foss-north 2018: Atari ST Free Operating Systems

[BlankVector]

Last week, I made a presentation at foss-north 2018, in Gothenburg, Sweden. Subtitles will be available soon.

Main topics were GCC, EmuTOS, FreeMiNT, emulators... but also, many software and exotic hardware. Basically, it shows what can be done with FreeMiNT distributions, on various hardware.

You can also download all the slides as PDF from my speaker page.

This was also a good opportunity to meet nice Atari people

[wongck]

Thanks for sharing.
Saw it without subtitles, and it was easily understood. No problems.

[LynXX]

Hey awesome talk to get a good overview of the community efforts around the Atari! I was always a bit confused with AES, VDI, Mint and stuff (having mostly used STs) and that cleared up a lot of things! The hardware part was really interesting too!

Thank you very much for sharing! Merci!

[dhedberg]

Thanks for this! Had I known you'd visit Sweden I'd have tried to make a trip to Gothenburg to see the presentation live and meet up with you!
Great presentation!

[Cyprian]

Great job Vincent
I saw it yesterday on Apollo core forum.
That presentation/thread should be pinned in this forum.

[Faucon2001]

Great presentation Vincent.
It’s amazing to see all together the work done by the community.

[1st1]

Very good presentation, it givs a total overview about current situation.

Next step should be to unite all kinds of MiNT Distributions (see Vincents presentation, I think all flavours are listed), packages and so ob to get something what functions "out of the box" on all (Emu)TOS supported platforms, one installation image which runs on (accelerated) ST/STE/TT/Falcon, Firebee, Hades, Milan, Eagle, Amiga-Vampire, Atari-Vampire, Suska, MiST(er), RaPi, Aranym, Hatari, and so on. With well prepconfigured desktop, tools, developer tools, applications, games, etc for a successfull start. It should have the same look & feel on all supported platforms as close as the hardware (mainly graphics card, amount of RAM, CPU speed/compatibility) supports it, having a good and working, well preconfigured set of tools, applications, games, with good documentation for installation recommendations, compatibility list for more applications, working and easy to use online/offline update etc?

[Atarieterno]

Great presentation, congratulations.

[mikro]

Next step should be to unite all kinds of MiNT Distributions (see Vincents presentation, I think all flavours are listed), packages and so ob to get something what functions "out of the box" on all (Emu)TOS supported platforms

Actually Faucon2001 has done a huge step forward in this area. You don't need to be a software developer to offer something like this. So whoever takes up the task...

And of course hats off Vincent and thanks for showing my name in front of Swedish audience so many times. ;-)

[vido]

Great stuff Vincent!
I think this is the step in the right direction to make people more interested into future of Atari platform!
it should be more such presentations ...

[simonsunnyboy]

Great slides giving a spot-on overview of everything Atari! Well done and maybe something to answer many FAQs.

[1st1]

Next step should be to unite all kinds of MiNT Distributions (see Vincents presentation, I think all flavours are listed), packages and so ob to get something what functions "out of the box" on all (Emu)TOS supported platforms

Actually Faucon2001 has done a huge step forward in this area.

Tell more about this. Is there a link?

[BlankVector]

Thanks to everyone for all your kind words

Actually Faucon2001 has done a huge step forward in this area.

Tell more about this. Is there a link?

Just in case:
There are many hyperlinks in the PDF. Just click project names, pictures... and your browser will open the relevant page.

BTW, Faucon2001's work is BeeKey/BeePi.

[Melies]

Excellent presentation, thanks for sharing !

[Faucon2001]

Next step should be to unite all kinds of MiNT Distributions (see Vincents presentation, I think all flavours are listed), packages and so ob to get something what functions "out of the box" on all (Emu)TOS supported platforms

Actually Faucon2001 has done a huge step forward in this area.

Tell more about this. Is there a link?

Yes in my signature.

[1st1]

Hello Philippe, thank you for this. Interesting. Did you considder to enhance your MiNT distribution to be able to install it also on real Atari (compatible) hardware, like TT, Falcon, Firebee, Milan, Hades, Eagle, ST with Turbocards+Alt/TT-RAM, Vampirized ST/Amiga? Yes, i think, this might be a bit more complicated as there could be a lot of different CPU support levels (68000, 020, 030, 040, 060, Apollo-68080, Coldfire) and graphics cards (original Atari hardware, different VME-cards (Matrix, Nova, ...,), CTPCI+Mach64, SuperVidel, SAGA, Firebee, ...). But I wish someone would do this,as EasyMinT ist abandoned since 3 years and still not perfect and now packages outdated. Do you have contact to Stefan Niedegge, who is currently building the Amitari MiNT distribution for Amiga+Vampire? I think a contact to him should be good to get a unified MiNT distribution for all platforms, which installs the same way on original hardware, on new hardware and in emulator.

[joska]

VanillaMiNT works on most real hardware, including Amiga. No "unix"-stuff though.

Not sure if it's a good idea to create one single MiNT distribution to cover all needs. It will almost certainly only cover 80% of the needs for 80% of the users. It's more important to improve stability and performance, and make it easier for users to get started either on their real hardware or on some emulator. Even today, most Atari users does not use MiNT. So there is a potential here, even if it's a small one

[lp]

Very nice presentation. I was surprised to see a slide with GFA/GBE.

[1st1]

Vanilla could be a start, but after it is installed, it is very simple, light and unusable. Just an empty basic desktop. Compare with EasyAramint, Amitari, BeeKey, BeePi and BeeBox, you boot it up, it looks nice with color effects, nice backround on desktop, preinstalled applications for many needs, working internet access and applications, games and so on.

Let's base it on Vanilla or whatever, let it mount an application drive which is similar in functionality as those mentioned above. I tryed that, based on EasyMint, it's not that easy, the bad thing is, if it fails for some reason (incompatible app, missing or old packages, etc.), it hangs up, I need to reset, reboot, long filecheck (allmost 1 hr), confused.

[Faucon2001]

Did you considder to enhance your MiNT distribution to be able to install it also on real Atari (compatible) hardware, like TT, Falcon, Firebee, Milan, Hades, Eagle, ST with Turbocards+Alt/TT-RAM, Vampirized ST/Amiga?

No, it is not part of my priorities for now, may be in a "not so close" future. I build this distribution mainly for Aranym, though it works with only some light modifications on a Falcon (by changing FVDI by Videl Inside, activating NVDI screen drivers and changing Mint Kernel and drivers), and some tricks on a Firebee (more tricky indeed). So it's possible, but it's not for the faint hearted.

Yes, i think, this might be a bit more complicated as there could be a lot of different CPU support levels (68000, 020, 030, 040, 060, Apollo-68080, Coldfire) and graphics cards (original Atari hardware, different VME-cards (Matrix, Nova, ...,), CTPCI+Mach64, SuperVidel, SAGA, Firebee, ...).

I understand the concept you want a Real distribution ala OSX, Windows and Linux, but that's another story, this is a hell of a task which will need a lot of involvement of many people with all the hardware you are mentioning. It's a comunity project indeed, but I am afraid that it would interest in the end very little users. Forget using EasyMint on a 6800 with 4mb, and even my CT60 Falcon feels slow with EasyMint.

Do you have contact to Stefan Niedegge, who is currently building the Amitari MiNT distribution for Amiga+Vampire? I think a contact to him should be good to get a unified MiNT distribution for all platforms, which installs the same way on original hardware, on new hardware and in emulator.

No, but I will. I am glad to see that his distribution his based on BeeKey (which is based on EasyAraMint ( which is based on EasyMint)), so it's seems we are allready in the good direction

The best answer that we have now is Vanila Mint, thanks to Joska work. It does what it is asked for, it's light, it works on almost every hardware and emulators, and the user is free to go in the direction he wants afterward. It doesn't integrate all the tools of BeeKey, but that's not its aim neither.

[joska]

Vanilla could be a start, but after it is installed, it is very simple, light and unusable. Just an empty basic desktop. Compare with EasyAramint, Amitari, BeeKey, BeePi and BeeBox, you boot it up, it looks nice with color effects, nice backround on desktop, preinstalled applications for many needs, working internet access and applications, games and so on.

"Unusable"? Not what I've heard from the people that have downloaded it. You seem to miss the point with it. It is exactly the opposite of EasyMiNT, BeeKey etc - it's small, light and works on real hardware. It's not "unix" at all, it's multitasking GEM with networking. All configuration is done with GEM applications, no config file editing, no complicated installation, no complicated, scripted boot-process. Just GEM.

EasyMiNT and it's successors are quite heavy stuff, VanillaMiNT isn't. EasyMiNT and it's successors has lots of features, VanillaMiNT is GEM-focused. Different distros for different needs. VanillaMiNT is a derivate of the FreeMiNT setup I made for the Firebee, which was made to prove a point: MiNT can be an alternative for users which only wants to multitask GEM applications and maybe use simple online tools like ftp and mail.

[1st1]

The intersting on MiNT is, besides Multitasking, the integration of a kind of Unix system with all it's tools, X, networking and other possibilities. That is what I like on a full installation of EasyMint. But I dislike that it looks so incomplete compared to EasyAraMint.

Imagine a Vanilla- or EasyMint installation, which mounts a partition with the content of EasyAraMint/BeeKey with all it's applications, look & feel. I tryed to do that based on EasyMinT on my TT, but I failed, many apps and so are crashing and I don't know why, and I don't get the same look & feel of EasyAraMint. This partiton's content could be simply unzipped from an archive of the installer. That partiton already mounted on the same drive letter (example: u:/v and v:). The main work would be to make two packets, the hardware dependent basic installer which installs MiNT kernel and VDI based on CPU and graphics type, and generate the application-ZIP which is hardware-independent (except for Coldfire stable apps).

Imagine one MiNT distribution, which installs on whatever (Emu)TOS running hardware, which looks exactly the same everywhere. This is what Linux made successfull, those Slackware, SuSe, RedHatsa, easy to install, ready to use. A lot of peoples fail to install the current MinT distributions, there is still too much to edit config files, add other XIF for special network cards, missing packages to support some applications and whatever... On my TT, after a MiNT crash, it takes allmost 1 hour until I can continue testing, ext2 fsck of 32 GB partition takes that long, frustrating and showstopper...

By the way, here is the link to Amitari: http://www.apollo-core.com/knowledge.ph ... 9&z=4jbj8e I have to check, he calls himself "Beetle", in german Atari forum and here is also someone with that name, maybe the same? @Beetle?

[vido]

Imagine one MiNT distribution, which installs on whatever (Emu)TOS running hardware, which looks exactly the same everywhere

You cant do this with applications without having sources and be able to patch/compile them for every Atari platform.
Applications which would run on most of the Atari platforms arent that much. Mostly ported from other platforms ...

[joska]

You cant do this with applications without having sources and be able to patch/compile them for every Atari platform.
Applications which would run on most of the Atari platforms arent that much. Mostly ported from other platforms ...

I have yet to find an Atari (or "Atari") that 1ST Word does not run on. The majority of GEM applications works everywhere.

[joska]

The intersting on MiNT is, besides Multitasking, the integration of a kind of Unix system with all it's tools, X, networking and other possibilities. That is what I like on a full installation of EasyMint.

Yes, this is what you like. But it's also what I dislike I use Linux on my PC's. I have no need to run the same programs on an inferior platform. I use Ataris to run GEM software.

As I said, you can't please all the users with a single distribution. Needs and preferences differs too much for that.

The main work would be to make two packets, the hardware dependent basic installer which installs MiNT kernel and VDI based on CPU and graphics type, and generate the application-ZIP which is hardware-independent (except for Coldfire stable apps).

The problem is that on several platform you depend on copyrighted drivers. You can't make a single distribution that installs everything from scratch on all platforms without violating copyrights.

A lot of peoples fail to install the current MinT distributions, there is still too much to edit config files, add other XIF for special network cards, missing packages to support some applications and whatever...

This is why I created VanillaMiNT. Follow the simple instructions when installing on supported hardware and it works. Yes, you need to copy the XIF for your network card, but that's it. You don't have to touch any config files at all. Yes, VanillaMiNT is very basic, that's the entire point of it. Most Atari users are not familiar with unix, and only need to run GEM applications.

On my TT, after a MiNT crash, it takes allmost 1 hour until I can continue testing, ext2 fsck of 32 GB partition takes that long, frustrating and showstopper...

This is what happens when you try to emulate a multi-GHz system on a 30 year old computer. SCSI on your TT is ~2Mb/s, validating 32Gb will necessary take some time. Also, interpreting and running the boot scripts take time. And to be honest - even with everything set up there is still too many niggles. Things are just not solid enough, and all the unix services are using a lot of memory and (on stock hardware) a lot of CPU resources.