News from RISCOS Ltd No. 31 November 19th 2004 ------------------ Hello everyone. First I must apologise for the delay since the last newsletter, but as most of you will be aware there has been so much going on in the various corners of the market, that it simply hasn't been practical to issue regular updates. So here is the best of the news since the last newsletter. RISCOS Ltd and Castle Technology Ltd announce new co-operative -------------------------------------------------------------- Agreement on future RISC OS Development --------------------------------------- Castle Technology Ltd and RISCOS Ltd are delighted to announce that late on Friday 15th October they concluded negotiations on a new Licence Agreement that ensures a bright future for all areas of RISC OS development. The new licence ensures that both RISC OS 4 and RISC OS 5 will be merged together, as soon as practically possible and that clear areas of responsibility have been established ensuring that duplication of effort is minimised. Paul Middleton Managing Director of RISC OS Ltd said "I'm sure that all the RISC OS users who have waited for the availability of the Select Desktop experience will be delighted to know thatan expect to enjoy it on many more platforms, such as the IYONIX pc, next year.” Jack Lillingston Managing Director of Castle said "This is fantastic news for all parties concerned and I know that this sets sound foundations for a bright new future of RISC OS. Castle will continue with the IYONIX pc and other desktop products, whilst Tematic (a trading division of Castle) will focus its activities on the embedded sector. This means that more and more devices using RISC OS will become available around the world.” John Ballance, CTO of Castle Technology explained that "merging the two versions of RISC OS together makes very good sense. This means a set of standard APIs for RISC OS and this will be of great benefit to RISC OS developers.” Mike Glover of Icon Technology, who chaired the discussions, pointed out that "this solution ensures that RISC OS 4 will continue to be available for the foreseeable future and that all RISC OS hardware and software developers will continue to supply their products.” RISC OS 4.02 ------------ This was released 5 years ago now, and will become end of line in a couple of months once existing ROMs are exhausted. 4.02 will still be available for AMSs (OEMs), but we expect most to move over to using 4.39 as their base product over the next few months. RISC OS 4.39 ------------ This will shortly become the standard RISC OS 4 ROM upgrade release for purchasers upgrading either from RISC OS 3.x or 4.x The advantages of having 4.39 are primarily based on the availability of DHCP networking and the other Boot option tools that are in ROM. If you have a 4.39 based machine and your hard drive fails (for example) then you have a much more usable machine (especially if you are on a network) than you would with a 4.02 machine. 4.39 is obviously a much more advanced version of RISC OS than 4.02 so it makes sense to have 4.39 in ROM even if you are a Select subscriber. There is however NO INTENTION to produce further different versions of RISC OS as ROM updates for the forseeable future. The stock of OTP ROMs is finite and for support reasons it is far better to have a known level of RISC OS in ROM rather than a wide range of OS versions. Early purchasers of the Red Flash ROMs with RISC OS 4.39 may be able to reflash to later versions of RISC OS / Select, but that is not part of the official roadmap for Select developments. Select ------ The Select scheme is the main development platform for RISCOS Ltd. Following the development of a new initiative with Castle (as announced last month) we are now collaborating to make Select features available to Iyonix users. The exact mechanism for this is still under discussion but it is anticipated that Select subscribers will have the choice of subscribing to either or both of a 26 bit version of Select and/or a 32 bit version of Select. The Select scheme has always been intended to be a means by which RISC OS can be kept up to date with new technologies as they emerge. The key expertise of RISCOS Ltd has always been to improve the Desktop Users experience, by introducing new features that compliment existing third party applications. RISCOS Ltd has also put a large amount of work into analysing the lower level code of RISC OS 4 and resolving many long standing bugs. All new RISC OS 4 code has of course been developed to be 26/32 bit neutral with the aim of producing a 32 bit version of Select as soon as market conditions allowed. Features intended for future versions of Select (not necessarily Select 4) include:- Video Hardware abstraction. Full set of Standard Postscript compatible Fonts. Collection of extra Fonts. Easy system recognition of registered file types. GIF Image File renderer. Fast Database searcher. ATA Hard disc drivers. Further enhanced Paint and Draw packages. Support for 32 bit processor modes. Support for RISC OS Select on 32 bit only processors ---------------------------------------------------- The availability of RISC OS Select on 32 bit systems such as Iyonix is anticipated in early 2005. RISCOS Ltd does not intend to support 32 bit Operating Systems running on 26 bit capable processors. We believe that the legacy market prefers to maintain inbuilt support for applications which have been built to run on 26 bit processors, rather than requiring the use of an emulator in order to run 26 bit applications on a 32 bit based Operating System. By this we mean that RISCOS Ltd intends to provide 26 bit Operating Systems for 26 bit capable hardware - such as Risc PC and 32 bit Operating Systems for 32 bit only hardware - such as Iyonix. We do not intend to support 32 bit Operating systems running on legacy 26 bit processors. Select 32 Development query --------------------------- We are very interested to find out what the real level of demand is for a 32 bit version of Select, and the features that are expected of it? As you all may be aware Castle are not proceeding with the Merlin project and major developments on the RISC OS desktop features will be done by RISCOS Ltd via the Select scheme. We announced at the Guildford Show that there would be the option of a) transferring from Select to Select 32 b) of adding Select 32 to existing subscription c) of joining straight into Select 32 d) of joinging both Select and Select 32 So if you are an Iyonix user and would like Select to be available for it, then please let us know. Please send general "yes please" comments directly to mailto:developer@riscos.com If you have general queries about what should go into future versions of Select then please post them here to the SmartGroups for general discussion. Much of what was proposed for the Merlin project was not of general interest, so please make your suggestions sensible. RISCOS Ltd secures further supplies of OTP ROMs for RISC OS 4.39 Production --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Following the sell out success of the latest version of RISC OS 4 (which was produced on a limited production run of 150 Flash ROMs) RISCOS Ltd is pleased to announce that it has managed to secure significant supplies of the same type of OTP ROMs which were previously used to produce the RISC OS 4.02 ROM upgrades. Production of the OTP ROM parts by OKI was ceased two years ago and it was thought that the current limited stocks held by RISCOS Ltd for RISC OS 4 ROM production were the last available. RISCOS Ltd licences RISC OS 4 to Advantage Six Ltd -------------------------------------------------- RISCOS Ltd has today announced that it has added Advantage Six Ltd to its list of Authorised Manufacturers (AMS). Paul Middleton, Managing Director of RISCOS Ltd, said "I am proud that five years after we first launched RISC OS 4 that we have added another new name to our list of manufacturers." RISCOS Ltd announced its intention of producing customised versions of RISC OS under the Embedded RISC OS Banner in 2002 and Advantage Six Ltd will be using both full versions and special "Embedded" versions of RISC OS in its future products. Matt Edgar of Advantage Six added that "RISC OS was the obvious choice for our products given the expertise that exists within the RISC OS community. Advantage Six will be working closely with both Stuart Tyrrell Developments and RISCOS Ltd on developing our new products". The first fruits of those developments will be on show at the forthcoming Wakefield Show on May 15th and 16th. Preventing Open Mail Relay -------------------------- If you use the SMTP protocol to fetch/download your email, you may be unwittingly allowing your machine to be used as an 'open relay'. This means that people can send out junk mails via your machine without your knowledge. http://www.vigay.com/inet/openrelay.html Forthcoming Shows ----------------- Acorn Midlands Show 2004 ------------------------ The ARM Club are again organising the ACORN MIDLANDS SHOW 2004 at the National Motorcycle Museum which has been rebuilt after last years show. The show is open from 10.00 - 4.30 and admission is £3 (£2 for Club members). Children under 14 free. http://www.armclub.org.uk/shows/midlands/ RISCOS SOUTHWEST Show 2005 -------------------------- The RISCOS Southwest Show will be again be held at the Webbington Hotel in Loxton, near Axbridge, North Somerset on Saturday 26th February 2005. The show is open from 10.00 - 4.30 and admission is £3 (£2 for Foundation & ARM Club members). Children under 16 free. http://users.argonet.co.uk/acornshow/main.html User Group Meetings ------------------- A reminder that I am always happy to visit User Groups to demonstrate RISC OS Select, RISC OS 4.39 or just talk generally about the RISC OS market. Standing Order Renewals to be replaced by Direct Debit ------------------------------------------------------ As I have mentioned before we continue to have a large number of problems with administering Standing Order payments and we have now been approved for Direct Debit authorisation. We will be contacting everyone who currently pays by Standing Order to arrange for Direct Debit Mandates to be set up as soon as the Bank Formalities have completed. Replying to queries from this Newsletter ---------------------------------------- If you are responding to a specific query in this newsletter please use the appropriate mailto: address to reply rather than replying to the sender of this email. Also don't reply to the general foundation or admin email addresses as your enquiry may not get dealt with promptly. We try to reply to all enquiries within 5 days. But at peak times it may take longer to reply. regards -- Paul Middleton RISCOS Ltd 3 Clarendon Road Cardiff CF23 9JD Tel 02920 492324 Fax 02920 492326 mailto:paul@riscos.com Copyright ©2004 RISCOS Ltd.