Re: [MiNT] Memory protection for the FireBee?

[skeezix <skeezix@skeleton.org>]

On Tue, 8 Sep 2015, wittau@lnxnt.org wrote:

# > On 27/08/2015 07:52, markus@mubf.de wrote:
# >> Frankly, to me it's one of the things that makes the difference between
# >> a 'toy OS' and a serious one.
# >
# > Definitely.
# 
# Whatever the future development of FreeMiNT may bring to us. I just want
# to assure all of you that it is still my aim to use the FireBee/FreeMiNT
# as main system!
# Even if it may sound strange to some of you these days, I hope you
# developers can always consider there are some people out there with
# realworld usage of the system. ;)

	Warning; serious ramble :)

	The interesting trick is trying to change your workflow so that a 
Firebee can be a main system, yet still be Atari; I had a realization soon 
after I got my bee, that all my work was in trying to port over BSD and 
Linux applications and environments (and my own code and games.) Get SDL 
working, port over a game, that sort of thing... that depended on porting 
over other libraries and environments and code, iterating. Sure, its cool 
as heck to have sshd running there, and ssh in and out, and do filesystem 
mounting, and run Apache, and all that....... but you can do that on a $10 
pcb and existing machines much better. So what is the point? (well okay, 
we also thought it was cool to do this back in the day, but still.)

	So I question.. what does the Bee _add_, besides just being retro 
fun? Well, it has the Atari mindset and software behind it. So sure, we 
want to do modern things and thus have to leverage existing probably Linux 
code (browsers etc), but we need to do it in 'not just another much more 
expensive raspberry pi' way. Of course, its also 'your own raspberry pi 
design' which adds a lot. (I've designed my own computers, and its a huge 
thrill to do anything at all on them :) ... is running a simple browser 
different on the Bee? better in some way? being able to cut over to some 
25 year old tool make it work interestingly? (and sadly if you're thinking 
along those lines, you already kow that ARanyM can do that for you in your 
existing environment)

	The answer, what a Bee can do for you that other machines cannot? 
I'm not sure yet what the answer is. Its still just 'neat' for me (much 
like all of us fiddling with UltraSatans and HxC and so on on old 
machines.. theres not much point, but its fun!), but I imagine the answer 
changes for each person. We have graphic artists, audio artists, and 
mostly a bunch of coders and hackers who like to make stuff and keep the 
old spirit alive. Really, what seems to be in it is.. we all just like to 
tinker, and keep the old days going.

	So, to make your Bee a main head .. its a lot of work; its just 
for neat old day fun. But can you come up with a strong use-case, that 
motivates and drives everyone? I'd like to see :) (I don't mean this to 
come off discouragig, but as discussion.. what do you use your Bee for? 
What does it add to your experience? etc..) 

		jeff

--
If everyone would put barbecue sauce on their food, there would be no war.