| Just got back from the SIGgraph Invitational, and it was well worth it.
The first two 'demos' were fairly interesting, but I was mainly
interested in seeing the X windows.
Dale had 2 Amigas set up on ethernet, both running TCP/IP. One
was a straight 2500, the other was a 2500UX with a 68030 in it.
He wasn't hurting for power. Both were running X.
In fact, the 2500 was running 2 X servers, one a soon to be
released black-n-white X11r3, the other a full color version.
It was running several local clients, and a remote client on
the 2500UX. This was a very impressive demonstration of the
Amiga's multitasking and graphics ability. Dale pointed out
that the Amiga was the _only_ machine that could run 2 servers,
each in a seperate screen along with the resident OS. (ie.
AmigaDOS/Workbench) Someone asked (rather tongue in cheek )
whether the Mac II could do such a thing, and the answer was
a resounding "No chance!".
One of the clients was a rotating geometric figure that was
done in wire frame and full hidden line removal. Dale then
showed the code for another client (Plaid?) with the full
DEC copyright notice at the beginning. He then compiled it,
linked it, and it ran flawlessly. Very fast in a color
X screen, and *_very_* fast in another single bitplane screen.
The two X systems had different window managers, and
provided different looks and interfaces regarding icons
and menus. He also showed a IFF 'snapshot' of an Amiga
running Motif clients from a Sequent machine. Very sharp!
Obviously the 020 and 030 machines really fly, but I got the
impression that a basic 1 meg system would make a very slick
X terminal. Another meg would allow you to run several
local clients. The custom chips really add a lot of performance
to such a graphics intensive piece of software.
I was very impressed.
I would think that with the addition of a full Xlib in about
2 months, the Amiga could become a serious contender for
a low cost X workstation. I don't know if Unix for the Amiga
will ever be as big as Commodore hopes, but the X system could
be the ticket to 'respect'.
Dale also talked about the formation of an Amiga networking
consortium, to set standards for running different protocols
over different physical mediums. It's the eventual goal
to be able to run any supported protocol ( TCP/IP, DECnet, OSI... )
over any transport ( Ethernet, Serial, ...). Now that would
really be the icing on the cake.
Talking to a Commodore Unix engineer before the show, he said
that Unix is still a way's away. As a system it obviously
runs well enough right now to support X, but needs quite
a bit more. In their testing, a Commodore built 030 has
been performing about 35% better than a NeXt machine. Much less
overhead it seems.
Well, I could go on, but I'm rather tired. Besides other people
might like to blab a little bit also. I hope everyone else
is as exicited about this as I am. Real good stuff.
Steve
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| Steve did a good summary of the X window stuff.
>Someone asked (rather tongue in cheek )
>whether the Mac II could do such a thing, and the answer was
>a resounding "No chance!"
Actually the reply was more like, "I don't think a VAX can even do that!"
hmm...
Dale said he would announce the "Native Developers Kit" (or some name like that)
with XLIB etc., today at Siggraph. Since the development is going along so fast
and because he wants people to be able to do full X-Windows development on the
Amiga, he thinks it will beat Color X-Windows out the door. Also Color X will
probably replace the current monochrome X with upgrade policies.
Dale joked about testing out the Amiga C compilers by running 20? meg of
code through for the developers kit. He said he needed Aztec for their Make,
and Lattice for the ANSI compatiblity. He alluded to finding a number of
bugs in Lattice, that they are now fixing.
Martin Hash presented a new animation module that lets you add sound to
animations. It will work with their products, DeluxePaint III and I guess
anything that uses the PD Display program. It looked pretty friendly, and
supports SMPTE sychronization if that is important. It is graphic oriented
using a time line, horizontal bar "Gantt chart" approach.
The other presenter failed to get his Amiga to targa board deal to work.
It is working at the Commodore/Siggraph booth, I guess. The product uses
the bridgeboard with a targa board (up to 24 bit) attached, and runs the
PC as a "dumb server, something PC's do best". The product then converts
all kinds of different graphics formats back and forth "on the fly"
The presenter/comnpany president used to work for ASDG and seemed to know
what he was talking about. He said you can use the product with a scanner
and slide maker to produce slides from all the pobular graphics formats.
I don't know all the buzz words for this process so I hope what I said
makes some sense. The producet "mumbleIMAGEmumble" looked flexible and is
clearly designed for a business not specifically tied to Amiga users.
Thats about it for me.
Dave
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