Reader Mail

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                               Reader Mail
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From: Nicolas Franck <gryzor@club-internet.fr>
Subject: Mods Anthology Review in AR411

Hello Jason!

I'm the author of the Mods Anthology CDROM, and I've *just* found out that
you had reviewed it in a previous AR issue! (shame on me ;)

First, thanks for this!

Secondly, I read that you didn't manage to use the "MAFind" tool?

I quote you:

> There is an informative AmigaGuide readme file included and a search
> facility.  Unfortunately, the search script does not seem to work
> completely on my system: it will locate strings in song titles on all
> four CDs, but will not interactively load them.

I guess that you forgot to do something _important_ before running MAFind,
either:

- Forgot to execute the "Click_Me_First" script (on any CD)?

      These scripts include some important 'Assign' commands, *required*
      for MAFind to be able to send the mods to Delitracker from the
      AmigaGuide just-built document.

- Forgot to launch Delitracker!? eheh this may happen...

- Forgot to launch "RexxMast" in your system? It is of course needed.


Otherwise, I don't know what happened... but you must have forgotten
something, as the MAFind worked very well for all other users.

Too bad that you didn't manage, because MAFind is really a strong point
of this collection! Those who hadn't any problem to make it run were all
very delighted with its power, believe me ;)

Best regards,

Nicolas
gryzor@club-internet.fr

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From: ROI@hotline.pfalz.de (EMMANUEL HENNÉ)
Subject: Re: AMIGA - What pisses *YOU* off? Take note JASON COMPTON!

"Captain !"-"Yes, Data ?"-"There`s an incoming subspace message concerning
"Re: AMIGA - What pisses *YOU* off?  Take note JASON COMPTON!"!"-"Who sent
it ?"-
"Jason Compton, Sir."
"To the captain`s lounge, Mr Data."


Thanks a lot, Jason, for AR 415.

Do You have the FIRST of all AReports still on Your harddisk ?
That must be a collector`s item, could You send it to me :) ?

CU,

Emmanuel


-    Amiga Report 1.01, and all back issues, are available on Aminet.  I 
     wasn't even an AR reader when the first issue came out, I started
     reading in AR 1.14 and had my first article published in 1.19...and
     the rest is history... - Jason

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From: Donald Feldbruegge <dhfeldbr@facstaff.wisc.edu>
Subject: Amiga Thoughts

Hello Jason,

I have been following (with interest) the recent series of posts about
QuikPak and VIScorp, and the effect on the future of the Amiga.  I decided
to make a brief, private, non-inflammatory comment. 

If you are correct about the inability of the many interested parties to
work together for the future of the Amiga, then I fear that the A4000 was
the last Amiga that will ever be produced.  I hope you are wrong this time,
but my gut feeling is that you may be correct.  I don't think that any of
the companies, individually, has the needed resources (people and/or money)
to produce an Amiga.  I doubted that VIScorp could pull off the computer
along with the set-top box.  My feeling is that QuikPak can manufacture,
advertise and sell; however, Operating System and hardware design is beyond
their capabilities.  I think that PIOS has probably lost interest in the
AmigaOS, but would be unable to deal with manufacturing and selling, if it
were to regain interest.  Each company, alone, has strengths and
weaknesses.  If any of them try to do the whole thing alone, they will fail
due to lavk of resources.  What was the old saying about "together we may
succeed, but individually we will undoubtedly fail." I know that each of
the companies has their own interests, but I feel an alliance would benefit
all of them.  If they can't work together, I don't think that the Amiga
name and AT property is worth anything at all.

As I said, I hope you are wrong, but you are probably correct.  In that
case, we had better stop worrying about the Amiga and start to think about
what is the best replacement.  Otherwise the whole market will finally
fragment (PIOS ONE, A\BOX, who knows what else) and there will be no
successor at all.  Of course, I suppose that I could just shrug my
shoulders and say that my Amigas are working fine; however, there will be
no future software developement and I will eventually end up in a time-warp
like the Amiga.  :-)

Enough of my comments.

Best wishes,
Donald Feldbruegge


-    Mr. Feldbruegge is referring to posts where I expressed doubts that a
     successful "consortium of Amiga companies" could be put together to
     jointly purchase the Amiga.  I stand by what I said, and it's backed
     up by a number of the exact companies that people like to bring up in
     this sort of discussion.  This doesn't mean I have no hope for the
     continuation of the Amiga--quite the opposite--but I just don't find
     that particular scenario realistic.  But yes, it will definitely be
     worth watching the Amiga-spawned technologies and where they go.
     - Jason
 
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From: "Eric Fortier" <cfortier@clic.net>
Subject: Letter to the editor

Hello Jason.

I would like to thank you for your commitment to AR.  1997 will hopefully
be a better year, and I wish you receive the credit you deserve.

First, regarding Windows 95.  As a programmer, computer phreak and
Amigaphile, I was anxious to get my hands on Windows 95 when it came out in
August 1995.  When i first installed it, it crashed, and I had to reformat
my drive.  But when it ran correctly, it was great!

A new better interface, faster response to various activities, more
robustness, it all made perfect sense!  Then, I started REALLY using it. 
Ho boy, do I miss the Amiga!  But why?  Windows 95 is a MUCH more powerfull
OS!  it's has built-in virtual memory which is quite reliable!  Built-in
drivers for internet protocols and "almost" any devices, modems, cards,
ect!  a really cool taskbar that allows you to very easily switch programs!
A System Tray which has mini icons representing various system utilities
curently running which you can simply point and click to acces!  and so
much more!!

Well, there are various reason why now, almost 1 1/2 year later I
absolutely *HATE* windows 95 (soon to be 97).  The system is so complex
it's incredibly Crash-Prone.  I won't get into more Windows 95 bashing, but
I just want to spill my guts: It's because of such piece of software that
we can't get along with just 16 megs of memory.  It's because of such
software that we can't stand our 486 computers anymore.  It's HUUUGE,
unoptimized.  It's build as a pre-emptive OS on a computer that has only 1
processor.  What's the deal here?  Ha well, I guess newsgroups such as
alt.windows95.crash.crash.crash have a reason to exist.

And from this I would like to link to a letter Gustav Kjeldsen wrote you
regarding MUI.  This "Toolkit" is the embodiment of everything I don't like
about today's Computers and OSes.  It give people easier things to use at
the expense of system resources.  I agree that it's an incredible piece of
software.  it provide users with very advanced system configuration
options.  But to have EVERY program use this?  I don't think so.  Or if
they would, we'd all have to get more memory and processor updates REAL
soon.

To quote Gustav: "Nobody could be dissatisfied with that...  Unless they
WANT something different, but then they won't follow ANY standard, and
that's not too admireable..." I wouldn't have said that to people of Newtek
when they were making the first release of the Toaster!

You see, that is exactly what people feels like.  Get with the flow!  don't
try and do things on your own, you won't succeed!  Go with standards!  It's
easier!  Don't Reinvent the wheel!

And I just hope you don't think i'm getting this from my sick psyche.  As a
Windows programmer, I'm on several mailing list, and receive ~100 emails
everyday.  I can tell you that many developpers think in the line of "I
won't do this software for anything below a pentium 90, people WILL
switch!" This is what Microsoft tought, and today, due to competition, they
provide Windows 3.1 users with their very own version of Internet Explorer.

On another topic I would like to talk about the future of the Amiga.

First, my personal views are that we need to embrace what first made the
Amiga a success.  Unique hardware.  This is to my opinion the only way a
computer can really stand apart.  a PC box is just that.  a box with an
Intel processor in it.  But there is a catch.  A PC Pentium motherboard
without the processor goes for around $130 canadian dollars.  It all comes
down to the price.  The hardware must be so unique as to provide people
with such power that the price would be worth it.  And to my opinion it's
not possible by embracing all the current PC standards.  The only way I see
that a computer can be profitable is by the brainstorming of people,
pushing to make new developments in the area of hardware.  In that respect,
the only company I can support is Phase 5 which stand by these same
principles.

Coupled with the right software, something really new and improved,better
and more pleasing can be made.  The OS must be utterely configurable and
should come with the basic tools used to maintain/use it: File manager,
backup software, disk salvage/defragmenter, builtin internet support, ect.
And it should not take 70 megs on your HD!  (my windows directoy is
actually 90.3 megs, excluding VM swapfile)

These are some of my views.  In it's current state, the Amiga is fun, but
outragously underpowered.  In the future, it should be highly modular,
powered by the state of the art technology and Unique hardware.

I thank you for reading this long email and wish you a really good and
properous new year.

Eric Fortier - RIR/TechLogic - Quality Document Imaging for all sizes

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