Total Amiga - 22

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Total Amiga - 22, Magazyny
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Issue 22, Winter 2005
What’s Inside Our
Winter
Wonderland?
Amiga Forever 2005 Premium
DVPlayer: OS 4 movie player
AmiDisk: OS 4 native file manager
World of Wi-Fi
Plus:
• OS 4 and MorphOS updates.
• Big Bash 3 and Amigathering 6 reports.
• Interviews.
• Rexx Programmer’s Reference review.
• Battle for Wesnoth review.
• Optimising graphics memory tutorial.
Broken Sword
Contents
News
IBrowse Draws Closer
News
Editorial
Bytes...
W
elcome to Total Amiga
Adios
Details of the long-awaited
upgrade to IBrowse, one of the
Amiga’s premier web browsers,
have now been released and
beta versions of the new release
have been demonstrated at
shows around the world. Version
2.4 is mainly a bug-fix release
while the team concentrates on
version 3.0 which will support
newer web standards like CSS
(Cascading Style Sheets) and
the DOM (Document Object
Model). Despite its minor
upgrade status, the new version
still promises many useful
enhancements, an extensive list
of which are available on the
IBrowse web site.
Probably the biggest item in the
list is the new plug-in API which
will enable developers to make
software that integrates into web
pages. The first example of this
will be the Flash animation plug-
in which will be supplied with
IBrowse 2.4. This plug-in will
enable IBrowse users to view
many sites that use Flash
animated content. The IBrowse
team point out that their plug-in
is based on an open source
Flash player that does not
support features of the more
recent versions of Flash,
however it should be a big
improvement over no Flash
support at all!
A small improvement that is
bound to win IBrowse 2.4 a lot of
fans is the ability to open web
pages in a background tab. This
feature enables you to open a
link in a new tab but have the tab
you are currently viewing remain
active, the new page then loads
in the background so it is ready
when you have completed
reading the first page. Trust me,
it’s really handy! Another minor
enhancement is the addition of
context-sensitive pointers, at last
the IBrowse pointer will give you
a clue if you are hovering over a
text or image link.
Under OS 4, IBrowse gains
preliminary character set
support, this means that pages
which use other character sets
such as those in Greek and
Russian will now display
correctly. The support is called
preliminary because it only
covers the web page itself and
not aspects of the user interface
such as form elements (buttons,
text fields etc.) or page titles.
The spoofing engine, which
allows IBrowse to pretend to be
another browser to fool brain
dead web sites has been
rewritten to be much more
flexible which should improve
compatibility. Javascript handling
has been improved and for OS 4
users there is a PPC native
version of the javascript.library
which should substantially
improve performance on
Javascript heavy sites.
Many other aspects of the
browser have seen smaller
enhancements and bug fixes.
These include the HTML engine
and table parser, cookie support,
the internal GIF decoder and
memory management.
IBrowse 2.4 will be a free
upgrade for version 2.x users, a
paid upgrade for owners of older
versions is expected. For further
details, including a very
extensive list of the hundreds of
changes since 2.3, visit the
IBrowse web site:
Issue 22
Winter 2005
Prepares for Launch
In the lead up to the release of
Amiga OS 4.0, Hyperion are
launching an official website for
the operating system. We
understand that the web site will
probably be on-line by the time
you read this and that an
announcement will be made to
the Amiga press when the site is
launched. The new site also
showcases the new-look OS 4
logo which we reproduce above.
According to Hyperion, the
website will grow over time to act
as a central resource for both
current and future users and
licensees of Amiga OS 4. At the
time of launch the website will
contain three separate
issue 22 and what a jam-
packed issue we have for you
this time (so much so that I’m
squeezed into this tiny column)!
Much of the buzz on the Amiga
forums recently and at the Big
Bash 3 show in Peterborough
(see our report in this issue) has
been about the Amy’05 PPC
motherboard from a new
company, Troika. We have been
lucky enough to get an exclusive
mini-interview with the people
behind Amy’05 and some
pictures as they gear up for
production. So, if you haven’t
already done so take a look now!
Once you’ve taken that in, don’t
forget that there’s much more in
this issue! In particular there’s
two more great interviews, the
latest Amiga Forever release for
retro fans and more on Wi-Fi.
If you’re a US or Canadian
reader, then you may notice that
this issue has been posted from
Canada. Greg Condon of the
PANORAMA Amiga users group
in Vancouver is now printing a
second run of Total Amiga in
Canada. This has enabled us to
cut our subscription rates to
North America by 25%! Thanks
to Greg for his on-going effort to
help readers in this region.
We need your help to keep each
issue as packed with varied and
interesting content as this one...
if you would like to contribute
please contact me for details.
Enjoy the mag!
Robert Williams
editor@totalamiga.org
Garry
introductions to the OS, each
targeted at different groups of
users, and a number of
interesting articles intended to
remind people of the great
legacy of the operating system
and the features that make it
such a great user experience.
Over time, further articles will be
added to give more insight into
the new version of the OS, and
Hyperion will be offering
downloads and a developer’s
section from the web site closer
to the Amiga OS 4.0 launch.
The new site will be available
from the following URL:
os4.hyperion-entertainment.biz
News
Editorial..............................2
Troika Amy’05....................8
Amiga OS 4 Update........ 10
MorphOS Update............ 12
Features
Big Bash 3 Show Report. 14
Amigathering 6 Report.... 16
Jamie Krueger Interview. 18
IBrowse Team Interview.. 24
Micro AmigaOne Audio
Update............................ 28
Reviews
DVPlayer......................... 30
Amiga Forever 2005
Premium Edition.............. 32
AmiDisk........................... 36
XNet-RSS....................... 38
On the Edge Preview...... 39
Broken Sword................. 40
Battle for Wesnoth.......... 42
Rexx Programmer’s
Reference....................... 44
DaveyD, the web master of
AmigaWorld.net, recently
posted to the site that Garry
Hare has contacted him and
stated “Several months ago I
terminated my association
with Amiga, Inc. I am no
longer affiliated with Amiga in
any capacity.”.
You may remember that
Garry’s company KMOS
purchased the rights to Amiga
OS and then purchased
Amiga Inc. itself, and then
dropped the KMOS name in
favour of Amiga Inc.! Amiga
themselves have not made a
statement regarding this
move and we have no
information on what it might
mean for the company’s
fortunes. We do know that
this change has had no
noticeable effect on the
development of Amiga OS 4
which continues apace (see
our OS 4 Update feature for
further details).
You can read the e-mail from
Garry and some reactions at
the following AmigaWorld.net
thread:
modules/newbb/
viewtopic.php?
topic_id=15634&forum=16
Support
Optimising OS 4 Graphics
Memory Usage................ 46
World of Wi-Fi................. 48
Colour screenshots etc... 52
A preview of the new Amiga OS 4 web site showing how it
introduces the OS and reminds visitors of key features.
A screenshot of IBrowse 2.4 beta running on OS 4 with the new
context-sensitive pointer image highlighted.
About Total Amiga
Legalese
Total Amiga
is published quarterly
by South Essex Amiga Link.
Editor:
Robert Williams
Design:
Robert Williams
Contributors:
Tony Aksnes
Andy Baldie
Sam Byford
Sean Courtney
Nigel Derbyshire
Magnus Johnson
George Sokianos
Mick Sutton
Tommi Toivanen
Proofreading:
Sam Byford
Greg Condon
Sean Courtney
Mick Sutton
Contact Us
If you have any queries,
suggestions or want to contact us
for any reason please use one of
the following:
EMail:
editor@totalamiga.org
WWW:
Post:
Total Amiga,
26 Wincoat Drive,
BENFLEET, Essex,
SS7 5AH, UK.
Telephone:
+44 (0) 1268 569937
(19:00 - 22:00 UK time please)
Only Amiga Software
Made it Possible
Total Amiga is designed and laid
out using:
Hardware:
Home built x86 PC:
Athlon XP 2500+, 512MB RAM,
nVidia gForce 2 MX400
AmigaOne-XE:
800MHz G4, 512MB RAM,
3DFX Voodoo 3 3000
Software:
Amithlon by Bernie Meyer et. al.
Amiga OS 3.9 by Amiga
Amiga OS 4 by Hyperion
PageStream 4.1 by Softlogik
ImageFX 4.5 by Nova Design
Perfect Paint 2.93
by Georges Halvadjian
Photogenics 5 by Paul Nolan
Final Writer 5 by Softwood
Ghostscript from artofcode LLC,
Amiga OS port by Whoosh777.
There are also some essential
utilities we couldn’t live without:
Directory Opus 5, SGrab, MCP,
Turbo Print 7, MakeCD.
Our thanks to the creators of this
and all the other great Amiga
software out there.
Total Amiga is entirely created
using Amiga software, no other
platforms are used at any stage of
the design or layout process.
Fonts
The body text of Total Amiga is
set in Triumvirate Normal as
supplied with PageStream, the
heading typeface is Forgotten
Futurist by Ray Larabie. Take a
look at Ray’s huge range of
freeware fonts at
his commercial foundry at
The views expressed in this magazine
are those of the author of each piece,
they do not necessarily reflect the
views of the editor, other contributors
or SEAL.
Please Note:
Total Amiga is produced
by the editor and contributors in their
spare time. While we always strive to
produce the magazine on time and
include all the advertised contents this
is not always possible due to other
commitments. The price you pay for
Total Amiga covers our costs and
nothing more, we don’t make a profit
from it.
If you wish to contact a contributor
send your message to one of the
addresses in this section.
Amiga is a registered trademark and
the Amiga logo, the “Boing Ball”
device, AmigaDOS, Amiga Kickstart,
Amiga Workbench, Autoconfig,
Bridgeboard, and Powered by Amiga
are trademarks of AMIGA Inc.
“Amigan” is copyright by Bob Scharp
and used with his permission.
All other trademarks mentioned are the
property of their respective owners.
The design, layout and all uncredited
articles in this issue of Total Amiga are
copyright © South Essex Amiga Link,
2005. The credited articles remain
copyright © of their author.
If you wish to use an article from Total
Amiga, for example in your own
magazine or on a web site, please
contact the editor.
Advertisers
AmigaKit.com....... 9, 23, 35
ForeMatt Home Computing
........................................ 27
GGS-Data....................... 41
TOTAL
AMIGA
Winter 2005
2
3
     News
News
AmiNetRadio Turns 4
Open Your MindSpace...
Bytes...
Bytes...
Boxes in
MOS TCP/IP
AmiZeux have made a new
release of AmiNetRadio, their
music player which in previous
versions has emphasised
Shoutcast MP3 streaming
support. While the excellent
Shoutcast support with its
powerful search facility is still
there, the team have worked
hard to enhance other aspects of
the program. The play-list editor
in particular has been improved
with the ability to resynchronise
play-lists with the files available
on your hard disk. Play-lists are
now automatically created
containing the hundred most
recently played songs and all the
songs played in the last 7 days.
ANR has an extensive plug-in
system which allows for many
areas of the program to be
extended. For example, audio
format plug-ins are now included
for a really wide range of sound
files including AHX, CDDA,
Soundmon, FutureComposer,
WAV and AIFF.
A new user interface plug-in is
included which places all ANR’s
functions in one tabbed window
for those that prefer this
approach over the multi-
windowed standard GUI.
Other improvements include two
new scopes, more ARexx
commands, and many bug fixes.
AmiNetRadio is primarily
developed and tested under
MorphOS, but it is a 68K
program so it should work under
all versions of Amiga OS. The
initial 4.0 release caused some
crashes on 3.x and didn’t work
on OS 4 but this was quickly
corrected with 4.1. Most
functions now work on non-
MorphOS systems except for the
ANRNG skin, and some of the
player and scope plug-ins; there
is a compatibility guide on the
program’s website. ANR is a free
download from:
MindSpace is a work in progress
OS 4 native drawing package
designed with creating diagrams
in mind. The author lists potential
uses as flow charts, UML
diagrams, mind maps and brain
storms. Unified Modelling
Language (UML) is a standard
used by software developers to
model their software, the models
created can be expressed as a
diagram. Future versions of
MindSpace will be able to
produce code templates for C++
classes and C structures from a
UML diagram.
The current release is 0.2 and
can already be used to create
simple diagrams. Tools are
available to draw basic shapes,
lines and text. Objects can have
fill and border colours, and the
line weight of the borders can be
defined. Some of the shapes
available are clearly designed
with specific types of diagram in
mind and the author plans to add
“primitives” (templates) for many
types of diagram. Unlike a
classic drawing program (like
DrawStudio) in later releases
you will be able to use
connecting lines to structure your
diagram, and these connections
will remain intact as objects are
moved in the diagram.
MindSpace 0.2 is freely
distributable and can be
downloaded from the
developer’s web site below. His
long term plan is to produce a
usable free demo version with
limited export facilities and a full
release at a low price (around
10Euro is currently envisaged).
mindspace
Synergy
Develops
MorphOS has long lacked a
native TCP/IP stack with
users having to use Miami or
Genesis under emulation to
get their computers on the
‘net. This situation at last
seems to be changing with
“Sonic” working hard to create
a new native stack called
ezTCP based on existing
open source software. A
MorphZone.org bounty has
been setup to reward this
effort and the features
required to complete it include
DHCP support and a MUI
user interface. Beta versions
are currently being regularly
released on MorphZone and
each one seems to make
considerable progress and
work with more network
applications.
For further details and to
download the latest beta visit:
modules/bounty/
bounty_view.php?
mychoice=ezTCP
Many people now have more
than one computer and
having more than one
keyboard and mouse around
soon becomes a frustrating
experience. If you have
networked computers which
each have their own monitor
then Synergy is a handy open
source program that enables
you to share a keyboard and
mouse across the network so
there’s no need to buy a
switch. To use Synergy, the
computer with the keyboard
and mouse connected runs
the server program and a
client program, synergyc,
runs on all the other
computers that share the
input devices. You configure
the server so it knows how
your monitors are physically
arranged and then when the
pointer reaches the edge of
the screen control “jumps” to
the computer controlling the
monitor on that side.
Synergy is available for
Windows, Mac OS X and
Linux, and now Douglas
McLaughlin has ported the
client program to OS 4. The
Amiga port implements the
basic Synergy features
(keyboard and mouse
sharing) and also supports
clipboard sharing so you can
copy information to the
clipboard on one computer
and paste it on another! A
couple of features are
currently not implemented:
screen blanker
synchronisation and support
for Mac OS X as a server (the
keyboard mapping is
incorrect) but for most users
these will be unimportant.
Synergy is a free download
from OS4Depot.net, Douglas
asks that you send him an
e-mail if you use the program.
amisynergyc.lha in
network/misc
Aminet News
Since the release of the new
interface at Aminet.net, the
maintainers of the Amiga’s
long-standing premier
software archive have
continued to add new
features to the site and to
resurrect old functionality that
was lost during the upgrade.
Since we last mentioned
Aminet in issue 20, notable
additions to the web interface
have included:
• A variety of upload statistics
so you can track site and
category upload activity.
• Customiseable RSS feeds
so you view uploads that
interest you in an RSS news
reader.
• Site-wide architecture
filtering so you can exclude
software incompatible with
your hardware or OS.
• Sort order of file listings can
be changed by clicking the
column headers.
Turning Gold into... CubiC?
Dietmar Eilert has released a
new version of his popular
GoldEd Studio product and in
the process has given it a new
name, CubiC IDE (Integrated
Developer Environment), to
better describe its capabilities.
The key part of the environment
is still GoldEd, a powerful text
editor that is now at version 8.
GoldEd is very flexible in its
configuration and is supplied
with specialised editing modes
for C/C++, HTML, ARexx,
Installer and other languages. To
create a full development
environment CubiC integrates
with SAS/C, vbcc, gcc and Storm
C with the following features:
• Source level debugger support
for StormC users: breakpoints
are displayed next to the code.
• Configurable references
system for includes, source
codes and other material to
help find information quickly.
• QuickInfo function to display
information related to the word
under the cursor (e.g.
prototypes of OS functions).
• Highlight of matching brackets.
• QuickFunc navigation lists all
functions, labels etc. defined in
your source codes.
• Grep support for searches
using regular expressions.
• Free compilers included with
easy installers.
• SDKs included for OS 3.x,
MorphOS, PowerUP and
WarpOS.
includes the free compilers that
would otherwise require a very
large download. You can pay
either by bank transfer (if you are
located within the Eurozone this
should be very cheap or free) or
by PayPal. Find out more and
download a demo version at
Dietmar’s website:
When available, you can buy the
package on-line at his web shop:
shop/webshop.htm
Rockin’ to the Beat!
CubiC IDE is a 68K Amiga
program and is supported by the
author under AmigaOS 3.x and
MorphOS. Dietmar has stated
that he does his best to support
Amiga OS 4 although he does
not have a system to test on.
The full CubiC IDE package
costs 69.90 Euro and upgrades
are available for GoldEd Studio
AIX owners at 19.90 Euro. The
package is supplied on CD which
View at
The collection of OS 4 native
audio software is growing with
the latest addition being
RockBEAT, a software drum
machine with a ReAction user
interface from James Carroll who
you might recognise as the
author of the WookieChat IRC
client. RockBEAT is a software
drum machine which enables
you to create your own
drumming tracks and save them
out as WAV format audio files.
The program can create multiple
tracks each one being 4 x 4/4
measures with 16th notes. You
can save either individual tracks
or all the tracks as a complete
song. The program uses 16bit
44100Hz PCM WAV samples for
the drum sounds. A selection are
supplied and you can add more
simply by copying them into the
correct directory.
RockBEAT is shareware and
costs $15 to register. A demo
version with a 10 minute time
limit is available for download
from:
revolution.com/rockbeat
Factor 5
WarpView is a new picture
viewer for Amiga OS 4, while
fairly simple in functionality its
unique “selling” point is that it
uses Warp3D for its image
display. The advantage of this
method of display is that the
graphics card’s processor is
used to scale the image
which is both very fast and
looks smooth. Once loaded,
the image can be zoomed,
rotated and panned. If you
select an image within a
directory the cursor keys can
be used to display the other
images.
WarpView requires an
AmigaOne with a Radeon
graphics card (the author is
working on Voodoo support)
and is reported to work on OS
4 pre-release update 3.
warpview.lha in
graphics/viewer
A example of old functionality
that has returned is ADT
support on the Aminet.net
FTP server. ADT stands for
Aminet Download Tool and is
an extension to the FTP
protocol that enables an
application on a remote
machine to perform Aminet
searches and display lists of
recently uploaded files. This
feature will be welcomed by
users of FTP clients like
AmiTradeCenter and AmFTP
which support ADT.
The new Aminet user
interface can be found at the
URL below, if you want to
support the development of
Aminet, a PayPal donation
button is available.
TOTAL
AMIGA
Winter 2005
4
5
     News
News
Bytes...
Bytes...
Let the Development Begin!
Trawl for Music with TuneNet
Scalos
New Wookie
Hyperion have released version
51.15 of the Amiga OS 4
Software Development Kit (SDK)
to OS 4 developer pre-release
users. The kit includes the tools
and documentation developers
need to create native programs
for OS 4. Key features include:
• GNU C/C++ compiler, incl. the
GDB source-level debugger.
• Includes and Autodocs for Pre-
Release Update 3.
• VBCC ANSI-C compiler.
• Developer documentation and
example source code.
• Many pre-configured third-party
libraries as contributions.
• Code profiling support for both
clib2 and newlib.
• Based on GCC 3.4.4 tool set.
complete package weighs in at
about 100MB, this is also
available in several “chunks” for
users on slower Internet
connections and there is also a
slimmed down version for those
who don’t require the
contributions.
To download, login with your OS
4 pre-release details at:
www.hyperion-entertainment.biz
Playing back media tends to be
processor intensive, so having
native players for your processor
is a real advantage. This is
doubly true for audio players
because they are often left to run
in the background while you do
other things with your computer.
OS 4 users will be pleased to
find TuneNet, a native MP3
player with Shoutcast streaming
support by Paul Heams which is
in constant development.
TuneNet integrates with IBrowse
and AWeb so you can easily
listen to Shoutcast streaming
audio. You can also listen to
MP3 files from your hard drive
which can be organised via play
lists. Some of the program’s
other features include an Internet
stream search facility, sound
level meters, and a station and
current tune display.
Recent alpha releases have
added new features. A plug-in
system enables the program to
support more sound formats;
basic Protracker and AIFF plug-
ins are already available.
Another addition that we’re sure
many users will like is the ability
to save a stream to your hard
disk for later listening. Even
more exciting enhancements are
planned for the future including
Shoutcast broadcasting (which
we don’t believe is currently
possible on the Amiga) and
improvements to the interface.
TuneNet is freeware and can be
downloaded from:
Update
In addition to his work on
RockBEAT, James Carroll has
been continuing to develop
his IRC client, WookieChat.
Since our review of version
1.52 in issue 20, lots of new
features have been added
bringing the program up to
version 1.9. Notable
improvements include: A URL
grabber window which
records all URLs displayed
and allows them to be visited
in a browser. Sounds can be
played to alert you to a new
tab opening or a particular
word being mentioned, you
can choose to only play these
sounds when the WookieChat
window is inactive. Chat
history allows you to recall,
edit and re-send previous
messages. Probably the most
useful new feature is that
DCC-send support is now
implemented so you can send
files directly to other users.
Download the latest version
of WookieChat from:
revolution.com/wookiechat
The Scalos team have
released the latest version of
their Workbench replacement
system which now includes a
native PPC MorphOS version
(where it replaces the default
Ambient desktop). Scalos has
many advantages over
Workbench including full
internal multi-tasking, more
powerful name view, support
for PNG icons (with full alpha-
channels), configurable
menus and context sensitive
pop-up menus.
In addition to MorphOS
support, recent releases have
added (amongst many other
changes):
• Thumbnail views of items
within a drawer.
• The icon under the pointer
can be highlighted
(optional).
• Default icons for file types
have adjustable
transparency.
• Tool tips provide information
about files and drawers,
plug-ins support for
information about specific
file types (for example
image dimensions).
The SDK is available as a free
download from the Hyperion web
site for pre-release users. The
Candy Factory 2: News at Last
The original release of Candy
Factory Pro, a graphics package
ideal for quick buttons, titles and
logos, was always a firm
favourite here at Total Amiga. So
we were pleased to hear that
development had resumed back
in 2003. For a long time nothing
more was heard, but in July
ZeoNeo revealed that work had
continued since the original
announcement and they
demonstrated it at Amiga shows
at the end of that month.
The premise of Candy Factory
remains the same in the new
version, you take a mask (that is
a greyscale image) and then
apply effects such as textures,
bevels, glows, drop-shadows,
bump-mapping and lighting to it
to produce an attractive effect.
The mask can either be
produced in the program (for
example you could create text for
a logo) or created externally and
imported. The combination of
Candy Factory’s effects makes it
easy to achieve all kinds of
results, it is particularly effective
at mimicking natural surfaces like
metal or plastic but the choice is
really up to you. All Candy
Factory’s controls update in real-
time so you can tweak your
settings until you’re happy with
the result, there’s no waiting for
effects to “render”.
Version 2 is a substantial
upgrade and many parts of the
program have been rewritten to
take full advantage of Amiga OS
4. This means the program is
PPC native and has a ReAction
GUI using new features
introduced in OS 4. All over the
program, improvements have
been made that address some of
the shortcomings of the earlier
release. Multiple project windows
can now be opened at the same
time and the working canvas can
have an unlimited size viewed
using scroll bars. This is a big
improvement over the last
release where the canvas was
limited to the size of the screen;
which was a major limitation for
print projects where higher than
screen resolution is required.
Multiple layers will allow several
effects to be included in one
image without having to first “fix”
the initial effect to the
background. You can go back
and edit any layer at any time
and also change the layer order
(via drag ‘n’ drop) greatly adding
to the program’s flexibility.
Candy Factory 2 makes use of
the new ReAction “toolbox” class
windows for its editing palettes,
these are special windows for
this task that do not become
selected when you click them –
meaning when you choose a tool
the window stays selected. The
tool windows in Candy Factory 2
are even more powerful, settings
for things like “bump-map”,
“bevel” and “material” can be
kept in individual windows or
combined in a single tabbed
window to reduce screen clutter!
No further details of Candy
Factory 2 have been announced
so far, and the program isn’t yet
mentioned on the ZeoNeo web
site. You can read the official
press release and see some
more screenshots in this thread
on AmigaWorld.net:
news/article.php?storyid=2449
TuneNet showing Internet
radio stations.
KHTML Koming Soon?
As great as Amiga web browsers
are, especially in the user
interface department, their
development teams have a hard
job keeping up with the
standards used on the web and
also with the many ways web
developers use and misuse
them. One common plea heard
from Amiga users is “why
doesn’t someone just port an
open source browser?”. While
projects like AmiZilla show that
this is no mean feat, a lone
coder going by the nick’ of
Marcik has started work on a
web rendering library for
MorphOS based on the KHTML
engine. In the short time he has
been working on the project,
Marcik has already reported
some impressive progress.
KHTML is the rendering engine
developed for the KDE project’s
Konqueror browser which is also
used by Apple as the basis for
Webcore which is behind its
Safari browser. Marcik has
based his port on GTK+Webcore
a version of Webcore further
modified by Nokia (phew!).
Screenshots on the developer’s
site (two of which are shown
below) show development
versions of the library running in
a very simple browser and
successfully displaying pages
with good layout and images.
There is even a screen-movie
available where you can see it in
action. All in all it shows more
progress than any of the other
porting projects that we have
seen. In his FAQ section, Marcik
says he aims to have a beta
version out by the end of the
year and an initial release in
February 2006.
While Marcik is aiming his
development at MorphOS, the
end result will be open source
(under the LGPL and BSD
licences) and he says it should
not be a hard task for someone
to port it to Amiga OS 3.x or OS
4. If you would like to support
this development, there is a
bounty open on MorphZone.org
(standing just shy of $700 or
about £400 as I write) which will
go to the developer once the port
is complete and meets a set of
documented objectives.
For more details, screenshots
and a link to the bounty visit:
3CAG
If you live within a reasonable
distance of Peterborough in
the UK, then you’ll be pleased
to hear that a new Amiga user
group is being started by Paul
Hovell (known as The_Editor
on AmigaWorld.net and the
brains behind the Big Bash
series of Amiga shows). The
3 Counties Amiga Group
(3CAG) are aiming to hold
their first meeting in mid-
November and plan to charge
members only for the
meetings they attend. The
group are keen to recruit
members so if you are in the
area why not get in touch with
them, further details should
be available on their web site
by the time you read this:
Scalos is freeware and can
be downloaded from the link
below, note that the latest
releases are currently in Beta.
Marcik’s KHML-based test
browser showing ask.com and
MorphZone.org. The layout looks
pretty good!
Candy Factory 2 showing multiple project windows, the layer manager and combined toolboxes.
TOTAL
AMIGA
Winter 2005
6
7
     Features
SUBWAY USB
CATWEASEL MK IV
Troika Amy’05
R
ecently a company new to the
The Subway brings USB to the Amiga A1200
and now the A600 (when used with the
clockport adapter).
Access Amiga format floppy disks with the
Catweasel MK4 interface.
• Gb/100Mb/10Mb Ethernet port
using RTL8110 controller.
• 5 High Speed USB 2.0 ports: 3
rear and 2 front connectors.
• Two ATA 133 (IDE) channels (4
devices) using Sil0680 controller.
• 6-channel 5.1 surround sound
with audio headers. Support for
Line In, microphone (Analogue)
and SPDIF (digital).
• Two 33 Mhz, 32bit PCI slots
This PCI card connects to a floppy drive and
allows reading/writing to Amiga floppy disks
USB gives your Amiga access to many
standard peripherals such as mice, printers,
scanners and keyboards.
Amiga scene, Troika NG
announced that they are working
on a new PowerPC-based
motherboard to run Amiga OS 4.
Troika planned to show a prototype
of the board at Big Bash 3 in
September but unfortunately due
to component supply problems did
not have it ready in time. However
during the show specifications
were released along with the
board’s official name, Amy’05.
The Amy’05 is a flex ATX sized
motherboard measuring 170 by
191mm, making it slighly larger
than the mini ITX µA1-C but only
by 20mm on one side. A PPC
750Fx (G3) processor is soldered
directly to the board and is cooled
by a heat-sink and fan. Amy’05
uses a Tundra Semiconductor
Tsi107 northbridge, this is the
component that interfaces the PCI
bus, RAM and other systems to
the processor. System memory is
provided through 2 DIMM slots for
PC100/133 SDRAM up to 1GB in
total, inexpensive unbuffered
modules can be used. The
following functions are built into
the Amy’05:
Ideal for WinUAE/Amiga Forever.
Subway attaches to the clockport internally.
Fully registered USB Stack is included.
Shipped with drivers for Windows - many
other platform drivers are in development from
third party suppliers.
£69.99
£62.99
REDUCED!
ORDER CODE INTCAT004
ORDER CODE USBCTR001
You will notice that no “legacy”
ports such as PS/2 mouse, PS/2
keyboard, parallel or serial are
included. This reduces the
complexity of the board and
shouldn’t cause many problems as
USB devices are so widely
available. Users with USB storage
devices will be pleased to see the
inclusion of USB 2.0 high speed
which offers massively enhanced
transfer rates.
80GB IDE HARD DISK
X-SURF 3CC NETWORK CARD
The Amy’05 (part of a familiy of products called Prometheus) block
diagram showing the logical layout of its components.
Get your big box Amiga connected with this
Zorro network card.
Upgrade your AmigaOne with this great
80GB hard disk.
Troika seem to have been listening
to calls for an affordable way to
become an OS 4 user, and are
aiming to price the Amy’05 at less
than £400. To minimise production
costs the CPU is not upgradable
and no on-board graphics chip is
included. Users will need to
purchase an inexpensive PCI
graphics card to use with the
board. No doubt most Amiga
dealers will stock suitable cards
that are supported by OS 4.
The drive can be partitioned and formatted
on request ready for AmigaOS installation.
Now your Amiga can share files with other
networked computers (PCs & Macs)
Drive is 3.5” IDE, 7200RPM with 8MB Cache.
It can also share a broadband network
connection.
We now offer various additional services
such as Linux installation - please see
www.amigakit.com for costs.
Features RJ-45 and BNC connection. Ideal
for A1200 with Zorro, A2000, A3000 & A4000
£44.99
£73.99
ORDER CODE HDDIDE003
ORDER CODE NETZOR001
2.5” HARD DISK (4GB)
KICKFLASH OS4 (ZORRO)
KICKSTART 3.1 ROMS (A1200)
Q&A
Photos showing Amy’05 components ready for production, from left to right: A Tsi107 north bridge and design
manual, Tsi107s ready for use, various ancillary components inlcuding DIMM sockets.
Kickflash is a Zorro card that can be
used with any big box Amiga.
Upgrade your Amiga to the latest
Kickstart ROM chips in order to use
AmigaOS 3.1, 3.5 and 3.9
This 2.5” hard disk is ideal for the
A600 or A1200.
The basic version comes with 1Mb
Flash memory (upgradable to 1GB)
It is supplied fully formatted and
partitioned. All 2.5” drives that we
supply are preloaded with OSInstall
program that makes installation easier
We asked Troika some
questions that didn’t seem to be
answered in their press release
or in the FAQ section on their
We were sorry not to meet you
and see the Amy’05 at Big
Bash 3, what went wrong?
All our plans were to introduce
Amy’05 at the BB3 show. We all
worked very hard to be there,
but in the end it didn’t work out.
We had more posters, fliers and
the Amy’05 Rev.B would have
been shown in a beautiful case
that Simion Archer made for the
show.
We ran into a major problem at
the last minute. We used some
of the same sound components
in the Rev.B design as the µA1.
The parts were on order and
listed as available for some 6
weeks, we then received an
email telling us those parts were
no longer available. This trashed
all our plans for BB3 and the
sound system!
Given those problems, what
are your plans?
Our next step has been to take
out the sound system and get
the Rev.B board out, so that the
testing and porting can be
finished. We had other
improvements that would be
brought into the Rev.B1, some of
those have now made it into the
Rev. B board that should be out
by the time you read this.
Next steps follow as the Rev.B
board is tested and used, any
changes are made into the
Rev.B1 board. This board is then
tested and we might have a Rev
B2 board to test or Amy’05 will
become the Rev.C (commercial)
board for series production and
resale.
What inspired you to design
the Amy’05?
Many of the early ideas for
Amy’05 took shape at the time
the Mac Mini first came out. We
researched most of the talk from
AmigaWorld.net, along with
ideas and problems AmigaOne
users were having.
We wanted to make a complete
break from many of the legacy
parts used and wanted to move
OS 4 to some new levels
starting with USB 2.0. Amy’05
moves on to USB ports for the
mouse and keyboard.
What is the estimated release
date of the Amy’05?
Our goal is still for Amy’05 to
enter production this year. You
have to plan parts orders some
6-8 weeks in advance for
production runs, most of that
work is done for the first run.
Do you have plans to be able
to meet both the initial “pent-
up” demand for an OS 4
compatible board and
ongoing demand, avoiding
long waits between
production runs?
In our business plan, we have
two production runs scheduled
for 2005.
Do you plan to sell Amy’05
boards directly or will they be
sold via dealers?
We will use both sales methods,
different for each country. We
have a long list of Amiga dealers
that would love to have Amy’05
in their hands right now!
Will Amy’05 be licenced to run
OS 4?
We designed Amy’05 from the
start to run OS 4. Just less than
a year ago we contacted all the
parties involved in the OS 4
process and went to work on our
project. We operate very
differently than many
companies, and feel that fluffed
up news releases that end up
empty, are not worth our time or
your readers. Therefore don’t
expect us to have a major news
release on OS 4. It would be
unprofessional to comment on
our business dealings and we
would rather demo a working
product.
What other operating systems
will Amy’05 be able to run?
Various versions of Linux as
many of the components in our
design are used daily in the
embedded, and server markets.
Many different ROMs now in stock for
the full Classic Amiga range - check
www.amigakit.com for details
A Kickstart image can be copied into
the Flash memory for a quicker boot.
Many other hard disks in stock.
£18.99
£24.99
£36.99
ORDER CODE ZORKFL001
ORDER CODE AMIROM001
ORDER CODE HDDIDE004
LOGITECH ULTRA-X
BLIZZARD SCSI-IV KIT
512MB RAM (µAmigaOne)
The SCSI expansion kit for the
Blizzard 1230-IV / 1240 and 1260
accelerators. Fits onto the expansion
connector on these boards.
The Ultra-X keyboard is a stylish
silver design with laptop style keys.
Give your Micro AmigaOne 512MB of
memory with this upgrade.
For users who want a quality keyboard
that is aesthetically pleasing to look at.
Tested on the Micro AmigaOne before
delivery and comes with specific
fitting instructions.
Also features an additional SIMM
socket which will take up to 128MB
extra memory.
USB/PS2 fitting- ideal for AmigaOne
or A1200/A4000 with Lyra adapter.
£59.99
£24.99
£99.99
ORDER CODE SCSACC001
ORDER CODE LOGKEY002
ORDER CODE MEMAMI030
A600 CLOCKPORT ADAPTER
LYRA KEYBOARD INTERFACE (A1200)
LYRA KEYBOARD ADAPTER (A4000)
Lyra keyboard interface connects
over a chip on the A1200 motheboard
and permits an external Amiga or PC
keyboard to be attached.
Now your A3000/A4000 can use
standard PS/2 keyboards with this
adapter cable.
Use clockport expansions on your
Amiga A600 such as the Silver Surfer
and Subway USB.
We stock a range of keyboards.
This fits over a chip on the A600
motherboard and provides a working
clockport -just like the A1200!
Ideal for tower projects, the keyboard
connector is mounted on a backplane
£23.99
£19.99
£12.99
ORDER CODE ADAKEY002
ORDER CODE IDEINT001
ORDER CODE ADAKEY012
amigakit
.com
TM
PHONE (UK)
0870 199 9569
Many more products available at
www.amigakit.com
Shipping worldwide. P&P charges are subject to destination.
All products subject to price changes and availability. E&OE.
All orders subject to our conditions of sales and returns.
PHONE (US)
360 207 0349
TOTAL
AMIGA
FAX
+44 (0)870 706 4427
8
online amiga store
E-MAIL
sales@amigakit.co.uk
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