From: don@chopin.udel.edu (Donald R Lloyd)
Subject: Re: Amiga OS weaknesses and strengths
Organization: University of Delaware
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 13:46:29 GMT


Hmm... an actual constructive article from MB...

barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N. Barrett) writes:
>   My beef with AmigaOS as a whole is that it seems to be crafted oppositely
>to the MacOS.  The Mac OS is not very pretty under the surface, but is VERY
>elegant on the surface.  The Mac OS on the surface has lots and lots of 
>niceties, big and small. AmigaOS is more elegant under the surface, but is
>almost completely devoid of niceties on the surface.
>
>   Let's face it, on the surface AmigaOS needs lots and lots of work.  The
>Amiga clipboard is almost completely non-functional compared to the Macintosh 
>clipboard.  ConClip needs lots of work to be very useful (it needs to support
>more than just console devices, and needs lots of other fine-tuning; 
>double-clicking on a word should highlight the whole word, for instance.  You
>shouldn't have to drag across the whole word to highlight it).

     There's nothing non-functional about the Amiga clipboard; the problem
is that it's not supported by many applications.  Thankfully, this seems to
be (slooowwwwwlllyyy) changing.
     As for ConClip: we don' need no steenkeeng conclip.  I use Snap.  It
does what you mention above & quite a bit more, including graphics clipping.
I've heard it won't work right with a >6 plane screen on AGA machines, but
other than that it works fine.


>  The Workbench
>has so many problems it needs to be thrown away and replaced.  Box-selecting
>is totally broken.   When you move one icon in a window, all icons in that
>window flash four times for every icon that is moved, the Workbench lacks
>iconic representations of tasks started by the Workbench (both OS/2 and
>Windows have this, and it is nice); except for the rare program that puts an
>AppIcon on the screen, and in this case the AppIcons are mixed with the file
>and directory icons, making everything very confusing to the novice user. 

     I don't particularly _want_ all those icons cluttering up my screen.
I guess it's tough for OS/2 and Windows to mix the process icons with
disk/file icons, since they don't _have_ disk/file icons...
     Granted, a lot of users would probably find this feature useful.  It'd
be rather simple to include an Iconify commodity in the OS.

>CrossDOS is very poorly implemented in 2.1 and 3.0, with a disk in a drive
>having totally different device names depending on whether that disk is in
>AmigaDOS or IBM format.  Also, with CrossDOS enabled, there are almays two
>'disk' icons on the screen for every disk in every drive.  Very, very messy.  

     OK, stick an Amiga disk into a Mac and see how well it copes with it. :)

     In some ways having two device names is a feature, especially for beginners
(or forgetful people) who might not remember or realize whether they've got
an MS-DOS or Amiga disk in the drive.  Likewise with the two-icon 'problem'.
Having the extra icon is annoying, but it does allow WB users to reformat
a DOS disk as an Amiga disk or vice-versa simply by clicking on the appropriate
icon and choosing "Format" from the menus; it allows them to avoid the CLI
for such activities.

[Workbench is so crippled it should be trashed/replaced]

     Well, for the most part, it already has been.  The 1.3 -> 2.0 workbench
upgrade was quite an overhaul.  I used to use the CLI all the time, but
since 2.0 I rarely find myself at a command line, because WB is more than
adequate for most of what I do.  (Although I confess to heavy use of DirOpus
for lots of things).
     I think the best thing CBM could do for the workbench is to continue
improving, refining, and supporting Commodities Exchange.  They should
include a larger variety of Commodities with the OS distribution.  (Did
I hear someone scream, "ToolManager" ?
     Besides, what would you want to replace WB with?  Program Manager?


[stuff deleted about Mac Edit & About menus]

     Many Amiga applications have the features I deleted ;).  The
Style Guide calls for such things, and developers who do a reasonable
job of following it will include them.

>the clipboard.  The Multifinder menu is also always available from any program,
>allowing easy navigating through the Macintosh's approximate equivelent to
>the Amiga's screens.  The Finder is full of little niceties that you hardly
>ever really notice, except when you use something (like the Amiga's
>Workbench) that is devoid of them.  Things such as box-selecting that works
>well (you never have to transfer your attention from the mouse to the
>keyboard to box-select and drag icons).

     Yeah, in that transition between mouse and keyboard I tend to lose
track of what I'm doing and get so confused and frustrated that I turn off
the computer and go look for something to eat.  Not.
     Better drag-select would be nice I guess, but it's not something 
I'm really clamoring for.


> Icons don't flash when they are moved.

     I _believe_ this has been fixed under 3.0.  Could be wrong, though.
I generally do a Show By Name rather than by Icon, so I seldom notice this.

> The Mac's 3-D Look supports the entire 16-Million-color palette on 
>color Macs; the Amiga's 3-D Look still uses a 4096-color palette even on
>AGA Amigas.  Multiple icon sets are available in the system, so that the
>Finder looks great on monochrome Macs, and even better on color Macs; the
>Amiga's stock Workbench icons look horrible in monochrome, and support only
>four colors even on Amigas that can display a 256-color Workbench; the
>Amiga's stock icons are also drawn from a 4096-color palette, and not from
>a 16-million-color palette.

     Agreed here, especially on the icons... CBM really should supply some nicer
looking, more colorful ones in the OS distribution for those who want them.

>   I could go on and on and on.  The Amiga is still a rather ugly child on the
>surface, and is in dire need of some radical cosmetic surgery.  I am basing
>all of this on extensive first-hand experience with AmigaOS 2.1 on an Amiga
>3000.  Some of the problems could be solved with only minor modifications to
>the Amiga OS.  For instance, the last of support by the Workbench for a visual
>record of Workbench-launched tasks could be solved by integrating the main
>Commodities Exchange tool with the Workbench, and making each CX task show up
>on the Workbench screen's root as an icon instead of as a string in a tool's
>window (as it is now).  But many of the other problems (such as the Amiga's
>completely non-functional clipboard) may not be solvable.

    If I want to see what Commodities I have running, I just run CX from my
WB "Tools" menu, as set up with ToolManager.  That's my preferred method of
dealing with them; as I said before, I don't _want_ those icons cluttering
up my Workbench.
     So now you're declaring the clipboard completely non-functional?  Odd,
I seem to remember using it on quite a few occasions.  But MB has spoken.
The clipboard is non-functional, CDTV is dead, and CBM is doomed.  (Or was 
that clipboard doomed, CDTV dead, and CBM non-functional?  Whatever.)

>   But, all in all, Commodore needs to pay *MUCH* more atrention to the 
>surface details.  As the Macintosh has shown, what's under the surface does 
>not matter as much if the outside looks really good.
>

     The main "surface detail" CBM needs to pay attention to is getting a
working RTG standard out there so we can supplement the native chipset
with a wide variety of 3rd party graphics boards and still be able to run
most of our existing software.


-- 
Don Lloyd                / "No, I just think that a computer grafted on top of \
don@chopin.udel.edu      | another computer is a kludge.  It has nothing to do |
GeNIE: D.LLOYD7          \ with the Intel CPU"  - Jerry Shekhel                /
BIX: DRL