Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ncar!gatech!mcnc!uvaarpa!vger.nsu.edu!manes
From: manes@vger.nsu.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.games
Subject: Re: FAUG demo of Powermonger by E.A. -- long review
Message-ID: <362.276633c3@vger.nsu.edu>
Date: 12 Dec 90 17:42:27 GMT
References: <1950@unlisys.in-berlin.de> <1990Dec5.110344.6364@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> <1787@seti.inria.fr> <1990Dec10.133123@avahi.inria.fr> <22110@well.sf.ca.us> <1990Dec12.114250@avahi.inria.fr>
Lines: 70

In article <1990Dec12.114250@avahi.inria.fr>, colas@avahi.inria.fr (Colas Nahaboo) writes:
> In article <22110@well.sf.ca.us>, farren@well.sf.ca.us (Mike Farren) writes:
>> That's Mike, not Marc :-)
> 
> oops... Sorry!
> 
>> So what?  There's also no multitasking, and no hard drive.
> 
> Let me try another explanation for nuking the OS. I am new to the amiga world,
> but multitasking on the amiga with many processes accessing the drives seems
> to me an error-prone situation... By doing this I often get corrupted I/O
> which I dont get by doing things sequentially. (*)

Really?  Corrupted I/O?   Funny I have been using Amiga's since 1985 and
have had only one occurance under 1.1 that  resulted in a disk corrupt
requestor.  

Can you give us an example where this happens and with what programs?

> 
> No, I'm not saying that AmigaDos is at fault, it may be one of the 10 resident
> drivers/utilities I use which is at fault, but this stresses my point: If you
> want PowerMonger to multitask, it is because you are a power user, and thus
> are using tons of little taks whose interaction may lead to problems, making
> you say "PM doesn't works", but the problem may be in your super-hyper-duper
> screen saver...

All true here.  However that does not mean throw the baby out with the 
bath water.  I am always cautious about any program that attempts to modify
the way AmigaDOS operates (read my rantings on ARP).  However no one is
causing (forcing?) you to use utilities that 'play' with Intuition to 
make it do something it was not designed to do.

I run with a near vanilla Amiga and have had next to zero problems 
multitasking.  I would never encourage anyone to not write a program
that does not multitask. 

> 
> So they perhaps want to avoid having bad reputation because of other people's
> fault... Or they have discovered a bug in the OS preventing safe multitasking
> for their purposes.

No, they are probably thinking it would be easier for them to write the
code if they ignore coding standards and the Amiga operating system.  It
has nothing to do with support.

I doubt that most game writers would be familiar enough with the Amiga
Operating System to know a bug or not.  However that is just an 
opinion.

> 
> (*) As an example: Seems to me that using two concurrent processes to read
> MSDOS disks via MSH yields you corrupted buffer I/Os, but I'm not sure
> 

MSH is PD.  CrossDOS does not have this problem.

> --
> Colas Nahaboo, Bull Research France -- Koala Project -- GWM X11 Window Manager
> Internet: colas@mirsa.inria.fr, Phone: (33) 93.65.77.70, Fax: (33) 93 65 77 66
> INRIA Sophia, 2004, rte des Lucioles, B.P.109 - 06561 Valbonne Cedex, FRANCE

 -mark=
     
 +--------+   ==================================================          
 | \/     |   Mark D. Manes                    "Mr. AmigaVision" 
 | /\  \/ |   manes@vger.nsu.edu                                        
 |     /  |   (804) 683-2532    "Make up your own mind! - AMIGA"
 +--------+   ==================================================