Hyperion Entertainment Message Boards

Rigo wrote:Sure, we've got a spare 30 minutes, let's see what we can rustle up

Simon

I ll give you more than that, would be satisfied with few months progress (so we loose the few weeks more ...)

Well, as much as I hate to disappoint, I think you'll be waiting a lot longer than that.

We all know there are a lot of shortcomings in AmigaOS, it hasn't really had any serious TLC for many years, and the lack of developers is not helping that either. Simply wishing for features like the ones you have suggested will not magically make them appear. The filesystem alone would take months, if not years to get to a releasable state and be reliable enough to protect your precious data, even with the recent internal changes to make this stuff easier. It just isn't going to happen overnight.

Printing is something that would take a dedicated team a year to get releasable, and that's having access to all the relevant specs for these modern printers (many of which are "Windows" printers).

The only real way to make these kind of wishes come true is to install the SDK, and go hunting for the information needed, and get stuck in.

With more developers comes more software. The current AmigaOS developers have enough on their plate with trying to keep up to date with stuff already included in the OS, let alone adding any more to the list.
That said, don't let this sound negative, work is ongoing to improve the situation, but there is only so much that can realistically be done with so few developers working on core components. It would be great if we could all code full-time for AmigaOS and get paid for it, but that is another thing to add to the "wish-list".

Simon

I'd go for a compromise with printers...just like it has already been done in regard to gfx cards.

Why not simply support (only) those printers (with updated drivers) that understand PCL/Postscript?
iirc Postscript (at least) documents are available!?

nbache and some others confirmed that PS printers work with (limited features) with the available PS driver.

That way probably one(?) person could dedicate his/her precious time to update the Postscript driver available in AmigaOS4.

vox wrote:http://os4depot.net/index.php?function= ... pr_dev.lha

Thanks Niels, this means printing to a PC via network, not directly to a printer connected to Amiga.

Not a PC, the printer itself has an NIC built in and gets its own IP address on the LAN. It's becoming more and more common.

Best regards,

Niels

Raziel wrote:nbache and some others confirmed that PS printers work with (limited features) with the available PS driver.

That way probably one(?) person could dedicate his/her precious time to update the Postscript driver available in AmigaOS4.

I'm not sure what "limitied features" means; I haven't come across any obvious limitations myself. What features are you missing?

Best regards,

Niels

@chris

I might be wrong, but I think the only OS that support NTFS are Windows and Linux. Microsoft obviously have the specification for Windows, and Linux is the haven of open source and reverse engineering.

Macos have by default support of read NTFS too (type in google "macos ntfs"), and with some "trick" enable via standard drivers to have writing too. They even have different kind of realizations which come from 3d party devs (on one of them morphos implementation based btw, check link below). Also all those oses like beos and solaris support it, but Imho Its enough to know for us that NTFS for Linux based on open source and revere engineering. We know how many users linuxes have, so we can be sure its good enough.

Everybody else still uses FAT, so unless you're actually sharing a USB hard-drive with Windows, there's no need for NTFS anyway.

Different users use different. I for sure use FAT only because os4 didn't have NTFS support, and if there will be NTFS i will use it. All my USB sticks are NTFS based for all of my most tasks, and some time i specially need to reformat it to FAT, just because os4 does not support NTFS. Not saying that "everybody else still uses FAT" is "a bit" wrong imho, because for example all the ppls i know in RL, use NTFS on their win* machines (what mean that when i want to share something with them, i suck up with FAT).

This is probably best left to third party developers.

Yep, why not. For example, there even some success (with sources) of NTFS support already done for mos: http://blubbedev.net/filesysbox/
It have some limitations for now (small ones), but in end it works, and can be ported to os4 by someone who know the stuff. It still will be "3d party", but whatever it called, if it will works, then its enough.

nbache wrote:

Raziel wrote:nbache and some others confirmed that PS printers work with (limited features) with the available PS driver.

That way probably one(?) person could dedicate his/her precious time to update the Postscript driver available in AmigaOS4.

I'm not sure what "limitied features" means; I haven't come across any obvious limitations myself. What features are you missing?

Best regards,

Niels

I am hoping that updated PS/PCL printer drivers might support the new/enhanced/added features of todays printers.
While i still use a HP LaserJet 5L (no PS) i'm pretty sure development on those printers didn't stop...e.g. higher resolution, color, duplex etc

kas1e wrote:Not saying that "everybody else still uses FAT" is "a bit" wrong imho

When I said that I meant other devices - digital cameras and the like - all use FAT.

@Raziel

The main problem with HP printers is that our usbprinter.device doesn't have Dot4 support.
Most HP printers support PCL5 or PostScript, both of which are supported by our existing drivers.

chris wrote:@Raziel

The main problem with HP printers is that our usbprinter.device doesn't have Dot4 support.
Most HP printers support PCL5 or PostScript, both of which are supported by our existing drivers.

There is a dot4 usb printer driver on the depot, iirc, couldn't that be incorporated into the available usb printer driver.

And actually i don't have the (USB) problem rigtht now as i'm using my printer through the net, like nbache, using lpr or rather netprinter.device.

I don't quite understand when it comes to PS/PCL printer drivers...if PS is supported then "thats it"? There is nothing more a PS driver could be teached to do, like duplex print (on/off), maybe even copy/scan from a MuFu?
Do i understand it correctly that a PS printer driver simply creates the data so that a PS compatible printer understands it and sends it off?
Every other feature (duplex, use of higher dpi etc.) has to go into another part of a printer driver?