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REBOL, AMIGA/TAO & MICRO$OFT DOT-NET (Long!)

 [1/8] from: edinburgh:veitchi at: 29-Sep-2000 22:01


This one is for all you AMIGANS out there! Petr? Whilst perusing the Amiga website yesterday & reading about "The Amiverse" Amiga Digital Environment & it's various layers & foundation technologies, I came across the following sentence...... In addition, Amiga is working on a revolutionary common language that unites command line, scripting, control and serious application development. My immediate thoughts were this smells like REBOL. I've been reading snippets about the new Amiga plans for the last year or so, things like Amino / Aqua, Phoenix Consortium to the new Amiga/Tao platform & software development kit etc. How strong are the ties between REBOL & the new AMIGA environment ? Are REBOL independent or subsidiary in the whole Amiga scheme of things? Is REBOL/Express with /Command, /View and at some future date /Multimedia going to be the foundation for computing in the next decade or just as another jigsaw piece in the AMIVERSE built upon a Tao runs anywhere and everywhere operating system. Other integral parts of the Amiverse and Amiga Foundation Layers are built upon objects and applications which according to the Amiga SDK literature can be developed using the "Certified Worlds Fastest" Java Runtime Environment, GNU C Compiler Kit or in the bleeding edge TAO Virtual Processor Assembly Language. These languages compile to portable binaries than will run on every platform, processor & operating system that Tao Elate OS runs on. How does REBOL fit in here? As an integral part ? although I don't see anywhere that say this, or as something which is complementary to the Amiverse but somehow still separate and different. I think the whole platform independence space is going to become very crowded with a lot of different but similar technologies competing for the same mindshare. If REBOL are platform and operating system independent and not positioning themselves firmly & squarely behind the new Amiga developments then why did they pass up on the publicity & benefits which would have accrued from the much heralded QNX Product Announcements & Releases this week. Is it because QNX will compete for the same space as Amiga/Tao? or was just because with loads going on at REBOL just now with /Command, working on /Express, new developments to /Core & /View that a reliable working QNX version of /View was just not a high enough priority? Regards QNX , I remember reading a translation of an article which appeared in a German magazine from about a year ago in which Carl stated that in addition to using a Classic Amiga with his Kids' that he had been spending a lot of time using QNX Neutrino as well as BE operating system which he complimented as being based on taking the original goals of the Amiga & Apple Mac to the next level with todays technologies. REBOL have both QNX & BE versions currently in the works and certain experimental builds available, however I noticed that within weeks of the Amiga/Tao announcement a version of REBOL for Tao Elate appeared, again is this REBOL working in tandem with Amiga or shadowing them but ensuring REBOL works on all these platforms by themselves to ensure they have a fall back position. Modern multimedia applications are built upon three main things, hardware, i.e. CPU processor type, Operating System and lastly Graphics Layer. If REBOL truly are independent then having /View & later /Multimedia available across all & every platform is going to lead to having to maintain a truly enormous code base to cover every range of CPU + OS + Graphics Layer. Think about the whole multitude of possible permutations & combinations. A subset might be as follows; Intel 86 + MS Windows + GDI / Win32's PPC + Mac OS X + Aqua Intel 86 + BE OS + Be Media Layer PPC + BE OS + Be Media Layer Intel 86 + Linux + XFree86 Sparc + Linux + XFree86 PPC + Linux + XFree86 Intel 86 or Sparc or PPC etc + Linux + MicroWindows Intel 86 or Sparc or PPC etc + Linux + QT Embedded Every CPU + Tao Elate + Amiga Foundation Layers Every CPU + QNX + Photon Micro GUI Add in Solaris, Palm, Symbian, FreeBSD, Unix as well as NETBSD which runs on every platform known to man including ports to the Sega Dreamcast & Sony Playstation then the list of combinations becomes huge. Can REBOL independently support all this menagerie of hardware & software ? True the embedded & device market is going to be huge, and on a will involve computing on a much more pervasive & integrated & massive scale than we've seen hitherto in the personal computer & workstation era. The next generation of digital televisions, games consoles, screen & keyboard WEB telephones, handheld computers etc are going to be everywhere & really bring computing into the everyday lives of the masses so there will be space for everyone like Rebol, Amiga, QNX, Linux, Be, Microsoft Palm, as well as Sony, Sega & Nintendo who are all aiming to get as much of this enlarged computing pie. Who will win? Who will fall by the wayside? The current picture is so big that it's hard to see it clearly from all the possible angles and who's technologies will emerge as the major players. If I was a betting man I would be thinking along the lines of; Microsoft Linux / Free Software Variants Amiga / Tao QNX Be Intel Sony Sega Nintendo Into this mix through Language technology and I believe that we have a great future & potential with REBOL, maybe not in it's current guise or ownership, we'll see how REBOL increasing in popularity plays out with regards to the Major Computer Giants either Buying it Out or developing their compatible implementations and also once open source implementations become available. Open Source maybe the only way viable to support every platform with REBOL, that way platform developers & enthusiasts could be responsible for maintaining & developing REBOL like technology on their chosen platform. Carl Sassenrath & a consortium of parties with major interests in REBOL as a technology could develop & write standards & specifications for REBOL, whilst platform specific implementation is left to each platform group. Aside from REBOL, JAVA now stands as the most popular Language currently in use on the planet, with massive resources devoted to it in industry & education, I don't see this changing anytime soon. Whilst it may not be our cup of tea, it's obviously massively popular & will continue to be a significant technology for modern software development. REBOL's popularity will undoubtedly continue to grow but will only become mainstream once currently missing features like multimedia are implemented and it becomes possible to develop plug-in components for REBOL to enable a wider & more rapid development of REBOL's capabilities as a technology, the growing trend towards open source in technology will also affect REBOL's prospects until capable open source implementations are available. Which bring me finally to everyones favourite baddie, the worlds biggest & richest & popular ( by installed / monopolistic numbers! ) software compnany, Micro$oft (or Microshaft as some might say.) They do & will continue to have an enormous impact of the whole of the computer industry, even if they are split up, they will not simply go away, the will continue to be the biggest & most powerful players in the market. They are too big & too powerful simply to go away. The massive installed base of Windows means they will continue to enjoy substantial income & profits for years to come with their bi-annual upgrade & replacement strategies. What are their plans to protect their massive advantage, financial income & power, as well as fight of JAVA, Linux & Open Source / Free Software and grab a lions share of the forecasted massive growth in the embedded & computer devices market ? Answer Windows.Net ( That's in marketing speak DOT NET ! ) Although Purley Imaginative & Fictional Vaporware at present Microsoft has announced plans & strategies based on the growing use of XML & Internet technologies to integrate these more & more into future releases of their operating system & application software, they're also promoting web-services which is software & applications in which data can reside anywhere or everywhere on the internet & is provided as a service for a fee or a subscription package to the user. Central to this new DOT NET world of distributed applications & data storage will be the COMMON LANGUAGE RUNTIME. Similar in concept to the JAVA engine this will be an interpreter & compiler for programs which will produce executables which will run identically across the whole spectrum of platforms on which the Common Language Runtime operates. This wil be possible probably by using some kind of portable byte-code like Java. What will be innovative about the Common Language Runtime will be that you can program for it in a mutlitude of languages which is plans to support. For example the will be Compilers & Interpreters for the Common Language Runtime for Visual Basic, C++, C#, Java, COBOL, Perl, Python, Delphi TCL etc, in this way developers & companies can protect their existing investments & sunk costs in their favoured language technology whilst still producing software which works on the all the platforms the CLR supports. Whilst the API's to support all these various languages will by necessity need to be open and transparent on a scale hitherto unthinkable in terms of Microsoft, I've no doubt in my mind that the Common Language Runtime will be highly proprietary and will be the mechanism by which Microsoft will endeavour to maintain their iron grip and domination of the computer industry. The Windows operating system like most operating systems in the new distributed paradigm will continue to be eroded in terms of importance of use & income / profitability as newer, better & cheaper operating systems continue to be developed like Tao, Be, QNX, NetBSD, Embedded Linux etc. Who controls the lions share of the distributed applications engine market will control the future of computing. In this way Microsoft & their common language runtime will battle it out for supremacy with Amiga/Tao, Linux + JAVA etc. How will REBOL fare in this new world? They have the right ideas & a great technology in development but can they muster the resources to support all the platforms and gain developer mindshare away from JAVA & M$ Dot Net. Can they do it alone or will it require the assistance of a Sun, IBM or HP to buy them out. Will Open Source be a part of the answer? Will Carl & Co. throw in their lot & hitch their wagons to the success to the new Amiga Digital Environment & the "AMIVERSE". Sometimes I also think back to Carl's early comments about REBOL being a two phase masterplan. Firstly a better means of expression, which we see in REBOL the language that we all know & love. Secondly a better means of operation, a small, compact & powerful operating system closely tied to the language. This thought continues to bug me as I try to elicit meaning from the deliberately evasive description. Does this mean that by developing threads, processess & multitasking for REBOL as well as enabling a way to compiling to executable that we can have a REBOL operating system in the same way that FORTH can be it's own contained environment encompassing Language, Compiler, Interactive Interpreter, round robin Multitasking Operating System as well as Application programs built on top. Is this what Carl's cryptic announcement meant, because that really would be something REBOLUTIONARY. He has the knowlege & experience to create such a beast or did he simply mean building a REBOL engine on top of a modern, small, powerful & progressive operating system like a Be, QNX or Amiga/Tao. Only time will tell us the answers, however Iam sure that REBOL the technology has a great future and we on this list will do well to follow it's progress & try to help shape it's future to our liking and ensure success & prosperity for Carl, the REBOL team and not forgetting ourselves. I just hope and pray that in 5 years time I'm not here on this list trying to drum up encouragement for OSCAR: :REBOL an open source REBOL for the insidious Micro$oft Common Language Runtime. Anyway, sorry everbody for this absurdly long rant about REBOL and the future of distributed computing, this is my two cents worth, however it will be an area which will have a profound affect on all us REBOLLERS, so let me know if you agree or disagree with anything I've said. Anyway Petr, What does that blurb on the Amiga Website mean when it says Amiga is developing............etc. Cheers, Mark Dickson

 [2/8] from: ryanc::iesco-dms::com at: 29-Sep-2000 14:57


Gee Mark, I think we got more than 2 cents worth, more like $5. Anyways, I must agree that there seems to be alot of uncertainty building in the computer industry as of late. I think what somebody said about the OS becoming a commodity is pretty close to what we will be seeing. Yeah thats alot of work for REBOL, but fortuneately much less for those using such technologies. --Ryan PS: Have you heard the particularly large thumps of Micro$ofts recent product releases. They have been constricting their license holders a little bit trying to drum up cash lately too. I think they possibly might be trying to avoid taking a hit in q4 forecasts. Ryan Cole Programmer Analyst www.iesco-dms.com 707-468-5400 I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world. -Einstein

 [3/8] from: carl:cybercraft at: 30-Sep-2000 12:00


On 30-Sep-00, [edinburgh--veitchi--co--uk] wrote:
> This one is for all you AMIGANS out there! Petr? > Whilst perusing the Amiga website yesterday & reading about "The
<<quoted lines omitted: 4>>
> development. " > My immediate thoughts were this smells like REBOL.
I assume this is what's going under the code-name "Sheep"? Anyway, while the above may remind you of REBOL, to most Amiga users its sounds like an extended ARexx. ARexx is a language to allow applications to communicate and control each other and has been part of the Amiga OS since Workbench 2. (circa 1990?)
> I've been reading snippets about the new Amiga plans for the last > year or so, things like Amino / Aqua, Phoenix Consortium to the new > Amiga/Tao platform & software development kit etc. > How strong are the ties between REBOL & the new AMIGA environment ? > Are REBOL independent or subsidiary in the whole Amiga > scheme of things?
Independent, I'm pretty sure. The current Amiga Inc. have only existed since the beginning of this year. (Gateway owned Amiga before that, and still own the Amiga patents.) REBOL (going by what's been said on this list of late) is now around four years old.
> Is it because QNX will compete for the same space as Amiga/Tao? > or was just because with loads going on at REBOL just now > with /Command, working on /Express, new developments to > /Core & /View that a reliable working QNX version of /View > was just not a high enough priority?
Core is available for both the new Amiga and QNX RTP. And View isn't, as it isn't for the Mac. No favoritism here as far as I can see. I'm sure RT would like View on as many platforms as possible, as I'm sure they'd like it finished and out of Beta by now too. The later probably has quite a high prioity - hopefully... (: Someone said here that REBOL's not on the latest RedHat Linux either. Perhaps they've decided they'd rather not have it on OS distributions to stop accusations of them favouring one platform over another?
> If REBOL truly are independent then having /View & later /Multimedia > available across all & every platform is going to lead to having to
<<quoted lines omitted: 20>>
> Can REBOL independently support all this menagerie of > hardware & software ?
Why not? I assume there's just a bottom layer to REBOL that accesses the OS it's running on. This bottom layer is all they'd need to re-write for each new OS that appears. They can port Core pretty quickly going by the 40+ platforms it's already on. How quickly View will be able to ported after they finish it remains to be seen, but doesn't it occure to you that putting REBOL on new platforms quickly is probably part of its design specs?
> Open Source maybe the only way viable to support every platform with > REBOL, that way platform developers & enthusiasts could be
<<quoted lines omitted: 9>>
> popular & will continue to be a significant technology for modern > software development.
Which is all well and good, so how come Java's not on the Classic Amiga yet? (Other than that RT poached Holger away from us, but I'm sure he's having way more fun with REBOL than he was with the Amiga Java port, even if he's not allowed to sleep any more.:) And where's the Classic Amiga port of Mozilla? It's Open Source, isn't it? Should be a breeze to port compared to reverse-engineering an unfinished language such as REBOL, shouldn't it? Open Source has its place, but I have my doubts it's a good way of providing consistent versions of the same software across a wide variety of platforms.

 [4/8] from: petr:krenzelok:trz:cz at: 30-Sep-2000 2:30


----- Original Message ----- From: <[carl--cybercraft--co--nz]> To: <[list--rebol--com]> Sent: Saturday, September 30, 2000 2:00 AM Subject: [REBOL] Re: REBOL, AMIGA/TAO & MICRO$OFT DOT-NET (Long!)
> On 30-Sep-00, [edinburgh--veitchi--co--uk] wrote: > > This one is for all you AMIGANS out there! Petr?
<<quoted lines omitted: 10>>
> applications to communicate and control each other and has been part > of the Amiga OS since Workbench 2. (circa 1990?)
You are both wrong here. Sheep is the name of new scripting language for Amiverse, and it's being done by Vouter, author of famous AmigaE. There is no relation to REBOL. REBOL is multiplatform, but Sheep will be more like arrex, as system integration matters ... -pekr-

 [5/8] from: petr:krenzelok:trz:cz at: 30-Sep-2000 2:45


----- Original Message ----- From: <[edinburgh--veitchi--co--uk]> To: <[list--rebol--com]> Sent: Friday, September 29, 2000 11:01 PM Subject: [REBOL] REBOL, AMIGA/TAO & MICRO$OFT DOT-NET (Long!)
> If REBOL truly are independent then having /View & later /Multimedia > available across all & every platform is going to lead to having to
<<quoted lines omitted: 13>>
> Every CPU + Tao Elate + Amiga Foundation Layers > Every CPU + QNX + Photon Micro GUI
RT would be just insane to do so. Noone can imho handle so many versions. At that time, I believe we will be using real componentised system, so you will have just one .exe per platform, with set of loadable/unloadable components available ... -pekr-

 [6/8] from: carl:cybercraft at: 30-Sep-2000 13:55


On 30-Sep-00, [petr--krenzelok--trz--cz] wrote:
> ----- Original Message ----- > From: <[carl--cybercraft--co--nz]>
<<quoted lines omitted: 20>>
> AmigaE. There is no relation to REBOL. REBOL is multiplatform, but > Sheep will be more like arrex, as system integration matters ...
So, doesn't... In addition, Amiga is working on a revolutionary common language that unites command line, scripting, control and serious application development. refer to Sheep?

 [7/8] from: ptretter:charter at: 30-Sep-2000 10:36


Microsoft is getting ready for Win2k Datacenter Release and have been pushing hard. Shortley to release 64 bit Win2k as well. Microsoft is getting ready to hit the market place real hard. Doubling the offices in North Carolina (Charlotte) for support of upcoming products. They have decided to let the vendors provide full support of OS and Hardware when running Datacenter. Plus the release of the .NET applications is ramping them up. So much stuff coming out of Microsoft lately that its hard to keep up. Paul Tretter

 [8/8] from: jean:holzammer:faedv-n:bayern at: 4-Oct-2000 8:00


> You are both wrong here. Sheep is the name of new scripting language for > Amiverse, and it's being done by Vouter, author of famous AmigaE.
Wouter van Oortmerssen, really ? Cool ! E is my favourite compiler language. :) Jean

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