OS/2, eCS & ArcaOS - Technical > Setup & Installation
Is eComStation DEAD?
dbanet:
--- Quote from: David Kiley on August 02, 2014, 09:43:17 pm ---
--- Quote from: Boris on August 02, 2014, 08:44:06 pm ---becuase realized that arguing here makes completely no sense.
I support Martin's point of view.
--- End quote ---
Honestly your arguing is useful since it got us considering alternative kernels such as reactos which actually makes a lot of sense.
So if you have some thoughts feel free to share :)
--- End quote ---
Touché.
Alex Taylor:
--- Quote from: David Kiley on August 02, 2014, 08:31:25 am ---Like, the core linux kernel is already mature, with 90% hardware support and support for existing technologies (64 bit etc).
Why not make a new linux distribution, using the already existing technology - and then focuse on specific things that could make it more like os/2?
For example if we the community created a linux distro with a WPS like desktop experience, it would effectly become a new os/2 at least from the user gui experience.
So then instead of having to create a completely new os, now you can just focus all the effort on the desktop experience, since os/2 has a very unique WPS interface that has never been replicated.
And who knows, as we get more users, then you could futher add features, like an os/2 "classic" emulator that can run native os/2 & dos apps - similar to what apple did with os/x.
So yeah.. I think we could aim for a new os called Lin/2 :).
--- End quote ---
This has been proposed many times, and in fact was attempted at least once: IIRC this was basically what the Voyager project was about, although I think they went with another OS kernel rather than Linux.
I've never been a fan of the idea... at least, not if it takes the approach of simply creating a WPS on top of a whole Linux OS. I think it's sad to imply that what makes OS/2 special is nothing more than the GUI experience.
You can take a Ferrari's chassis, dash and seats, and stick them onto the innards of a Volvo... but what you end up with will not be a Ferrari. It might be a nice car, but neither Ferrari lovers nor Volvo lovers would likely be impressed.
muffetta:
Certainly respect all your points of view, but also do some considerations, and evaluate them without the devotion and love of the passionate, partly because I too am an OS2 fan:
If I plan a project that resembles a complete rewrite of an operating system (based on which model, open or closed source is of little importance) and I have only two programmers, I know that in the best case the first goals reach them in 15 years, probably, if I have, instead, 500 programmers, I reach the goal in 5 years. Users want to continue to use this system because bla .. bla .. bla .. What should I do if I only have 2 programmers in the meantime? tries to answer yourself.
Mensys/SSI has not pursued any similar project that would point to a definitive resolution of the problem by rewriting from scratch essential parts of the operating system (if I have not the original source code what should i do? Have to rewrite it from scratch, are you agree?) but aimed only to take IBM OS/2's users-park and maintain it, okay, a small software house, requires short-term goals .. bla .. bla .. bla, well, corporate policies, that's fine, but You have totally missed the goal.
A team of programmers led by engineers really motivated would have
dealt with the problem looking forward and with a lot of breath, a visual much more extensive, they would have to figure something reliable in short-term (achievable goal even with few resources) and then after 14 years (help me to say many!!!), collaborating with the OSFree team, given that the resources were few, they would given you at least the first tenderly child of a new, fully regenerated OS2. They would not waste time to adapt, try to configure, a patch here, another there .. blah blah blah, does not give me the code? well, I'll rewrite alone, but it takes the time it takes, and to not lose my clients, they would study a valid alernative, knowing that this alternative tomorrow will be useful.
I want to express this concept when I say that with a different point of view we would not have wasted time and resources.
Again, forgive the outburst.
Andi B.:
--- Quote ---You can take a Ferrari's chassis, dash and seats, and stick them onto the innards of a Volvo... but what you end up with will not be a Ferrari. It might be a nice car, but neither Ferrari lovers nor Volvo lovers would likely be impressed.
--- End quote ---
I like this statement very much. :) Well done Alex.
Even if someone could find and pay the manpower to program a WPS like GUI on top of Linux nearly no one will use it. Cause even in 15 years it will be by far not as stable and bug free than all the other *nix frontends already available. Nor will it be able to transfer the look and feel of the *nix apps to OS/2.
I get the feeling most of the people here do not have any clue hwo the different parts of an OS works together to generate the typical 'feeling' of these system. It is a dream to only port some GUI on top of another kernel + drivers to continue working the way we did lets say the last 20 years.
If I ever came to the point where I've to use another base OS on my private systems the smallest part will be to learn to live with the different GUI. Users of other GUIs will ROFTL when knowing the restrictions and bugs of the WPS. Come on, we use OS/2 - eCS cause we are used to it as a whole. We like the stability (ahm, this is not true anymore, other systems are more stable now, only try to compile some stuff or heavy use the WPS or...), the lack of viruses, the antique look and feel, but mostly cause we are used to it and know every single config.sys line and os2.ini entry by heart. If you change the base there's only a small additional step to use another GUI.
Long term plan - IMHO Mensys (to be more specific Roderick cause who else has worked on eCS there?) did have sort of long term plan. But his plan was based on a little more realistic estimation of what can be done with the little to non existent developer and user base than on big dreams we read ever and ever again. If you ever have written some code or contributed to some open source project you would know who much effort it needs to only improve some small parts and bring it at least to a quality level users start to try it out and give feedback instead keep silent or even worse vague complaining about although they not even looked at the readmes. Moreover even if people work a long time on some stuff and get paid for it, there's no guarantee to get some useful output. Only think about the crappy ACPI before David took over.
What I want to say can be summed up as stop dreaming of 'warme Eislutscher' (maybe someone can translate this ;)) and get of the ground and support the few people who invest hours and hours of there private time and money to let you run your system on some new hardware still today. Even if it costs you a ridiculous amount of money like OpenOffice SS, Java/QT4 sponsoring units or Injoy/PMView/Mesa/.... license. If these few developers leave it's finally over. And trust me, if these few active developers decide rpm is a necessity today then start using it. Write articles how to use it for dummys or fill tickets instead endless discussing why you dislike this non native OS/2 way of doing things. Other options are to use some sort of rpm on *nix or get used to stupid WIn behavior not storing window size an position any more or....
Martin Iturbide:
Hi
I can not think if making an OS/2 clone over Linux is a good or bad idea, because we need to have first PM, SOM and WPS. If we ever have an open source clone of this three components it will be interesting to see if there is resources from the Linux community to make that port.
OS/2 is more than the GUI (having a mask that looks like WPS on Linux GUI it is not porting OS/2 to Linux), I think what I like is the whole architecture. On the kernel side, (things that I don't understand complete) I started to like more the "Microkernel" architecture more than the "Monolithic kernel". why? Because I found out that for "Monolithic kernel" (Linux) you need to compile the kernel every time you have a new driver that is not supported by the kernel, please correct me if I'm wrong.
Regards
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