 92 21:15:55 GMT
Article-I.D.: unccvax.4755
References: <1992Jun4.142954.5321@marlin.jcu.edu.au>
Reply-To: ta00...@unccvax.uncc.edu.UUCP (Michael McKnight)
Organization: University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Lines: 71
31) A print spooler that will intercept PAR: and PRT: data and queue them in a
efficient way. And don't forget the controll programs to go with it.
32) Direct support for multiple SER: and PAR: devices. Something like SER1:
and PAR3: (and of course PRTx: also). I mean a system that can handle
a couple of parallel printers and a couple of serial printers and modems.
We would also need a Prefs program to control all of this and software
will have to give the user a choice of which device (some do already).
Take a look at the Windows 3.0 Printmanager. No matter what program you
are printing from, you get the same print requester and can make all of
your choices from there... then the file is sent to disk and the sending
software is freed up (although this is butt-ass slow in Windows).
33) Better graphic support. More colors at higher resolutions... and not
priced any more than a SVGA card at a comperable resolution. Oh yeah,
faster graphics too.
34) The ability for applications to open in a window on the workbench... I
mean completely in a window. So, for example, I can have two or three
sessions of PageStream open on the workbench and see them all at once
(see #33 above). The current method is a step to that (i.e PageStream
opened on the WB), but even my A3000 with 2MB chip & 2MB fast has a little
trouble printing a full page with large fonts if I have pagestream resized
to let me see a whole page in actual size on a 640x600 8color workbench
screen. There has to be a better way.
35) UNIX like support for process managment. ie. If I want a process stopped,
and I type break 5 I mean I want it stopped; I dont want to type STATUS
again and still see process 5 running. Also, if I type STATUS I'd
expect to see everything currently running or waiting listed, not just
those launched from CLI, but those launched from WBStartup and WB itself.
36) Virtual Memory. Surely if Intel and Microsoft can accomplish this, CBM
can. I mean, the A3000 has an MMU and a harddisk... what more do you
need? Make it invisible to the applicaions so everything out there will
still run. Also, make its size defineable.
37) Make windows on the workbench (ie disks/drawers) auto-updating. Lets say
I have the RAM: disk window open and files listed by name and I open a
shell and copy something to RAM:, that file should immediately show up in
the window. Get rid of the Update menu item.
38) Do something with the clipboard. Make it to where I can copy multiple
items from multiple applications and choose between which one I want
pasted.
Now, I know that alot of these items are only possible with systems with hard
drives on them, but I think every Amiga sold should have one. And there is
no reason that they should raise the price of a machine by 100%.
Why in the world is there no CBM supported CD-ROM drive for the higher end
machines? What are the game-playing A500 users going to do with one anyway?
I mean if they need a CD-ROM drive for their A500, it would be cheaper to
simply buy CDTV. Get us a CD-ROM drive for the high-end amigas.
Scrap the A600, keep the A500Plus and put the guts of the A600 in a portable
with a battery pack and a VGA gas-plasma screen and keep the price under
$1000.
Commodore, it's time to say, OK, this is the old and this is the NEW. Get
away from the current chipset at soon as you can. Keep compatibility with
software as best as possible and those developers who didn't follow the
programming rules, well, the software probably isn't much of a loss anyway.
I've almost paid off my A3000 and I'm looking to buy something new!
Send flames to NIL: and comments to...
Michael McKnight
ta00...@unccvax.uncc.edu
Path: sparky!uunet!cbmvax!andy
From: a...@cbmvax.commodore.com (Andy Finkel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Improving the Amiga (long, no not just long, massive)
Message-ID: <31715@cbmvax.commodore.com>
Date: 4 Jun 92 22:54:29 GMT
References: <1992Jun4.142954.5321@marlin.jcu.edu.au>
Reply-To: a...@cbmvax.commodore.com (Andy Finkel)
Organization: Flying Cat Software
Lines: 24
In article <1992Jun4.142954.5...@marlin.jcu.edu.au> c...@marlin.jcu.edu.au writes:
14) add a decent shell, with at least command history. It isn't hard
>guys. Even MS-DOS has DosKey. Most people who use the shell
>probably have a PD program. Type man tcsh for ideas.
>15) scrap their stupid scripting language.
The shell got command history for 1.3. The script language was improved
for 1.3 and for 2.0. Plus in 2.0 Arexx was added, which is an extremely
capable script language.
Just curious, but how could you not have noticed ? Are you using
1.2 for some reason ?
>Colin Adams Honours Student - James Cook University of North Queensland
andy
--
andy finkel {uunet|rutgers|amiga}!cbmvax!andy
"Is There No Truth In Advocacy ?"
Any expressed opinions are mine; but feel free to share.
I disclaim all responsibilities, all shapes, all sizes, all colors.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Path: sparky!uunet!munnari.oz.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!marlin.jcu.edu.au!cpca
From: c...@marlin.jcu.edu.au (Colin Adams)
Subject: Re: Improving the Amiga
Message-ID: <1992Jun9.033642.2729@marlin.jcu.edu.au>
Organization: James Cook University, North Queensland
References: <1992Jun4.142954.5321@marlin.jcu.edu.au> <31715@cbmvax.commodore.com>
Date: Tue, 9 Jun 92 03:36:42 GMT
Lines: 16
In article <31...@cbmvax.commodore.com> a...@cbmvax.commodore.com (Andy Finkel) writes:
>Just curious, but how could you not have noticed ? Are you using
>1.2 for some reason ?
I was wrong on this. The standard shell is better than I thought.
I've been using csh for ages and didn't take enough notice of the
2.0 improvements.
> andy
>andy finkel {uunet|rutgers|amiga}!cbmvax!andy
BTW, You didn't comment on MEmacs. Any chance of an upgrade?
--
Colin Adams Honours Student - James Cook University of North Queensland
"In case of doubt, make it sound convincing"