====================================================================== ________ _________ ____ _|__ __ __|_______ _________ __\ _____ \\\\ \_ _/ //___// _____//______\ _____ \\ // \\\\ /. \\\\__ \/ __// \\ \\____. /// \\\\ /. \\ \\___\¯ /___///___\ /___\ \\_________//\\___\¯ /___// ¯ \/ ¯ ¯ \. |¯ ¯|z!o ¯ ¯ \ ¯ A M I G A |#011130 | U P D A T E |________| "SO THE WORLD MAY KNOW" ====================================================================== AMIGA and the Amiga logo are trademarks of Amiga, Inc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G A O N E A N D O S 4 . 0 - S T A T U S M O R E C L A R I F I C A T I O N F R O M R E D H O U S E A N D T H I S F R O M C Z E C H A M I G A N E W S G O O D B Y E C L U B B E D , H E L L O T O T A L A M I G A D O N ' T F O R G E T " T H E N E W A M I G A N S " A M I G B G 2 0 0 2 A N N O U N C E D A M I G A E X P O 2 0 0 2 N E W E S T P A G E S T R E A M A N N O U N C E D D I G I T A L U N I V E R S E N E W P R I C E W A R P 3 D F O R A M I G A D E A M I G A F O R E V E R 5 . 0 R E L E A S E D C L O A N T O O N E M U L A T I O N A M I A T L A S 6 A V A I L A B L E P H O T O F O L I O 2 . 2 F R O M S T E E P L E M U I S E C U R I T Y H O L E E X P L A I N E D Editor's Thoughts and Introduction: Lots of news this month, some of it very confusing. We received letters from readers wondering what in the heck was happening to Amiga OS4, AmigaOne, and Amiga in general. We've rounded up the most informative items we could find and lead off the issue with them. We contacted Amiga but got the standard answer of "we don't respond to rumors, please see our web page". That's actually not a bad policy but at this point there's nothing on the web page to address any of these items in detail, so what we have below is all we know. There's also a scare with a security issue in MUI. We have the annoucement below. It's pretty thorough and a very competent exposition. While some of the language used might make some readers think it's less than professional, we suggest all users of MUI review it despite the writing style. It's probably a good idea to check with Aminet or vendors of susceptible software for fixes. Interestingly, Stefan Stuntz, author of MUI, seems to re-emerged into the Amiga scene. He's posted to the MUI mailing list concerning handling existing pending registrations (many have been unprocessed for months according to some who have tried to register) and a new upgrade. More information as we obtain it. Finally, there seem to be feuds cropping up again in our community. Amiga and MorphOS apparently have agreed to have nothing to do with each other. We don't think this is of tremendous import for the Amiga's future and doubt anyone will remember this a few years from now. Of more interest to us is the seeming rift between H&P and Cloanto, two sound and important Amiga companies. We have Cloanto's thoughts below and would be happy to run a well written response should one become available. Ah well, it's never dull in our little community, is it? Brad ---------------------------------------------------------------------- E-mail to the E-ditor: 2 Nov 2001 >On the 24th, Mick Tinker announced the end of the ill-fated Boxer >Project... So that's it? What are the details? If you mentioned this before, and I missed it! What abouit the people who pre-paid Anti-Gravity for one?? {No name} ~~~~~~ Sorry, we've run all the details that we have at this time. Anyone out there have anything to add to this story? Brad ====== 3 Nov 01 Brad, Thanks! You are performing a vital service, with so few Amiga-specific news avenues around. I'm a member of the Sacramento Amiga Computer Club's Board of Directors, and you've already been notified of this by someone else on the Board, please disregard my message: AmiWest 2001 is rolling! The only all-Amiga show on the U.S. West Coast is gearing up for July 28-29, 2001. It will be held in Sacramento California and Amiga will be there, so make your plans to attend now! Please visit the www.sacc.org website for more information. Thanks! --Bruce Duncan ~~~~~~ Bruce, Thank you for the kind words. We'll be here as long as there's a reason. We're pleased to hear the show is going on and look forward to providing details to the readers. Brad ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G A O N E A N D O S 4 . 0 - S T A T U S 30 Oct. 2001 from Eyetech It's nearly November and the AmigaOne is due to go on sale at the WoA-SE in London, England on November 3rd 201 - right? No, we're sorry but the AmigaOne wont be on sale until the New Year. Is this the ultimate disaster to befall the Amiga community? Is the AmigaOne another Boxer? Is this the real end of Amiga as we know it? Certainly not. Before you rush out and declare that Nostradamus was right in his predictions about the Amiga all along please take a few minutes to read the inside story of what has really been going on behind the scenes with the AmigaOne and OS4.0 development and why, despite all the odds, it is actually all going to happen very soon. Amiga Inc took over the Amiga intellectual property (IP) in December 1999, at the very height of the dot.com boom - and Amiga Inc, although not a dot.com company themselves, were very much part of the technology sector. They easily got their first round of funding - but when they needed more cash 8 months later - and as predicted in their original business plan - technology companies were about as fashionable as British beef. Even the most sensible, conservative business plans from proven companies in the technology sector failed to raise any significant cash. What is more, not only were the venture capitalists unwilling to invest but, in many cases they themselves were also fighting for survival (and this included one of Amiga's and TAO's main backers). Bill McEwen has never made any secret about how tight things were financially at his widely reported banquet speeches at St Louis and Sacramento this year. To their enormous credit Amiga Inc have not only managed to survive the last 14 months on not much more than fresh air, but they have managed to deliver some - though not all - of what they intended in terms of technology and some high profile contracts. Remarkably they have also managed to befriend some significant new investors - Amiga's future is now looking very positive. But in order to survive on a very tight budget finance spending has to be prioritised very carefully - in todays financial climate potential investors are only interested in very lean companies that think at least 20 times before committing to any expenditure. Amiga's clear priority was (and is) making the Amiga DE a success which inevitably meant that OS4's funding had to take second place. And OS4.0 is fundamental to the AmigaOne. Unlike Amiga, Eyetech is privately financed. That means that our resources are based on past profits, and we are not set up to raise funding from venture capitalists or the public. On the plus side it means that we can take decisions quickly without investors painstakingly examining every facet of our business. The downside is that one big mistake could be disastrous for the company and our employees. Our funding of the development of the AmigaOne project was a calculated risk, but one we believed would pay us an adequate return in the medium term. We went into this venture with our eyes wide open, knowing the risks associated with the two main program dependencies which were, to a greater or lesser extent, outside our control. The first was Escena's ability to develop the custom chipsets needed for the AmigaOne. And the second was Amiga Inc's ability to deliver OS4.0 by the time the hardware was ready to go into production. It is true that we had some early setbacks with the hardware development. This was mainly with the AmigaOne's PCB layout, which was not strictly speaking within Escena's field of expertise, but which was so inextricably linked with the custom chip design that putting it out to subcontract would have been both counterproductive and very expensive. And why, whilst we are on the subject, did we decide that a custom chipset was necessary in the first place? There were, and are still, three compelling reasons. o No suitable PPC north/southbridge chipsets were available in small (less than 100k production quantities) when we started the project. o Such chipsets even when available (in 1000's quantities) only have a supply cycle measured in months before being superceded. This would have made any small volume design based on such chips obsolete virtually immediately it was completed. o Without a complete rewrite of the Amiga OS - rather than an incremental porting as with the whole OS4.x strategy - the ability to access the classic Amiga chipset was essential, and no commercial chipset could have provided such a bridge. This has also been quite complex to implement, but is based on pre-tested core modules which form the core of Escena's expertise. However in May this year, although some work had already started on OS4.0 it became clear that the Amiga Inc's had other priorities for the limited funding that they had available - that is for the DE development. This meant that the funding that was needed from Amiga Inc to finish OS4.0 was not available on schedule and this was starting to have a material effect on its development timeframe. Hope was still high that funding would be imminent, but venture capitalists do not make investment decisions lightly or quickly in the wake of a tech stock melt down. Without a guaranteed delivery time we, Eyetech, effectively suspended the development of the AmigaOne pending a resolution of the OS4.0 developments. Escena in the meantime undertook some mission-critical (and far better paid) contract work for some internationally renowned blue chip companies. And just to make it absolutely clear, I have absolutely no issues with Amiga Inc's decisions in allocating their priorities in this way - I would have done exactly the same in their position. Similarly the decision to suspend the AmigaOne development was ours, and ours alone. Since then we have been working hard with Amiga Inc to seek a practical resolution to the development of OS4.0. After many months, and more than a few dead ends we have finally worked out a tripartite agreement between ourselves, Amiga Inc and Hyperion. This allows the development of OS4.0 to start immediately - and at no upfront cost to Amiga Inc - whilst allowing them to build on the work done in OS4.0 for the development of OS4.2 and beyond. As well as guaranteeing a path to allow the AmigaOne development to be finished and for it to go into production, it also gives an absolute guarantee of the development of the operating system for the AmigaOne beyond OS4.0. And as part of this agreement Hyperion will also be releasing OS4.0 for the CyberStormPPC accelerator for the A3/4000, which must be this years best news for owners of these Big Box Amigas. Of course Hyperion are not developing OS4.0 alone, rather they are heading a consortium of well known and respected Amiga developers, including Haage & Partner, the Picasso96 team, Matay, Olaf Barthel and many others. So the best news of all is that this agreement - which will finally and unequivocally fix the path forward for Classic Amiga owners everywhere - will be signed this weekend at the London-based WoA-SE show on 3rd November. It has taken many hours of negotiation to sort out the details, but now it is in place the last major hurdle to the Next Generation Amiga has been overcome. All parties are now working flat out once more to ensure that OS4.0 and the AmigaOne can now be launched in tandem early in the New Year. Thank you all for your patience and understanding. Alan M Redhouse Managing Director, Eyetech Group Ltd. http://www.eyetech.co.uk/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- M O R E C L A R I F I C A T I O N F R O M R E D H O U S E Posted to ANN by Alan Redhouse on 31-Oct-2001 14:23:01 In reply to Comment 89 (Mike Veroukis): Mike Veroukis said in comment 89: "It does not clearly state when EyeTech suspended development of the AmigaOne. It simply states when they felt Amiga Inc was in trouble. To assume that they stopped development the instant they saw a sign of danger is jumping the gun a bit. Take special note of the "Hope was still high..." comment. They may have given Amiga Inc a grace period of a few months, perhaps assuming that Amiga Inc could pull through. Infact, it's quite possible the OS4.0 developers continued on for some time after May before halting. Infact, the date OS4.0 development was halted could have been very close to the date that H&P released that infamous statement that started a huge flame war here a couple of months ago. In fact this timing fits perfectly well with some theories as to when development actually stopped. To simply assume everything fell apart in May and Amiga Inc has lied to the community for months is a bit of a reach. The quote above does not clearly state or imply this. " Mike is correct. I try to use the clearest possible English in the status update but I have obviously failed to get the message across properly to everybody :( Nowhere in my update does it say that OS4.0 had not started - and of course quite a lot of work has been done - but that the original plan required funding for OS4.0 to be FINISHED, and Amiga Inc had other priorities with their restricted funding. Bill has made no secret of the financial constraints that Amiga Inc were under at his public presentations at St Louis and Sacramento this year. What I said is that WE decided to put development of the A1 on ice UNTIL we had a guarantee of a FINISH date of OS4.0. Of course development did not suddenly halt immediately, as we were all expecting Amiga Inc to obtain funding 'any day now'. But eventually other revenue-earning priorities took over. I have absolutely no difficulties with any of Amiga's decisions or actions. They are exactly the same sort of business decisions that I would have made in their position. We went into the AmigaOne project with our eyes wide open knowing the risks associated with events outside our control, and in no way hold Amiga Inc responsible for OUR decision to suspend development of the A1. In fact - again as I said in our update - we have all been trying very hard to obtain an all round satisfactory resolution to an OS4.0 completion date that would allow us to complete the A1 development and roll out into production. And no, there is no point in announcing that a potential crisis exists whilst there is still very real progress towards a resolution being made. We obtained the agreement in principle earlier this week. This obtained, I wanted to set the record straight immediately to dispel some of the rumours and make sure that nobody made long journeys to WoA-SE on false expectations. As it is WoA-SE attendees will witness an historic contract signing. Much of OS4.0 was planned to be implemented using the CSPPC in parallel with the development of the AmigaOne hardware. The decision to expand the market for OS4.0 was an integral part of the 'no upfront cost to Amiga' part of the agreement. Hope this helps Alan http://www.ann.lu {If you haven't looked at this site, you owe it to yourself to do so! Brad} ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A N D T H I S F R O M C Z E C H A M I G A N E W S AmigaOne ML 5 November, 2001 AmigaOS 4.0 contract signed "Yes the contract was signed - and yes it was the real contract, not just a mockup for publicity reasons" - Alan, Eyetech CEO Alan explained that the contract gave Eyetech, Hyperion, H+P etc the right to develop os4.0. Amiga Inc will then take control of the OS back for a 'consideration'. Ben Hermlans, Hyperion: "'Consideration' is a legal term used in the contract law of common law countries such as the UK and the US. It refers to the benefit (money, action, transfer of property etc.) one contractual party can hope to receive from the other." Ben Hermlans, Hyperion: "Stop whining please and get your ass to the Cologne show [..] reserve judgement until that date." 6 November, 2001 AmigaOS4 Project Management Fleecy Moss: "Amiga is in control of OS4.0 - we have merely outsourced the project management. I am in daily contact with Hyperion and a feature document and deadlines and timescales are mulled over in minute detail." "As I explained at the show, this deal is more about freeing Amiga up to work on the SGA (Second Generation Amiga). AmigaOS4.0 was always more to do with getting a PPC based OS working on very specific PPC HW, and we were wasting a lot of time bouncing backwards and forwards. With the outsourcing agreement, the implementation has been moved much closer to the first piece of HW itself." 18 November,2001 AmigaOS 4 News From WOA 2001 Hyperion and H&P acquired the license to the AmigaOS4 PPC. With the support of many developers (with H&P and Hyperion as a core team) the OS step for step is transferred. First the TCP/IP stack, EXEC and FFS2 and there will be possibly a new LIBRARY concept. o Memory protection is limited at the beginning. o New Warp3D (now with Matrox, Permedia3 and Radeon 1/2 support) o Generic PCI driver for different PCI boards. o USB Support. o New TCP/IP stack ('Roadshow'). o Picasso96 as standard in a PPC native version. o Is to run on all Amigas with PPC, whereby the Blizzard of the performance could make problems. o 68k-Emulation (JIT version) is integrated. o AmigaDE will be added. o Java is to also come (however not directly with the first version) o price: approximately like Amiga OS V3.5 or V3.9. o Amiga ZorroII and ZorroIII cards are to be supported. o PPC Datatypes. o AHI for sound. Aspired date for completion is February 2002. In related news, Hyperion said that the release of OS 4 is not dependant on the release of the AmigaOne. Hyperion also told that they've been talking with both Elbox and BPlan and that there will be versions of AmigaOS 4 for the SharkPPC and Pegasos. http://amiga.realdreams.cz/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- G O O D B Y E C L U B B E D , H E L L O T O T A L A M I G A 7 November, 2001 South Essex Amiga Link is happy to confirm the announcements about our future plans for Clubbed magazine made at the World of Amiga South East Show on the 3rd of November. In the next few months we plan to make two major improvements to the magazine: A New Name From issue 10 "Total Amiga" will be the new name for Clubbed magazine, we hope that this name better reflects the fact that we are a general Amiga magazine and will encourage new readers to give us a try. Along with the new name the magazine will have an extensive redesign but will retain the essential feature of Clubbed, honest down-to-earth writing by real Amiga users. Bimonthly Publication With the changes at Amiga Active, Total Amiga is the only regular UK print classic Amiga magazine (as far as we are aware). To help fill this role we want to publish the magazine more regularly, therefore we will be looking to move to bimonthly publication as soon as possible. The main barrier to this is the number of writers on the magazine so in the coming months we will be actively seeking more contributors and we hope to work with the French magazine Amiga Power to share content (translated both ways). Whatever happens issue 10 will still be three months after issue 9 (just published) because we have to transform Clubbed into Total Amiga as well as create the new issue. About Total Amiga So far we have published 9 issues of Clubbed and the magazine has been praised for its quality and production values. Each issue has 44 or more A4 pages, a colour cover and is professionally printed. At World of Amiga South East both Fleecy Moss of Amiga and Alan Redhouse of Eyetech endorsed Total Amiga and you can expect to see articles from them in future issues. The magazine is entirely produced on the Amiga, written by enthusiasts and operates on a not-for-profit basis. We are committed to covering all aspects of the Amiga market and all products aimed at Amiga users in a totally impartial manner. A 4 issue subscription to Total Amiga costs £14 including UK postage and single trial issues are available for £3.50 inclusive. Overseas subscriptions are available, please see our web site for rates. You can order direct from SEAL by cheque or postal order or via credit card through Forematt Home Computing (http://www.forematt.free-online.co.uk) or on-line at Kicksoft (http://www.kicksoft.co.uk). For more information including details of all back issues please visit: http://www.seal-amiga.co.uk and click on the Clubbed section. An all-new Total Amiga web site with its own domain name will be on-line before the first issue is published. Thanks as ever, Robert Williams, Editor, Total Amiga Magazine ---------------------------------------------------------------------- D O N ' T F O R G E T " T H E N E W A M I G A N S " 30 Oct 2001 Although it seems that Amiga Active will be closing its doors, We just wanted the world to know that there is still an Amiga magazine printed in the english language. "the NEW AMIGANS" magazine was started back in January, 2000 (the first - sample - issue was printed in April, 2000) as a (sort of) working man's Amiga magazine. Several of our readers are contributing authors. thus keeping articles from getting too far out of the "practical". We hope that the Amiga dealers and readers of Amiga Active, instead of completely giving up, will give us a try. Our website, complete with suscription information is at: http://get.to/t.n.a We also welcome and inquiries or questions about our magazine at: wd8izh@beanstalk.net . Its gonna be a heck of a century! Bill Griffin, G&G Publishing Enterprises Home of "the NEW AMIGANS" magazine Ask about our new, US-based, Amiga Magazine Or check out our website at http://get.to/t.n.a .. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G B G 2 0 0 2 A N N O U N C E D 28 November, 2001 AmiGBG 2002 is the name of an Amiga fair that will be held in Gothenburg, the pearl of the westcoast, in 2002, more precisely on the 2nd of march which is a saturday. Last time an Amiga fair was organized in Sweden was back in 1998 when the now discontinued AmiTech was organized in Wasahallarna in Stockholm. Now we think that it´s about time for a new fresh start for the Amiga here in Sweden. To help the amigausers that are still active to get together and establish new connections this is an attempt to gather the forces. If you happen to be curious or even a beginner on the Amiga and want to know what will happen for the time ahead this is a golden opportunity to get an answer to all your questions. We are all facing an exciting future and the best way to take a joint step into the new era is to get together on AmiGBG 2002 in Gothenburg! Organization Who are we then? We are a number of people who have the Amiga as a common interest and have been using this wonderful computer for many years. The non-profit organization AmiGbg will organize the fair and will be aided by non-profit working functionaries in the work around the arrangement. Under the headline Organizers you can can contact us who work with the arrangements around AmiGBG 2002. What will be available at the fair? On AmiGBG 2002 you will meet exhibitors from different companies who are active in the Amiga industry, you will also find different user associations and see examples of how many ways there are that you can use your Amiga. Hopefully we will also be able to show the Amiga in a network, some classic demos, demonstrate applications and everyting else that belongs to a good fair. We are also working to enable workshops and lectures to show what will happen with the future Amiga. Questions? If you have any questions about the fair or are interested to contribute in some way you´re of course welcome to contact us. As the work with AmiGBG 2002 progresses you will continuously find new information on the web site so be sure to visit at short intervals! http://www.weemeet.net/wwwamigbgcom/omamigbg/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G A E X P O 2 0 0 2 28 November, 2001 The Amiga and Alternative Platforms Conference Baltimore, MD USA - Marriott Hunt Valley Inn 29 - 31 March, 2002 About Amiga Expo Presented by Nova Design, Inc., this show brings Amiga developers, resellers and other exhibitors together in an east coast venue! The theme of this show is The Future. We're moving forward, we've got AmigaDE, AmigaXL/QNX, Amithlon, WinUAE, UAE/Linux and more bringing you an Amiga experience on your desktops, laptops, and even handheld computers!! We're also reaching out to other alternative platforms and you can expect to see Linux user groups, Palm user groups, professional video solutions and more! Hotel Accommodations The Amiga Expo 2002 will take place at the Marriott Hunt Valley Inn on the last weekend in March, on the 29th - 31st, 2002. Show times will include classes and special events on Friday, exhibits and classes from 10am to 5pm Saturday and 10am to 3pm Sunday. Everyone should call the hotel immediately and book room reservations for the show now! These events tend to sell out the hotel space early so get your room quickly so you can be on location for all the events and late night sessions and parties! Call (410) 785-7000 and tell them you're booking for the Amiga Expo to get discounted room rates! Tickets Tickets can be purchased now. You can buy them online or by calling Software Hut, our exclusive ticket agent for this show. There is a discount for buying your tickets to the show and banquet now - so don't delay!! Banquet tickets are available in a limited quantity - buy yours now before we run out! Click HERE for tickets. News 11/28/01 - More exciting speakers are now listed on the News Archive page and QNX has signed up to be one of the major exhibitors at the show. They will be exhibiting and hosting seminars. Learn how to use the rest of AmigaXL - the QNX side!! Amiga Expo Merchandise T-shirts, caps, cups and more are available now at the Amiga Expo store. There are several designs and items to choose from. Buy a shirt, support the show, be the coolest looking person on the show floor!* *wearer may not actually look cool wearing our merchandise. Buy Amiga Expo Stuff! http://www.amigaexpo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- N E W E S T P A G E S T R E A M A N N O U N C E D 2 November, 2001 This is the first new product release for PageStream in almost three years! PageStream4.1 first began life as the Table Editor add-on, but it became clear from our customers that this wasn't an optional feature in PageStream, but an integral part of every day document design. So, the Table Editor has been scraped, and from its ashes arise the newest release of PageStream with tables built right in! Place a table on the page, add and delete rows and columns, join cells into larger cells, and set the borders and fill of each cell. Looking for something special? How about a gradient filled cell? Set your text with all the power of PageStream's comprehensive typographic features. Define formulas using basic math functions like + - * / ( ) ^ and higher functions like sum, average/avg, min, max, abs, sin, cos, tan, arcsin, arccos, arctan, log, int, and exp. Tables have never been so easy to create in PageStream! But we didn't stop there! Full mail merge with easy variable assignment and optional record range to print, even print multiple records to a page using the label and repeating print functions. Simple yet still powerful. Words that PageStream lives by! Advanced control over the compression and encoding methods used when outputting PDF helps create tailor made PDF files. Emailing the file to a service bearuo? Then save it with ZLib compression and binary encoding. Distributing the files to a wider audiance? Uncompressed with Ascii85 encoding might be called for. You decide! Text frames features got a second stage boost into the stratosphere in PageStream4.1! Looking for borders around your text columns? No need to draw a separate box, just offset the text inwards, with each edge set independently. Text frames can now be divided into non-equal width columns. Object transform has even more control than before! Advanced features such as fading the fill and stroke type to a target fill and stroke make many special effect possible. Even duplicating objects across pages is easy now. Changing your document to a chapter based design? The new move page control streamlines the process! Of course, PageStream is a little bigger and takes a little more memory than before, but not as much as you might think. Object selection was sped up, and over all improvements to the program structure help streamline its performance and memory footprint. A lot of "under the hood" tuning, not cosmetic window dressing, is what gets the job done sooner. What amazes our customers is how other "competing" applications are often five to ten times PageStream's size, yet don't offer an equally larger amount of functionality. In fact, the opposite is often the case! Features o Tables! o Built in Mail Merge! o Shift-cursor text selection! o Apply text attributes to using the object or reshape tool! o PDF export control over compression and encoding o Custom column widths and gutters inside text frames o Text inset from column edges! o Move pages between chapters o Duplicate/Transform objects across pages o Duplicate/Transform objects behind the original o Fade duplicated objects to a specified line and/or fill o Speed improvements o and of course much more! As further proof that PageStream has been, and will always be, the DTP program to beat, a quick look at Quark Xpress 5.0's top 20 wishlist includes 11 items in PageStream, and PageStream has 8 of the top 10! Where does all that money go? Pricing Table Editor customers will receive 4.1 automatically! PageStream4.0 customers can upgrade to 4.1 for only $50, and upgrade multiple copies for even less. PageStream3.x customers can upgrade for only $115. Customers of prior versions of PageStream (2.x and 1.x) can upgradefor just $135. Retail price is a fraction of the other DTP applications at only $299. Other discounts exist. Check out our order page for more details on those discounts. PageStream 4.1 Ami Mac Win First time buyers full copy! $299 From PageStream 4.1 on another platform $60 From PageStream 4.0 on any platform $50 From PageStream 3.x on any platform $115 From PageStream 1.x/2.x Amiga or Atari $135 Competitive upgrade $150 http://www.grasshopperllc.com/frontpage.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- D I G I T A L U N I V E R S E N E W P R I C E 22 Nov 2001 This letter is to announce the availability of V1.03 of the software for online distribution at a fraction of its original price. If you haven't yet purchased "The Digital Universe" for the Amiga, now is the perfect opportunity. As long as you are able to download a 11.6 Mb archive from our web site onto your computer, you can now obtain the full V1.03 for $25 Canadian (about $16 US). The online distribution is in every way identical to the earlier CD-ROM distribution, other than the change of format and a reduction in price from $75 to $25 Canadian. The entire user manual is integrated into the software as a context-sensitive help system. For a full description of the Amiga version of "The Digital Universe", we invite you to our web site at http://www.syz.com/DU/amiga/ There, you will find a description of the features of the software, sample screen snapshots, and an online order form. If you have moved on to a Macintosh or Windows environment, we are currently shipping a version of the software for the Mac and are at work developing a Windows port. Visit http://www.syz.com/DU/mac/ or http://www.syz.com/DU/ibm/ respectively for details on "The Digital Universe" for those platforms. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to write to support@syz.com, or phone us at 780-961-2213. Thanks for your continued support! Dan Charrois President, Syzygy Research & Technology -- Syzygy Research & Technology Ltd. Box 83, Legal, AB T0G 1L0, Canada Phone: 780-961-2213 support@syz.com, sales@syz.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- W A R P 3 D F O R A M I G A D E 19-November-2001: Hyperion Entertainment brings 3D graphics to PDA's Hyperion Entertainment is very pleased to announce that it has finalised an initial version of its ``Warp3D'' technology, a mature, small foot-print, feature-rich yet very fast 3D solution for ElateTM/ Amiga DETM based devices. Warp3D allows content-creators to effortlessly deploy 3D graphics on low-end devices such as PDA's, web-tablets and 3G phones and is the product of years of development in response to concrete performance challenges and 3D technology. Hyperion intends to showcase the Warp3D technology by producing several PDA oriented games. ``A lot of the PDA content we are seeing now is a throw-back to the earlier days of entertainment software and whilst this is not necessarily a bad thing, we do believe that users would like to enjoy sophisticated 3D content on these devices as well. Our contract-work for LithTech Inc. also means we were able to incorporate extensive research and expertise in the field of software rendering which resulted in one of the fastest software renderers in the industry - the only viable solution on a non 3D-accelerated PDA. Add to that a highly optimised subset of OpenGL which is nonetheless capable of running industry-standard 3D engines like Quake IITM and LithTechTM and you have a piece of very compelling technology indeed.'' Warp3D was already successfully field-tested on the SH3 powered version of Sharp's Zaurus PDA and is due for imminent release. The technology will remain in continuous development and will be licensed to interested parties. Features: Flexible runtime-supported driver system allows for the support of 3D hardware (if present) or software-only emulation Completely transparent handling of drivers - applications run on both software emulation and 3D hardware without changes Generic API that was designed with years of experience in desktop 3D graphics Support for most primitive types supported by current hardware: Triangles, Triangle Strips and Fans, Lines and Points Support for different OpenGL shading modes, like MODULATE, REPLACE, DECAL and BLEND Support for texture mapping with different RGB and index color texture formats Extremely small memory footprint, under 60 KB. Tool-based (load only what's used). Support for Z-Buffering and Stencil Buffering Alpha-Blending Fog Fully OpenGL compliant Support for Vertex Arrays for maximum vertex throughput Automatic texture conversion by drivers to allow optimal hardware support Automatic video memory management - no programmer interaction required Completely written in VP assembler - local CPU optimisations possible Continuous development Software Renderer Features: Affine subspan texture mapping giving the best blend of speed and quality Supports Flat Shading, Gouraud Shading Texture Mapping (including full colour shading) Support for most common Alpha blending operations ZBuffering support (Z_LEQUAL) for normal depth buffering Planned Features: VP-based MiniGL, a minimal OpenGL subset sufficiently complex for Quake2-Engine games Complete OpenGL based on Mesa libraries for more powerful devices Vertex- and Pixel-Shader support Single-Pass multitexturing Support for T&L-Units where Vertex Shaders are unavailable http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G A F O R E V E R 5 . 0 R E L E A S E D November 28, 2001 - For Immediate Release - Cloanto released today version 5.0 of Amiga Forever, the official Amiga emulation and connectivity package for PCs. New features include just-in-time (JIT) compiler technology to dramatically increase execution speed, new ROM and operating system files to emulate not only the Amiga computers but also Commodore's CDTV and CD³² game consoles, and Software Manager, a content delivery and management system for one-click news, updates and downloads. An experimental version of the revolutionary Disk2FDI software, which makes it possible to read Amiga floppy disks on the PC, is provided for the technically inclined. Other improvements include support for new Windows XP and DirectX features and new Picasso96 technology to better map Amiga graphics calls to low-level DirectX functionality and native x86 code, in order to achieve maximum performance without sacrificing compatibility. Cloanto publicly benchmarked the new version of the emulation software to be 30 times faster than the previous version (which already matched the CPU performance of the fastest Amiga 68060 silicon). Amiga Forever can be installed or run from CD-ROM (no installation or reboot required), and is also available in a downloadable Online Edition. In either case, Amiga application can run side by side with the host operating system and its applications, while taking advantage of features such as virtual memory, advanced power management, digital rights management, NTFS filing system, wireless networking, and thousands of past, present and future drivers for peripherals, specifications and gadgets which the Amiga would otherwise not be able to support. For additional information please refer to the Amiga Forever home page at amigaforever.info. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- C L O A N T O O N E M U L A T I O N 28 November, 2001 {Note: we invite a comment of equal quality from the marketers of the referenced product, apparently Haage & Partner. Then we will probably stop running anything additional on what threatens to become another community damaging Amiga feud. Brad} TITLE Historical Facts about Amiga Emulation and Performance of Amiga Hardware TOPIC During the year 2001 statements were issued about some just-released emulation software which was by some parties claimed to be the"fastest Amiga", "the most compatible Amiga", "the first Amiga with virtual memory" and "the first Amiga notebook". In a way that reminds us of Orwell's 1984, questionable marketing appears to be used in an attempt to change history and facts. Cloanto would like to hereby express its opinion. DISCUSSION The statements which were issued in the advertising, press releases, web sites, packaging and documentation of certain products, and which Cloanto considers to be factually incorrect, include: 1. "This provides the first Amiga laptop that many users have been waiting for 16 years to see." ("Erstmals ist es nun möglich, einen PC-Laptop mit einem AmigaOS Betriebssystem zu installieren. Ein Fortschritt, den viele seit 16 Jahren erwarten.") 2. "With the ... it is possible for the first time to transparently make virtual memory available for the AmigaOS." ("Mit dem ... ist es erstmals möglich, dem AmigaOS transparent virtuellen Speicher zur Verfügung zu stellen.") 3. "The most powerful Amiga you can use now..."/"The most powerful Amiga you can use today..."/"The most powerful Amiga of all times"/"The fastest Amiga ever" ("Der leistungsfähigste Amiga, den man derzeit einsetzen kann..."/"Der leistungsfähigeste Amiga, den man derzeit einsetzen kann...""Der schnellste Amiga aller Zeiten" "Der leistungsfähigste Amiga aller Zeiten") 4. "The most powerful and compatible AMIGA® you have ever seen!" ("Der schnellste und kompatibelste Amiga® den sie je gesehen haben!") 5. " The most functional Amiga ever" ("Der funktionellste Amiga aller Zeiten") Cloanto trusts that these texts were written and disseminated in good faith, most likely by individuals and organizations who were new to Amiga emulation. Nevertheless, because of the potential for confusion among users, and the possible disruption of fair competition in an already challenged market, on October 22, 2001, Cloanto asked the issuers of the statements to kindly issue prompt corrections. Amiga Forever made Amiga emulation legal and official in 1997, allowing it to evolve and prosper. The Amiga emulation and OS software included in Amiga Forever were officially recognized by the Gateway/Amiga companies as an Amiga computer, and were licensed to carry the "Powered by Amiga" logo. Amiga Forever made it possible to everybody, from Amiga users, to developers, to senior Gateway/Amiga management, to enjoy both the power of virtual memory ("transparently made available to the Amiga OS") and the freedom of using the Amiga OS and software on a notebook computer. Since all of this took place in 1997, claims that such features were first introduced in 2001 cannot be valid. For the sake of completeness, it should be mentioned that even before 1997 small projects resulting in more or less finished portable Amiga computers which combined Amiga motherboard hardware with an LCD display and a custom case were known to exist, and were often displayed at Amiga shows. Also, Amiga utility programs which provided a certain degree of support for virtual memory to the Amiga OS and applications were distributed before 1997. On the side of performance, without even considering that statements such as "The most powerful Amiga you can use today" were issued several months before the product being described was actually released to the public (on or about October 20, 2001), little thought seems to have been given to another very powerful member of the Amiga family, the PowerPC CPU, which at least until the year before was being promoted using the slogan "The real speed is Warp speed!", and which was still officially supported as an Amiga CPU in the Amiga OS "3.5" and "3.9" packages. Cloanto has been a supporter of the PowerPC architecture and one of very few beta sites worldwide for certain (non-Amiga) PowerPC products before that CPU even was mentioned as a possible Amiga CPU. When, in May 1997, Cloanto published native PowerPC Amiga versions of some of its Personal Paint libraries on both Aminet and on the Personal Paint 7.1 CD-ROM, it became the first to do so (not counting development tools). Even assuming that the PowerPC hardware for the Amiga did not evolve, as it did, benchmarks using popular programs such as MPEG video players and other CPU-intensive code running on the same 200 MHz PowerPC CPUs that were available in 1997 indicate that the native PowerPC code is at least twice as fast as the same code compiled for the 68K CPU and then running, using a CPU released in 2001, in the emulation referred to as the "most powerful Amiga of all times". If even a 1997 Amiga is twice as fast as "the most powerful Amiga" of 2001 we cannot but wonder if maybe by "power" something other than speed was meant. Could that be the power of... marketing? Comparing emulation with emulation on the same hardware, even assuming that the statement "the most powerful and compatible" refers to one and the same program (and host operating system), which it apparently does not (QNX seems to be used as a host for "compatibility", while a stripped-down Linux is preferred for "power"), and assuming that the "most powerful" software actually runs at all (on most computers tested by Cloanto it failed to even boot the Amiga), during a public benchmark conducted at the Pianeta Amiga 2001 show it became evident that the emulation software for Windows as included in Amiga Forever performed the same CPU-intensive tasks in the same 21-22 second range as "the fastest Amiga ever" did. Additional tests involving intense DirectX graphics activity demonstrated the superior power and compatibility of the software included in Amiga Forever. While it is always very possible that benchmarks be chosen and/or tweaked to favor one or the other package, we believe that when one of the two packages consistently fails to even start on the same hardware on which the other package runs smoothly, this casts strong doubts not only about its performance, which inevitably falls to zero, but also on statements such as the "most compatible" and "most functional". Cloanto first tested the release version of the "the most powerful and compatible" package on a variety of computers, which all were capable of running Amiga Forever, and which included a ThinkPad A21p, a ThinkPad 760 ED, an Asus P2B motherboard with Matrox Millennium AGP graphics card and SoundBlaster Live! sound card, and notebooks and PCs by Siemens and Compaq. On the first four computers the software either failed to even boot from CD, or produced scaring random noise on screen, or kept animating a bouncing ball (an interesting variation on the Amiga "forever" theme), or refused to start in anything other than text mode (not very useful, since even the first Amiga had bitmapped graphics). On the fifth computer the software did not recognize the mouse and keyboard (USB), and therefore was unusable. An Amiga without mouse and keyboard... another "first"? (No, of course: the CDTV was the first Amiga without mouse and keyboard.) Probably as a a result of incompatibilities like the above-mentioned ones several resellers had to resort to selling complete PCs with carefully-chosen components, so that "the most compatible Amiga" would actually work. However PCs are designed to be expanded, and when a handful of developers has to keep up with the work of thousands of programmers who write drivers for new PC peripherals and standards mostly designed for Windows, what are the chances of compatibility with whatever components one may wish to add to such a computer? How can a system which was released without even support for a USB mouse or keyboard give peace of mind about compatibility with the latest graphics or sound card, or that other exciting gadget which may be released tomorrow? About the last statement, that of the "most functional Amiga", Cloanto is not sure what it was meant to mean. From the point of view of drivers, the software associated with this vague claim is certainly less "functional" than an emulation which has access to the wealth of Windows drivers. If it doesn't support a certain notebook, or display card, or wireless networking card, or filing system, or camera, or input device, or security or digital rights or power management standard, if it even requires a reboot into isolation, rather than being able of running side by side with another operating system and its applications, how can it be more "functional"? --------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I A T L A S 6 A V A I L A B L E now available! Welcome to AmiATLAS 6, the multimedia travel planer for AMIGA®. o travel routes with unlimited intermediate stops o fastest, shortest, cheapest and most pleasant route o route description choosable from very short up to very detailed o Maps printable with right measure, full page size or as a big poster o integrated CityGuide-system, for Germany, Swiss and Austria (in most cases with pictures!), with hundreds of informations about cities, hotels and parks o HotelGuide for thousands of hotels, with prices and equipment, mostly with pictures. o Integrated additional tools, for example a database about official registration codes of cars or a complete ZIP code database for germany o car costs calculation with many options. http://cloud.prohosting.com/amiatlas ---------------------------------------------------------------------- P H O T O F O L I O 2 . 2 F R O M S T E E P L E 26 November, 2001 Features of PhotoFolio 2.2 Listed below are bug fixes and new features of PhotoFolio 2.2. Features o Added a recent projects list in main menu. o Added the number of projects to keep in the recent list in settings o Added a clear recent project list menu item in the settings menu. This item is ghosted if there are no recent projects in the list. o Added 'Save selected decoded images...' to the proofs menu in a browse window. o Rearranged the main project menu a little. o Now you can abort the scanning of a directory in a browse window (the directory scan can take as long time for bigger directories or slow devices). o The settings window now shows only settings panels that are relevant to the current context. eg You dont see main window settings if you open a settings window from a browse window. o Localized "Tag" and "Value" from the information window. o Added 'show errors' to the browse window menu. This shows errors for that browse window in the error window, bringing it the front if auto error window is turned on in prefs. o Localized the about window. o Rewritten error class. o DirectoryView plug in module accecssable from the main window menu or from the context menu of a listtree path. o Export HTML plug in module accecssable from the export proofs as menu in a browse window. Export HTML settings appear in the regular settings requester. Bugs o New version of imageio.library that fixes a CMYK jpeg file format loading problem and adds native PPM read and write support. o New version of proof.library that adds PPM file type support. o New version of exif.library that fixes a minor text description problem. o Fixed a bug in the information window where the lists of items in an could have garbage tagged to the end of the strings. o Fixed a bug in ARexx GetProofAttrs, where if an invalid proof handle is passed in, PF didnt return an error. o Fixed a bug in GetProof where if you specified SELECTED and there weren't any proofs selected, you got a random number returned as the proofs id. o Fixed a bug in add path to listtree where adding a subdirectory of another subdirectory sometimes caused all added paths to appear in their own separate folders instead of being nested. o Fixed a bug in the vlab detection routines where a vlab object was created and never disposed. o Random enforcer hits/crashes with drag and drop to the listtree and between browse windows has been fixed. o New error window which treats all errors as files. eg Delete an error and you are deleting the file represented by that error. o Fixed a bug in listtreeclass with saving projects on quitting if you didnt enter a filename. o Fixed showing and image from the attribute window when not using the english locale. http://www.scouts.org.au/steeplesoftware/photofolio/en /currentversion.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- M U I S E C U R I T Y H O L E E X P L A I N E D URL : http://www.abraxis.co.uk/SA-2001-11-08.html Title: Security Advisory 2001-08-11 Escape Sequence Exploit Security Advisory 2001-08-11 Escape Sequence Exploit Original release date: November 8th, 2001 Revised: November 16th, 2001 Source: Heinz Tomato Ketchup Systems Affected o Applications running on AmigaOS using MUI, which do not check and strip incoming internet content for potentially exploitable escape sequences, and have APIPE: or similar devices mounted. A non-comprehensive list of applications is available at the bottom of this document. Overview We have received reports of an ancient malicious exploit in many Amiga applications. This exploit is activated by use of standard MUI escape sequences for positioning images inside text layout objects (for instance, a smiley face graphic inside a text view from a chat program). It can be activated by simply displaying text with the maliciously formed escape sequence, or allowing file access to strings that are not filtered for unsafe device names. I. Description As standard, MUI allows the programmer to embed graphic images inside text. This may include such operations as a small "mail" icon in a listview, or a smiley face graphic in an internet chat program. Such use is not harmful. But it is possible to construct an escape sequence that exploits active APIPE: style devices - such that file access to this specially constructed path will execute commands on that pipe. It is also possible to pass pathnames to certain internet software that contain maliciously constructed paths: such as file:///APIPE:. This is NOT a bug in MUI or APIPE: or any command-capable PIPE device. Payload For example, if this was embedded in unchecked internet content (for instance, the Subject line of an email) and displayed onscreen (for example, in a mail folder list): I[4:APIPE:Echo >CON:////Hacked/AUTO/WAIT/CLOSE Owned] The exploit would open a shell window with the title "Hacked" and the content "Owned". This is a harmless use, and does not explain certain intricacies of the hack either - I do not believe in giving out lit fireworks to small children. II. Impact It is possible to execute arbitrary code on the target system. I will not go into details on the other implications - again, I do not believe in giving out lit fireworks to small children. III. Solutions Recommendations for End Users End users should disable APIPE: and other similar pipe devices (AWNPIPE: is a possibility), and also upgrade their affected internet applications. A non-comprehensive list of affected and unaffected applications is at the end of this document. Please contact your vendor if you are not sure. The standard AmigaOS PIPE: is not affected since it is incapable of executing commands. If you cannot ensure that your applications are safe, it is recommended that you uninstall them and seek alternatives that are mindful of internet content. There are plenty of email, messaging and web clients on the Amiga, and most of them are secure. Recommendations for Application Programmers Application programmers should either: o filter the ESC character (ASCII 27) from internet content where appropriate. o prepend all displayed internet content with the - (that's ASCII 27, and a minus sign), however this will also disable legitimate use of the code. .. when using a MUI "Text" object (or any class or subclass which uses the standard MUI "Text" object), where applicable. See the autodocs for MUI_Text and MUI_Image for details. Work it out yourself, for Christ's sake. There is no excuse for passing unfiltered text, which may contain escape codes, to core MUI or OS functions. Also - if possible, detect and disallow accesses to APIPE: and other similar devices where internet content is concerned (for instance, loading images in a web browser using .) Searching for #?PIPE: strings is an entirely legitimate if restrictive way of fixing this problem. It would be more far-reaching to disable access to non-filesystem devices. For example, instead of using Open(), use Lock() to test the device first, and OpenFromLock() - if it fails, the device may well be a non-filesystem device. NOTE: this method will stop applications from running normally on WinUAE since the native filesystem does not support the packet required for OpenFromLock(). It is therefore not a foolproof test and should be used with care. Important Note It has come to our attention that there is a patch for muilowlevel.library which disables the exploit by disallowing access to PIPE: style ("non-filesystem") devices. Installation of this patch is NOT recommended. MUI itself is NOT at fault for this exploit, and installing it defeats the object of this security advisory - to make application authors think about how to secure their applications. Hacking and patching the OS and system libraries (such as MUI) is no substitute for due care and very small code changes. Do not believe programmers who say that their application "has no security hole". All MUI applications which pass unfiltered content to core classes - or any application which passes any unfiltered data to OS functions for that matter - has an inherent security hole. To patch the OS to prevent applications from working as users might legitimately use them is foolish to say the least. It would be like cutting your hands off so that you couldn't wield a knife to kill someone else. It has been put to me that having a PIPE device capable of executing commands, like APIPE:, but mounted with a different name is just as insecure when the application only checks for #?PIPE: in the filename string. It is worth nothing that; o There is no such pipe device mounted by default by any application on the Amiga (they all pattern match #?PIPE:) nor is one available on Aminet with a default name of anything other than #?PIPE: o If an application did maliciously access such a differently named pipe, it would first have to predict it's name - a user changing the name to FUNTUBE: would not be affected unless he told the entire world and invited them to hack him. Also if such a pipe was released as new software, updates to affected software would be protected from it by way of adding that default name. As it stands, APIPE and AWNPIPE device names are entirely predictable and it would not be wrong to say that most, if not all, users of AmiTCP/IP, Genesis, AmigaOS 3.5 (AWNPIPE comes on the CD) and AmigaOS 3.9 (APIPE is installed with the IP stack, and AWNPIPE is also on the CD) would be affected by utilising the standard names only. IV. Non-comprehensive list of applications affected and unaffected by this exploit This list will be updated as and when people get off their asses and test things. AFFECTED These applications are confirmed or suspected of being susceptible: o YAM (2.3 and below) o StrICQ (all versions) o AmigAIM (versions previous to 0.9437) o PINT (all versions) o Pretty Much Everything Else (tm) UNAFFECTED These applications are confirmed as NOT succeptable: o Vaporware apps such as Voyager, Microdot-II and AmIRC (all versions) o AmigAIM (0.9437 onwards) o Amster (all versions) o YAM 2.3p1 o SimpleMail --- NO WARRANTY Any material furnished by www.abraxis.co.uk is furnished on an "as is" basis. www.abraxis.co.uk makes no warranties of any kind, either expressed or implied as to any matter including, but not limited to, warranty of fitness for a particular purpose or merchantability, exclusivity or results obtained from use of the material. www.abraxis.co.uk does not make any warranty of any kind with respect to freedom from patent, trademark, or copyright infringement. --- Revision History: 2001-11-08: Initial revision 2001-11-10: Added information about standard PIPE not being affected. Added AmigAIM to unaffected list. 2001-11-14: Added more applications to list, muilowlevel recommendation. 2001-11-16: Added greater explanation of exploits, recommendations. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Amiga Update on the net: All back issues available at: http://www.globaldialog.com/~amigaupdate/index.html Stop by and check out our archive! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2001 by Brad Webb. Freely distributable, if not modified. ====================================================================== _ __ _ <>_ __ _ A M I G A /\\ |\ /|| || / ` /\\ A M I G A U P D A T E /__\\ | \ / || || || ___ /__\\ U P D A T E / \\_ | \/ ||_ _||_ \__// / \\_ amigaupdate@globaldialog.com ======================================================================