If you read my previous article you know I had a problem with running OWB. If I start it I will get a distorted screen. I decided to install AEROS to see how OWB would behave and of course I was really curious about this Aros system as well. AEROS is a hybrid distribution of AROS and Linux (in the moment debian 6.0 is used) available for ARM and x86 systems. AEROS will run hosted under Linux. Basically getting a lift from Linux. For this Aros version you will need some Linux knowledge when it comes to setting up the partitions. Pascal Papara did say in his interview with BoingsWorld that this would be simplified in the future. It is a work in progress so we will see a lot of improvements. Once I had it installed I tried OWB which started just fine. Since that started just fine I wanted to do new clean install of Icaros. To be honest I prefer Icaros above AEROS but AEROS also has it advantages. Since it runs hosted on Linux you will have a better support of your hardware.
This time the Icaros live DVD starts without any problems. I have the hard drive and DVD drive together on IDE port 2 which is different than before which might explain why it boots without any problems. It seems I spoke to soon since after I created the two partitions and rebooted and continued with the formatting and installing it give me also a distorted screen. This was right after I select to have the partitions formatted. Maybe it is the graphics card? Anyway I will start in the safe mode and continue with the installation. If after a new installation OWB still fails I might pick up a new graphics card on Monday.
It seems I made some progress since after the installation I select to boot with “Icaros Desktop (16M colour vesa graphics)” I can get OWB to start just fine. But if I start with “Icaros Desktop” it will not start OWB. Even if I set the resolution the same as “Icaros Desktop (16M colour vesa graphics)” which is 1280×1024.
Icaros OWB distorted view
The above picture shows how it looks. Earlier this afternoon I had to leave it as it is since we had a BBQ party but of course the minute I returned (did I actually drank less to be sober to continue or am I imagining this?) I fired it up again to see how to fix it. I sort had given up since it does work in that one start option “Icaros Desktop (16M colour vesa graphics)” but you still want to investigate if it can still be resolved. And I got it resolved so that I can start as “Icaros desktop” and get OWB to work even if the resolution is 1024×768. Thanks to the good help of magorium over at Aros Exec who provided me with the solution. That just really makes my day. I am already really excited about Aros but it just keeps getting better and better all the time.
It was time to use my A1SE and OS4.0 on a more regular basis so that is exactly what I did. Trying out some utilities and demos I had a really great time. With the weather getting colder nothing beats using your Amiga’s. Currently I am trying some stuff out that might be used for my next article for the The Bucket Programming Corner section.
Suddenly I get a “Please insert volume CONSOLE: in any drive” error at random times. Not really sure what is causing this. At first I thought it could be AmiSystemRestore since I installed this recently but even when this is not running it still shows this error. The problem is that once this comes up the system will freeze up and I will have to restart the machine. I will do some more investigation in to this.
Console error
Earlier this week I tried out the new NetSurf 2.8 version. I like the download window so that I can see the download status of a file. I normally fire up OWB when browsing but since I installed NetSurf 2.8 I fire this puppy up when browsing the net. I am really starting to like it more each day I use it. Probably I only touched the surface of it and there is a lot more to discover.
NetSurf 2.8 download window
For the last couple of weeks I am thinking about what my next project should me. I need something that would not take ages (I have very limited time so even the most simple projects would take ages) but can be done in a fair amount of time. I keep coming back to my already attempted file manager project. I kind of had it binned due to the ReAction issues I came across. After reading Trixie’s articles about ReAction over at OS4Coding.net I am going to give it another try. Since his articles show how it is suppose to be done, and showing what I did was wrong, I feel a new burst of energy to give it another try. Here’s to happy coding!
I am catching up on Amiga news to see what I have missed during my moving period. I noticed Amiga Roundtable had 3 new shows released since the “Burnt Banana Bread” show. Just finished the last one which featured Trevor Dickinson from A-Eon Technology. Trevor seems to be a nice bloke and very passionate about what he is doing. I hope we will see the Amiga Roundtable shows on a regular basis.
If I was going to buy new Amiga I think I would purchase a SAM board first due to the price. Don’t get me wrong I would love to have the AmigaOne X1000 but at the moment money is more important. Maybe by the time I want to purchase a new Amiga money is no longer a problem. But at the moment I am still happy with my A1SE. Unbelievable, eh?
I saw OWB 3.30 was released for OS4.x. I was already happy with the improvement of the previous version so I can’t wait to try this new version. Nice to see we are finally getting some movement in the browser department. I tried NetSurf 2.5 also some time ago but it crashed sometimes. Just checked if there was a newer version out but it is still on version 2.5.
The other interesting bit is a Rebol 3 test version that is running on OS4. I gave Rebol a try back in the days but I left it alone for reasons I can’t really recall. I even purchased one of the first books that came out. Of course it has matured more over the years and the fact that it will run on OS4 makes it worth while to give it a try again. I wonder if there is going to be some sort of beta testing group for this? I sure would like to be on that.
Wednesday the latest I should have the Amiga up and running again. The computer room should be pretty much done by the end of tomorrow with a little bit of small work on Wednesday. At least it is going to look great.
Just installed the latest version (3.29) of OWB on my AmigaOne SE with OS4 and to my surprise (and what I was hoping for) it let me login to my WordPress account. I tried it before with the previous version but once you login and try to go to your admin page it asks you to login again. Once you login again it goes straight back to that page asking you to login again. Looping forever much to my frustration. But not this time and I am actually writing this in OWB. It works very well actually. I do still have the problem that when I start closing tabs the system freezes. This could also be due to my OS4 setup. I have been playing around with the system a bit lately doing some stuff that could cause some issues. I am hoping to upgrade to OS 4.1 later this year for improvement purposes. Since I was so excited I thought I would write a short story about it. Which also gives me the chance to test everything a bit. You can download the latest version of OWB on OS4Depot.
This new update of OWB was not the only big thing today. There was also the Vintage Computer Fair at Bletchley Park that started today. It is a two day event so it is not over yet. The first videos are being uploaded to Youtube right now which I will check out later this eveninig. More stuff to make me happy.
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