Re: STiNG, CAB, and Multitasking (strikes back)

[Peter Rottengatter <perot@pallas.amp.uni-hannover.de>]

On Mon, 9 Mar 1998, Konrad Kokoszkiewicz wrote:

> also that Peter could personally demonstrate his arguments. Generally I
> think by the way, that you, Peter, should send the problem description
> initially to the MiNT list avoiding sending MiNT blames to the USENET, as
> it also could be considered emotional (esp. lines about your willing to
> support N.AES and unwilling to support MiNT, while N.AES works only with
> MiNT).

Ok I'll write my suggestions up a bit later today. Please note I never
said that I would not support MiNT. I always told the people to change
their AUTO folder sequence because of what I consider a bug in MiNT.
This does not resemble in any way a refusal to support MiNT.


> 1) MiNT is not "my software" coz I didn't write it. MiNT is free,
> available in source form. However, in fact, if MiNT and MiNT development
> belogns to anyone, it is the MiNT list.

Note whenever I used the term "you" in my english writing, I was referring
to you personally, *and* to the other people of the MiNT developers list.
I'm aware of the fact that MiNT does not belong to anybody anymore since
Eric Smith has bowed out (when was that by the way ?)


> 2) Atari declarations about "legal" and "illegal" ways of doing things:
>    a) are 5 years old now
>    b) are stated by a company that has been not interested in ST platform
>       since 4 years now
>    c) are stated by a company that is really dead since two years now.
>    d) refer mainly to TOS, not multitasking systems
>    e) when it comes to MiNT, may be changed by us if really necessary
>       considering new subjects of computing (networking, multiuser
>       systems, security etc).

Atari standards are old, but a reasonable common denominator for developers
for TOS. Even if you don't agree on that they're reasonable, they DID
serve precisely this function for most developers in the Atari world, and
they still do. So while you can dismiss them entirely, doing that you only
move MiNT into a small niche of the Atari world, since compatibility is
degraded seriously. Being in a niche, MiNT would cease to be of any
importance for Atari users. All this were a very bad development for the
already very small Atari world, I see no need to artificially accelerate
the decline of Atari software.


Cheers  Peter

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   Peter Rottengatter       perot@pallas.amp.uni-hannover.de
                            http://www.stud.uni-hannover.de/~perot
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