Submitted by It’s really been an Amiga week, hasn’t it? As such, it seems only fitting to close this week off with some seriously epic news from the Amiga community. As most of you will know, Hyperion and Amiga, Inc. have been embroiled in a tough legal battle over the distribution and development rights of the AmigaOS, and all its associated trademarks. The epic news is that this situation is now completely and utterly resolved.
Hyperion Entertainment is the company who has developed AmigaOS 4.x since 2001. The problem, however, was that Hyperion could not just develop the AmigaOS for whatever hardware it wanted; a number of complicated legal constructions were really obstructing the Amiga platform. It even led to a legal battle between Hyperion and Amiga, Inc.
After years and years of uncertainty, the two parties have now reached an extensive, end-all-be-all settlement agreement under which Hyperion gets the rights to the Amiga trademarks, as well as the rights to AmigaOS 3.x, AmigaOS 4.x, and any possible future version.
Within the framework of the settlement agreement Hyperion is granted an exclusive, perpetual, worldwide right to AmigaOS 3.1 in order to use, develop, modify, commercialize, distribute and market AmigaOS 4.x (and subsequent versions of AmigaOS including without limitation AmigaOS 5) in any form, on any medium and for any current or future hardware platform under the exclusive trademark “AmigaOS” (Amiga operating system) and using other associated trademarks (such as the “BoingBall” logo).
This means that no legal issues stand in the way of further developing and expanding the Amiga platform. It means we could see the AmigaOS expanded to PowerPC Macintosh machines, much like MorphOS recently did.
This is great news for us operating system enthusiasts, and, of course, for Hyperion itself. Most of all, however, I would like to congratulate the Amiga community with this news, as they had to sit through this nonsense year after year, and watch in disgust as their beloved platform was restrained by legal nonsense.
Here’s to a prosperous future for the Amiga!
Finally! But what will happen to Amiga Inc.?
At this point, who cares?
Anyone with an interest in OSs?
If you read the article, Amiga Inc. is no longer involved with AmigaOS at this point.
Therefore, who cares about Amiga Inc.?
The real heroes here, the Frieden brothers, who are two extremely talented developers, are getting the chance to set the future direction of this OS without the involvement of a corporation that has done nothing to do so.
Oh, sorry, I thought you meant who cares about the whole thing, not what’s happening to Amiga.inc. In which case you were correct!
My bad.
Although you do wonder what Amiga.inc got out of the arrangment. If anything..
Edited 2009-10-17 22:40 UTC
They haven’t actually produced any OS themselves. They bought Tao’s Intent and added a few bits and pieces. They outsourced development for AmigaOS itself (first Haage & Partner – later Hyperion). There is little to care about regarding Amiga.
That said I am curious what they intend to do. As I see it they have absolutely nothing left of any value.
Looks like Amiga, inc, got spanked but good in that agreement.
Not quite. Amiga Inc. still has 1 year left of an AGA graphics chipset patent. 😀
Other than that though, they got spanked!
I’ve had to read this news several times over, on AW.net, Amigans, Hyperions website and now on OS News. I’m still wondering if the clocks have been set right back to April 1st!
At the very least, the Amiga OS can have a clear direction. It can only be good news. Yippee!!!
So they finally resolve everything after PowerPC is all but dead on anything outside of the embedded space? Maybe they’ll port to ARM or x86.
But then once it’s ported to x86, it brings Windows into the equation. Microsoft sees it as a possible threat and starts it’s patent threats, “get the facts” campaigns and all that stuff ….
Edited 2009-10-18 18:26 UTC
Not really. If they start getting an actual market share of x86, however, then that will get Microsoft’s attention. There are countless operating systems for the x86 architecture and the only ones that are officially on Microsoft’s radar are Mac OSX and Linux.
Microsoft doesn’t even care about *BSD which will likely have a bigger slice of the pie over AmigaOS/x86 for a long time to come.
That being said, I’d probably buy a copy of AmigaOS/x86 if it became available. But that doesn’t mean I’d drop Windows or Linux for it.
EDIT: There are actually several variants of Linux that Microsoft is worried about. Ubuntu, Moblin, and Chrome are probably the three biggest.
Edited 2009-10-19 12:05 UTC
to x86!
I am really serious about this. Face the reality – but in 2009, the hardware did not count anymore – like back in the good old Amiga days. It is all about software nowadays.
Lets think of what a OS, like the Amiga OS, with its ground up design for multitasking, multiprocessing, multi CPU awareness and small memory footprint could do on a state of the art hardware machine!
It must be incredible!!
And put a PPC and 68k emulator in for the good old stuff.
Edited 2009-10-17 23:41 UTC
Can Amiga get back in the game? They could become a niche player, but there’s so much work to be done:
1) port to x86 (how about a 128 bit OS as Windows 9 is supposed to be?)
2) utilize GPUs to complement CPU processing (I’m a bit out of my league here, but I think supporting Nvidia’s CUDA, ATI’s Stream, or something similar is essential). Build it right into the OS for maximum speed
3) find a niche that’s not yet saturated (AmigaOS, in it’s day, was a leader in desktop video). Maybe the Amiga could be the manager of integrated audio and video throughout the home (organizing video, getting movies from the cloud, etc)
4) keep it lean and mean (both the OS and the company)
5) Hyperion needs to decide whether it’s a hardware company (like Apple) or a software company (like Microsoft). A hardware company would mean higher risk (design expense)/higher reward (profit on both hardware and software. They cannot waste precious working capital wavering between the two (see Be, Inc.)
6) Do something unique (I don’t know, maybe design computers that have no spinning drives, do everything in SSD or the cloud)
7) Court developers. Design an app store. Give developers free hardware/software.
8) Forge partnerships with content providers
9) A thousand different ideas I’m not smart enough to think of
That might work, except for the fact that 128-bit Intel processors don’t actually exist!
Dude, *NOTHING* associated with the Amiga actually exists.
It’s basically Duke Nukem Forever’s twin sibling…..
I’ve just posted something similar then I noticed your comment.
I agree with your ideas.
This is far from any win. OK, Amiga users might get new oportunities, great. But the outer world should know, that Hyperion used all but side tactics.
Somy xy years ago, MorphOS guys, as natural followers of Phase5 systems, proposed to Amiga Inc., that MOS could be the next AmigaOS. Amiga Inc. wanted to control new OS though. Then Ben Hermans (Hyperion) stepped in, and talked Amiga Inc. into “special deal”, which resulted into much delayed OS 4 release.
And the outcome? Now Hyperion has a right to AmigaOS? Come on? So – who’s the winner? Liars. Hyperion liars. No matter what they achieved, they deserve no respect …
I expect this message might upset many ppl, just because they do care about the AmigaOS itself only. But – the behind the scene tactics can’t be denied …
I am not familiar with the details. What lie are you talking about? If Amiga wasn’t helping in the development of the OS, I don’t see why the should have any claim on it. But like I said, I am not familiar with the details, so maybe I am missing something?
Because of the agreement they made.
Amiga.Inc wanted to port the OS to PPC, after a decision they made based upon the users. Hyperion was then selected to do a quick port, they hade a timeline of 6 months. Hyperion failed.
Or in reality they said that more features was a must, and the port wasn’t ready after the period. Some time after this A.Inc signed a new agreemet with Hyperion. But again, the failed to deliver. Some time after A.Inc wanted the sourcecode back, as it was stated in the agreement that they could have, with a buyback of $25000.. Hyperion delayed this to.
A.Inc sued Hyperion to have failed to deliver AmigaOS4 to Amiga.Inc. And people are blaming Amiga.Inc to not be interested in the OS … come on.. They wanted OS4 out fast, to developers and customers. They needed income like any other companies. OS4 was one of them.
But, if Amiga.Inc would go bankrupt the sourcecode and the rights to AmigaOS would fall into Hyperions hands.
So, with OS4 as a hostage with Hyperion, they just had to wait and hold out.
They have played this well, Hyperion, no doubt about it.
Edited 2009-10-18 19:27 UTC
I saw your similar thread was locked on AW.net, which I thought was a little wrong, but I don’t understand your point, MorphOS wanted to get the ‘Official Amiga OS’ job, the Amiga Inc decided not to give it to them, but instead gave it to Hyperion.
What’s your point? There was a job to be done, it was tendered to one of the competing companies. Maybe MorphOS would have been a better choice, maybe not, but the choice happened.
MorphOS 2.0 came out in 30.06.2008, Amiga OS4.0 was released 24 December 2006, you could argue that MorphOS 1.45 was a bit more complete than the various OS4’s pre-releases, again maybe not. But the sad truth is both took far to long to come out.
Edited 2009-10-18 08:45 UTC
I agree with you. And I know that we are more.
Excellent news indeed. I agree that an x86 port would be fantastic, as would an integrated app store (iPhone style).
Aside from having a popular hardware platform, to get Amigos OS back off the ground we need developers. Amiga OS still uses C as it’s primary development language. Fast as C is, there’s a dwindling number of coders that have any idea about how to write it. Not to mention that developing a sophisticated app using managed languages like C# is much much faster. IMHO, Amigo needs a development environment and language that is contemporary. Using C# or Java as a first class citizen in the Amiga SDK would make life a lot easier for potential devs.
Jeez, why not just port Excel and Powerpoint while you’re at it!
Words like ‘SDK’ and ‘C#’ and ‘citizen’ should be kept the hell away from the awesomeness that was Amiga.
I’ve written a PowerPoint viewer that does not work that bad 😉
Else, to all that understand nothing about anything else than x86 : this is not the topic and such a topic is really an invader in all discussions.
There would be many problems porting and having a x86 port and it’s the same thing for ARM on which we can the same kind of fanstasms.
Which problems ? The port itself, the SDK to update, programs to compile for this target, no drivers available on the most heterogeneous pool of machines, …
Exactly! Since when I left the Amiga developement programming has become politics. It’s not what it used to be back then and I don’t like it.
LLVM would kick Java and C# for execution speed and works with C for backward compatibility unlike the other two.
Also, kill the app store idea, we’ve already got http://www.aminet.org/ and http://os4depot.net/ for our freeware and demo ware apps.
One of the main advantages of AmigaOS over MacOSX and Windows is that it is an open system that anybody can develop software for. No proprietary programming languages yet.
Anyone can develop software for Windows without ever buying a line of code. Even the GNU tools are available under Windows.
I think they might win if they made a port into x86 in the first place.
Then, the second most important step would be to create a customized PC specification and optimize the OS for that custom PC.
Now, after that they would open specification so computer manufacturers would produce THAT SPECIFIC Amiga-PC and the OS would sell for a new type of home-computer.
The same way Apple inc. produces Macs except that Hyperion would license hardware specifications and keep control only of the OS itself (Microsoft practice).
If they do it right, they may establish a large enough user-base to make profit and further progress.
theCyberHawk: after this fiasco any former Amiga developer who trusts another corporation or closed anything should drop dead at the place.
What about Elate? In the past McEwen promised an AmigaOS 5 based on the Elate/Intent platform.
This thing could spank some asses in the OS world. It is very fast, microkernel based, centered around managed code and it is portable to all known hardware platforms and processor ISA in a very little time.
To me, porting it to x86 seems to me like the most illogical next step to take. First of all, what is the point of x86, if the OS supports just a very limited hardware configuration? No, if they are to be truly serious about making AmigaOS a world-class competitor (which I’m not sure is their goal anyway), then there is only one way to go: the embedded/mobile/ultra-low-power segment, whether on PPC or ARM. It is in this segment that AmigaOS has its biggest advantage, because it’s insanely fast and lean, plus in this segment a limited, well-defined hardware platform is the norm.
ARM would probably be best, since it’s seeing tremendous growth right now. Still, PPC isn’t dead yet in the embedded space, either. Witness the Cell–actually, wasn’t there already some talk about a port to it?
Sure, x86 might be nice so you can test it out on your desktop, but that’s what emulators are for, no? AmigaOS is so fast that even in an emulator things are likely to fly.
Edited 2009-10-18 09:17 UTC
I have to agree. A small OS company can’t possibly support all the thousands or millions of hardwares of x86 configurations out there.
If they focus on the PPC or ARM platform, they might find a profitable niche of users.
just because they go x86 doesn’t mean they have to go full support for every piece of crap out there.
look at apple, they’ve decided to only support intel and only really core 2 duo/quad and up.
the big issue will be trying to use any sort of recent graphics card with a working driver. i really don’t see that happening at all unless they get a wrapper going.
Edited 2009-10-18 19:21 UTC
Better to target SoC systems. It’s better for a small OS to be something Windows can never be.
Your comment does bring to mind the fact that x86 is also a player in the SoC arena. Theoretically, Amiga could target a very specific x86-based SoC platform. However, for PPC or x86 to work the use case would have to be set-top boxes, netbooks or the like, as ARM is still the best/only option for the cramped interiors of smaller mobile devices.
Edit: Just did a bit of research and found out that there is indeed at least one PPC-based netbook out there:
http://www.limepc.com/book.shtml
Edited 2009-10-18 23:06 UTC
That’s an interesting find – their UMPC looks rather slick, I bet that would make a great geek alarm clock.
Just keep in mind that 1700MIPS is about as fast as a really low end intel pentium3 processor.
It’s still about the same speed as a SAM440ep or SAM440Flex.
The LimePC has cache coherence issues. Otherwise it WOULD be cool.
But really, all this means is that Hyperion should now be able to spend more time bringing OS4 up to par with Morphos. The presence of two Amiga-like OSes with companies fully able to focus on their development behind them can only be a good thing for both, driving each to strive for better speed and higher hardware and software compatability.
One thing that would be good IMHO would be if Hyperion, the Morphos team and the AROS team were to sit down and hash out a POSIX-like standard that defines the basics of an Amiga-like OS, so that programs written for one could be easily ported to any other. The availablity of more apps would surely help all of them.
In a way such a thing already exists, in the form of the OS 3.1 API. But of course a lot of more modern stuff is missing, which would definitely be good to have in a cross-compatible kind of way.
Even niftier though would be if they open-sourced AmigaOS and merged it with MorphOS. I know it’s a long shot but one can always dream
.
I have long wondered how much the Amiga-like operating systems would slow down once they had to do all the things that modern operating systems had to do.
Memory protection slows down a computer a LOT if it has to process a lot of page faults. That’s why I have higher hopes for AmigaOS 3.x than 4.x. Little or no MMU support and a flat memory model. That’s what it takes to be a fast OS.
If you don’t believe me, try running AmigaOS 4.0 for classics and see if OS 4 running on a 150 MHz PowerPC is any faster than a 50 MHz 68060. I’ll give you a hint: It isn’t. The 68060 will win most of the time because it takes fewer and smaller opcodes to do the same programming and the MMU support costs processor power.
I see I’m starting to repeat myself so I’ll just leave you with these thoughts.
The lack of memory protection makes the operating system simpler and encourages coding applications with high elegance in mind.
I have hopes in AmigaOS-like operating systems.
Indeed, that’s one criticism of Amiga that I’ve never really gotten. The lack of protected memory has always struck me as more of an advantage than a disadvantage, at least for the heavily interactive sort of stuff that Amiga is used for. Yes, in a server context Memory protection can be crucial, but for single user system, proper coding and a good memory allocator WITHOUT “hard” protection make for a much better performing system.
The open-sourced Amiga equivalent is AROS. MorphOS is already based partially on AROS.