Re: [ql-users] The reality...
Wolfgang Lenerz wrote: Phew! I just came back from holoday, and there were 191 message in this list over a 2 weeks period! Who said the QL was dead? Drat, he didn't tell me whoever it was! -- Dilwyn Jones [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.soft.net.uk/dj/index.html
Re: [ql-users] The reality...
On 8 Jan 2002, at 18:23, Thierry Godefroy wrote: Welcome back Wolf, and happy new year to you ! Thanks, and the same to you. How is Qling in the indian ocean going? Nobody... ;-) Ah, you just don't listen to the Cassandras... Wolfgang - www.wlenerz.com
Re: [ql-users] The reality...
Hi all, Phew! I just came back from holoday, and there were 191 message in this list over a 2 weeks period! Who said the QL was dead? Wolfgang - www.wlenerz.com
Re: [ql-users] The reality...
On Sat, 5 Jan 2002 at 01:32:00, Dexter wrote: (ref: [EMAIL PROTECTED]) On Sat, 5 Jan 2002, Tony Firshman wrote: Even better, in our conversation I talked about superHermes. That is (as you Dexter may not know) a plug in replacement for the 8749. Yes, I visited your site and looked at the Hermes and SuperHermes. The pic shows a very nice and useful board. It solves a problem I hadn't even begun to address - standard keyboard support. (Ok, I haven't begun to address any of the problems yet; I'm still counting them ;) 8301 is a good project if you want a hobbyist addon for the QL. It is a very fragile chip, and is one I still sell a lot of. I am nearing the end of the pile though. A plug-in replacement, and it would probably be only one or two logic chips, should have extended screen and colour support under SMSQ/E Are you at all open to licensing? :o) Possibly not - the code is very much an integral part of the 17C44 code written by Laurence Reeves, and still owned (and understood) by him alone. lausATlausDOT demonDOTcoDOTuk -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:257/67) +44(0)1442-828255 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.firshman.demon.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] The reality... and other things
On Sat, 5 Jan 2002 at 01:06:39, ZN wrote: (ref: [EMAIL PROTECTED]) It's nice to see the group being so active once again, though I have to confess I'm actually postponing an email to my family just to answer this (hopefully the won't disown me if they ever find out :-) ). [Replacement hardware] Dave wrote: The attraction of the QL for me is manyfold: SuperBASIC is exquisite. Device independence is simple. Everything is easy. If it were possible to port QDOS to a different architecture, and retain everything good about QDOS, it would have been done already. This is exactly what it's all about. Actually, a true port of SMSQDOS is probably impossible as much of it's efficiency comes from it being form-fitted to a 68k CPU. Assuming a huge amount of work is undertaken, it would probably be possible to make large amounts of code native to some other CPU (and of course, some would be far more suitable than others!) but a certain amount of emulation would always remain. Market situation however dictates only one single solution if we are looking at a desktop QL - a cheap PC. It's the only way to make the thing cost effective. If one would want to make it a SBC, embedded system, or portable, then the situation becomes somewhat different. Using a PC for emulation might be cheap, but is hardly efficient. Keep this in mind: the emulation hardware needs 100W of power to do what original hardware does with 10W or less - and not at a signifficantly higher price, I might add. For something like a SBC or embedded application, this is of paramount importance. You definitely won't be dragging an Athlon PC around instead of something that fits in your pocket! Stuart Honeyball and I seriously considered an SBC .. well something approaching it. We called it IBOX. The core was a 68020 running QDOS (Minerva was our thought). It then linked to a logic chip and PIC to handle I/O. We primarily thought of analogue/digital/I2C and RS232 serial. The box though would maybe have a small LCD screen and certainly a keyboard interface, but with a small keypad built in. It was planned to do everything that a QL could, subject to hardware. Applications could be developed and tested on a QL and then downloaded. I even got to the stage of building a prototype with 1mb ram/processor/16C74a/Lattice logic chip. I have it in front of me - partly wired up. I even chose a potential case - which was 70 x 45 x 10 mm with two 9D serial ports (one for chaining to other IBOXs) and a 37D for I/O. Stuart lost interest though and I couldn't find anyone else to carry it on. Leon Heller (Quanta founder) even got involved after Stuart but he has retired (a la Tebby) to a pad in the Loire Valley. It cost him all of about £35,000 I think, and sounds an amazing place. Right at the end of the negotiations his solicitor said there was a problem. The deeds showed vast grounds including a forest, and the seller wanted to include them with the deal. 'Not on - I haven't the money' said Leon 'No - at no cost' was the reply. He was last to be seen driving his ancient Volvo with trailer and motorbike and possessions in tow. What it is to be single and free. PCI instead of ISA on Q40/Q60 would give you: *No* expandability under QDOS/SMS at all. There are PCI chips that would fit almost gluelessly into the Q40/Q60 designs. They reason I didn't use them, is not complexity of hardware design. PCI doesn't make any sense for QDOS/SMS if you are a little bit realistic about software development. At the same time the boards would be more expensive and harder to manufacture in our small quantities. I wholeheartedly agree. PCI is possible - just like almost any other 'widely used, well documented' bus. The problem is that there is hardly anyone capable of writing a driver for hardware tailor-made for the QL, let alone hardware that plugs into the 'widely used well documented' bus in general - and that is, almost as a rule, NOT well documented. Yep. When we designed the sH keyboard interface we had enormous difficulties choosing which of three protocols to use, and then getting the hardware to consistently work. We, of course, did not have the standard hardware interface, and that was the main problem. I even got to talk to a Cherry engineer, mainly because they actually had a comprehensive datasheet. He refused to tell me anything - it took 2 of our engineers 9 months to work around the bugs, and we won't share that with anyone. It took Laurence and I a bit less than that, but we haven't covered all the options (8-)# Tony Tebby (the person mentioned in the snipped section above) loves to tell the story of how it took him a week in the early stages of the QXL to get FORMAT to work - bugs again. Nasta knows the problems Phil Borman had with Qubide. I remember the advice in Zorland C on the PC back in 1986 - never use the built in serial port drivers. The PC is a horrendous mishmash of work-arounds - or was in the past. --
Re: [ql-users] The reality... and other things
snip fonts. Another possibility is the PDA like devices. Tony Tebby himself had ideas along these lines, with a neat concept called the ATAB. Which, BTW would be well worth investing some design ime into... Nasta Arnould Nazarian gave me some insight into this at QL2000 and it was a very interesting and potentially quite viable concept with the right backing. -- Dilwyn Jones [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.soft.net.uk/dj/index.html
Re: [ql-users] The reality...
Hi Arnould, Schools are very risk averse, and a difficult market to sell into. They have many special needs: high durability, long live, unbreakable, cheap, cheap or zero cost upgrade cycles, and transparent (to clearly show the principles being taught. In my mind, schools are not the market. Parents would be the market for a toy based on the QL. As I already wrote, 95% of these toys would end in a dustbin 2 months afther after Christmas, but in the 5 remaining percent of there would be new QL users for the future. Arnould
[ql-users] The reality...
Hi again, all... I've come to understand the reality of the QL scene as it now stands. It didn't take long, did it? :o) Basically, the marketplace is too small to be economically viable. There are not resources to fund development of significant new hardware on a fully commercial basis. People with skills basically support the system by donating their time and skills, and developing wonderful boards like the Q40, and Q60, but I'm sure those people will be first to say it doesn't support a business... Usually, one or two particularly devout and enthusiastic hobbyists step forward and take up the banner (that would be the Tony Firshmans and Q60 designers of the world) but they don't make a profit - particularly if they take into account the time they spend on it. At this point, most groups of users usually disperse or disband. What does it take to reverse this state of fortune? You have to revive the marketplace, or generate a new marketplace that's ideally suited to those users. It has to be able to generate income. It has to have lots of users that are willing to spend lots of money... How would you do that? You have to have hardware or software so compelling, people simply have to buy it. It also has to look like, or share a major characteristic with the original products. That's a tough target, but not impossible... The Q60 is about as close to that as you can get without shaving your head and shouting I'm Clive!, it's just really expensive because of the small production runs... They must have spent *months* working on it just to sell a few units. True love ;) Anyway, enough rambling... Dave
Re: [ql-users] The reality...
On Fri, 4 Jan 2002 at 20:56:34, Dexter wrote: (ref: [EMAIL PROTECTED]) Hi again, all... I've come to understand the reality of the QL scene as it now stands. It didn't take long, did it? :o) Basically, the marketplace is too small to be economically viable. There are not resources to fund development of significant new hardware on a fully commercial basis. People with skills basically support the system by donating their time and skills, and developing wonderful boards like the Q40, and Q60, but I'm sure those people will be first to say it doesn't support a business... Usually, one or two particularly devout and enthusiastic hobbyists step forward and take up the banner (that would be the Tony Firshmans and Q60 designers of the world) but they don't make a profit - particularly if they take into account the time they spend on it. Hear hear hear hear hear hear hear - very nice to 'see' someone who fully understands the position of the 'traders' in the QL scene now. I make a whopping loss simply on costs, but that includes the US trips. Mind you I had a caller the other day looking for 200 8049s - I popped up near the top of a Google search. Do you have any? Yes I replied, but you won't want them. He had already guessed I only had programmed QL versions. He did know about 8749s - but couldn't find any. I went to my usual supplier (non-catalogue) and he got them and 200 2732s for a very good price. I made more in that deal, which took 20 minutes than in the last seven years of QL trading - seriously. ... so QL trading does have some side benefits. Even better, in our conversation I talked about superHermes. That is (as you Dexter may not know) a plug in replacement for the 8749. It emerged when I met them yesterday with the chips, that they are thinking positively about a plug in board, so that they can sample food density more quickly (yes that is what the machine does) and link with a PC. It looks like I will be getting the job. -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:257/67) +44(0)1442-828255 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.firshman.demon.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] The reality...
On Sat, 5 Jan 2002, Tony Firshman wrote: Even better, in our conversation I talked about superHermes. That is (as you Dexter may not know) a plug in replacement for the 8749. Yes, I visited your site and looked at the Hermes and SuperHermes. The pic shows a very nice and useful board. It solves a problem I hadn't even begun to address - standard keyboard support. (Ok, I haven't begun to address any of the problems yet; I'm still counting them ;) Are you at all open to licensing? :o) Dave
Re: [ql-users] The reality... and other things
First, let me say that I'll be briefer than Nasta in my comments. I see the whole QL/QDOS/SMSQ/E really comes down to hardware. Software really does not break, but eventually, hardware will. Granted my original QL (bought in 1986) is still working, eventually it will have some sort of hardware problem. There are two approaches to solving this hardware problem: 1 - QDOS-native hardware (like Q40) 2 - Other hardware with emulation (like QPC or uQLx) Approach 1 is better and more efficient, but it can be costly and hard to implement. Approach 2 is less efficient, but it can be cheaper and easier to do. The future of the QL world should be in the coordination of both approaches. I'd like to see a time when SMSQ/E will run exactly the same, no matter the platform it's running on. I'd like to see color drivers on the Q40, QPC, and uQLx to behave the same (same modes work the same way). Storage on HD can differ from platform, but how they read floppies and CD's should all be the same. Access to networking should be the same. Sitting a user down to either one of these systems, they should not be able to see a difference. The approach each QL user will depend on what they like. Personally, I like to run in a pure QL world and I bought a Q40. When I feel like I have some extra cash, I might buy QPC. I'd like to see the Q40 become the standard hardware solution for the future. It has a lot of potential and it's already done. I'd like to see both QPC and uQLx move closer in how the behave and move toward emulating how the Q40 behaves. Granted uQLx depends more on QDOS than SMSQ/E, but getting SMSQ/E to be Open Source is another rant. We can all sit around and talk about the future and they way it should go, but actually making it happen takes work. I commend developers of the Q40, QPC, and uQLx. They put actions behind their words. As a great procrastinator, I appreciate how much effort goes into taking an idea and turning it into a reality. I'm not trying to step on anybody's toes. If somebody else want's to design more QL hardware, for what ever reason, I would not try to stop them, I'm must expressing my opinion. In an example of how not to do it, I'm spending my days playing with both Linux and IRIX systems. Even though they are both Unix systems, I have to translate the differences of where configuration files are ( is that /etc/inetd.d or /etc/xinetd.d). To make matters even worse, different Linux distributions put config files in different places. So a Linux book written about Slackware does not translate 100% to Red Hat or Mandrake or Suse or . (and don't get me started on different Fibre Channel switches and different RAID boxes). As I said, this is all just my opinion. I really does not matter until I actually turn it into action. Tim Swenson
