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First Look at YellowTAB's Zeta

Gentu writes "Great news for the BeOS fans. After Be sold its IP to Palm, many said that the BeOS was no more, but a new startup company from Germany, YellowTAB, was able to get hold of Be's source code and form the future of the never-released BeOS 6 ('Dano'), under the name 'Zeta'. YellowTAB added a lot of new goodies to the OS and brought it up to speed. OSNews features the first ever preview of Zeta with a lot of good information, along with some screenshots."

356 comments

  1. This Just in by N3WBI3 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Redhat announced tday it would skip the 9.0 release and go right to 9.1

    --
  2. A Time-Saving Hint by jimhill · · Score: 5, Funny

    If it's a Eugenia Loli-Queru review it can be boiled down to this: "It's not BeOS. It sucks."

    --
    Learn to spell: nickel, missile, lose, solely, amendment, speech, kernel, probably, ridiculous, deity, hierarchy, versus
  3. I still think SuSE is better by gotr00t · · Score: 5, Informative

    Mandrake may be "user friendly" but I think that compared to SuSE 8.0, it is much less robust in features and hardware support. SuSE has much better support for most of the hardware that I use than Mandrake 9.0, which actually took me a while to configure my ISA sound card. I hope that this distribution will change that.

    1. Re:I still think SuSE is better by leviramsey · · Score: 5, Funny

      Mandrake dropped automatic detection of ISA cards for a good reason: ISA sucks. There, I said it. ISA sucks big fat hairy moose cock.

      Join the 1990's!

  4. Who is Eugenia, and why do we care? by Gothmolly · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Who are these people to review anything, if their review consists of skimming the surface and focusing on their pet peeves? Thats how flamewars start - bickering over window managers. Let's talk REAL functionality, things like auto-detection of hardware, capabilities of the install kernel, etc.

    --
    I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
    1. Re:Who is Eugenia, and why do we care? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Eugenia used to write reviews on BeOS. Since it was such a small community, she rose to the top quickly. Then she started installing a bunch of different OS's (btw, none are as good as the BeOS), and started OSNews. She got some help with the noninstall stuff, and got a popular site up.

      Then, when she was in charge, she'd lash out at her readers (look at her webpage). She was the editor, but didn't speak good english, so she had many spelling and grammar mistakes. But don't correct her, that'd just make her superpissed.

      Basically, Eugenia is a self absorbed angry woman that got popular through the BeOS community, and now we can't get rid of her.

    2. Re:Who is Eugenia, and why do we care? by FortKnox · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Actually, Eugenia's reviews are usually "this is a journal of what happened when I installed this non-BeOS OS." Its just a collection of thoughts. I'd call it a journal entry more than any objective review (but that's what OSNews boils down to).
      Yes, I don't read anything from OSNews, because I want objective reviews, not a livejournal dedicated to operating systems.

      --
      Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
  5. My 1-item wishlist by aridhol · · Score: 4, Interesting
    When updating from 7.2 to 8.0, I had the fun of not having enough disk space. So I went through the package list, and tried to remove some stuff. However, it could not be removed because it was already installed. What I'd like to see is the ability for the installer to remove already-installed packages. Instead, I had to boot into the old system, remove packages, and re-install the update.

    I sent this request to the Mandrake developers at 8.0. As of 9.0, this feature was still not available. Probably won't be there for 9.1, but I can hope.

    --
    I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
  6. I love Linux 9.0! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    All my friends and family use Linux 9.0, and now, Linux 9.1 is even better!

  7. The phrase that could define OSNews by Quarters · · Score: 3, Insightful
    "The review is actually pretty bland, skimming the surface to linger on some of Eugenia's pet peeves."
    You could change that to, "OSNews is actually pretty bland, skimming the surface to linger on some of Eugenia's pet peeves." and it would still be a 100% valid statement.
  8. KDE and GNOME "Galaxy" theme by tyrann98 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm glad that a common theme between KDE and GNOME was also implemented by Mandrake. Competing and incompatible desktops is going to really hurt Linux for a while, especially if a user cannot switch between computers and get work done easily. Things such as the Start Menu, Control Panel, background, screensaver, and System Properties have been somewhat standardized in the Windows world. Even newbie users can get these things done on a Windows 95/98/ME/2000 and even XP desktop easily. They are different by close enough to make it a smooth transition. Linux is still not there with competing Bluecurve/Galaxy + KDE/GNOME camps. While the core should still be as configurable like the hacker wants, work should be done to have a standard interface (which can be changed) and standard "desktop configuration" utilities across the major distributions/desktop environments. We have the GNOME control panel, KDE control panel, Red Hat utilites, Mandrake utilities, etc... (include almost every major distribution out there) for everything! Everything is different and everything has a slightly different interface for the same tasks. I even get annoyed sometimes when it takes me a couple extra tens of seconds to find an app due to different menu layouts. And I know lots of other users that really get messed up even with simple things like changing the background or GDM/KDE icons on Linux.

  9. Slashdot: Eugenia's big troll tool! by Dr.+Spork · · Score: 4, Insightful
    You know, thanks to my devotion to Slashdot, I ended up reading many Eugenia stories. Am I the only person who noticed that she has basically written only one story in her life, and just substitutes some names and version numbers? Think about it.

    I am frankly sick of her crap. She has become the Jon Katz of interface design analysis. If Slashdot insists on licking her ass every week, they should make an icon of her, so I can put the topic on my ignore list.

  10. here we come... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
    YellowTab's site traffic has jumped to the phenomenal amount of 51 GigaBytes (GB) this month. We attribute this increase to the growing interest in the upcoming release of ZETA, the next generation of BeOS.

    ...and /.

    1. Re:here we come... by locknloll · · Score: 4, Funny

      let's see their next bandwidth bill... hope that it doesn't burn too much of their startup capital...

      --
      -- Power corrupts, but PowerPoint corrupts absolutely.
    2. Re:here we come... by cshark · · Score: 1

      Why are they going on about their hosting? Do they have any idea how bad it makes them look?

      Seeing this I need to ask the obvious question:
      Do these people even come close to having the resources to pull something like this off?

      --

      This signature has Super Cow Powers

    3. Re:here we come... by Selecter · · Score: 1

      Actually, that was posted well in advance of this story being on /.

      Their next bandwidth bill will be something else agin.....

    4. Re:here we come... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Nobody thinks Zeta is an Adobe, or MS...I would venture to say it makes them seem like people who have the same problems as Taco does with hosting /.

  11. Uh oh by ergonal · · Score: 2, Funny
    YellowTab's site traffic has jumped to the phenomenal amount of 51 GigaBytes (GB) this month. We attribute this increase to the growing interest in the upcoming release of ZETA, the next generation of BeOS.

    We have upgraded our webspace from 500MB to 1000MB and traffic allowance from 25GB to 50GB. This is the largest package that our host provides. In order to be able to add more features and functions to our site (especially for developers) we will soon have our very own server.

    I think you might need to up your traffic allowance once again.. BAM!

  12. Looks interesting... by Noryungi · · Score: 2, Interesting


    But I have to ask the question:

    Who still cares about BeOS?

    This is not a troll or anything. I am just curious.

    I was never able to use BeOS on my 'puters, since none of my graphics were supported, and, once I started using Linux and *BSD, I never looked back.

    So, Be fans, what makes BeOS so special?

    --
    The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
    1. Re:Looks interesting... by AKnightCowboy · · Score: 1, Funny
      Who still cares about BeOS?

      BeOS fanboys of course.

      I was never able to use BeOS on my 'puters, since none of my graphics were supported

      Ditto. The best my graphics card would do was black and white at either 320x200 or 640x480. I forgot which. It was horrible and certainly turned me off to BeOS. I don't recall which graphics card I was using at the time to test BeOS 5, but it was a very common one (GeForce256 or Matrox Millennium).

      So, Be fans, what makes BeOS so special?

      Maybe the stunning lack of applications and poor hardware support gave some old Amiga fanboys a new hope? :-)

    2. Re:Looks interesting... by mirko · · Score: 5, Informative

      So, Be fans, what makes BeOS so special?
      I used to code for BeOS : the API was stunningly easy to learn.

      I only found such pleasure with the Zaurus Qt API... a long, long time later.
      (BTW, I've also heard that AtheOS was similarly "coder-friendly")

      --
      Trolling using another account since 2005.
    3. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Like the lunix fags are any different.

      Actually, I had an easier time running BeOS from my CD drive than I had running lunix from my hd. But I still wouldn't seriously consider either of them for anything more than a couple hours of tinkering and amusement.

    4. Re:Looks interesting... by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 5, Interesting

      > Who still cares about BeOS?

      I for one, since I was lucky enough to have it run on a couple of computers.

      The problem with Linux and *BSD is that I just don't the time to config them. (Allthough it's cool that the Linux router "just works" -- has been for years.) Win2K is "OK" (would be good if it wasn't for the dam memory leaks), and I *hate* the Mac. GUI (pre OSX). BeOS is "sexy", blazingly fast, VERY well designed, and I really liked that it felt like a great blend of the Win32 and Mac. GUI, but designed by a person with REAL concern for users -- newbies and power uers alike. The only problem is that BeOS never gained "critical mass" like Linux. KDE 3 looks REAL sweet, but I have a dual 550 box just for Be. :)

    5. Re:Looks interesting... by Bastian · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nice clean interface - in fact, it has the only Drag'nDrop GUI I've ever seen that I would be willing to call uncluttered. Amazing API (if you program). All sorts of tiny little details that you can't really put your finger on

      I like BeOS because, in my opinion, it is well-concieved. It has all sorts of problems with drivers and application support, but then again that's how every OS starts out. BeOS had something that can't be added later - generally well-thought-out design. You can't add that in as an afterthought.

    6. Re:Looks interesting... by bumby · · Score: 2, Interesting
      Who still cares about BeOS?
      I do :)

      So, Be fans, what makes BeOS so special?
      Last time I tried it was some years ago on my 400MHz. It was goodlooking, felt very quick, and overall nice. It is easy to move from Windows to BeOS. As my dad now uses the old 400MHz:er, with Windows of course (he refuses to use anything new), I thought that he maybe was willing to use BeOS. Linux with GNOME or KDE is way too slow on his old comp.

      The lack of programs is the problem. What he needs is:

      A office-like collection of programs (word, excell, etc)

      Mozilla :)

      A image-editor like Gimp

      --
      Hey! That's my sig you're smoking there!
    7. Re:Looks interesting... by orpheus2000 · · Score: 1, Troll

      Who still cares about BeOS?

      The reviewer, Eugenia Loli-Queru. She is just about the most vocal and annoying Be fan on the internet. OSNews started as her soapbox for Be, and she cannot help but interject in *every* review that she writes, some mention of why Be is better than Windows/Linux/BSD/sex/God.

      I shudder to think what the text of the review is like, now that she's writing about the supposed BeOS 6.

    8. Re:Looks interesting... by cortana · · Score: 0, Funny

      No wonder you had trouble running Lunix from your hard drive... did you run into difficulties attaching your MOS 6510 to your motherboard?

    9. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I still love to add attributes to my media-files. No matter where I keep em on the disk I can always do a search on Artist, song, genré, BPM and such and get results directly...

    10. Re:Looks interesting... by MikeFM · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I used BeOS (as I try to use all popular OS's) enough to be pretty familiar with it and I had a roommate that was a BeOS cult member.. I still never quite saw it as anything much. Sure it didn't suck as much as Windows but that isn't really saying much and it didn't have much in the way of drivers or applications. It booted fast but with proper tweaking I can make Linux boot just as fast. I never really cared because I reboot maybe once or twice a year so what difference does it make to me? It looks pretty nice but no better than I can make Linux look. It had some interesting filesystem features. In the day it's journaling was quite the feature.. but today Linux and Windows both offer that. It still has some filesystem features that neither Linux or Windows has but I never really figured out why you'd want the filesystem to do those things anyway. I think BeOS did have a good sound service that both Linux and Windows could still learn from but other than that I can't think of anything I really liked about BeOS.

      BeOS also has the oddest installation problem I ever suffered. Whenever I installed BeOS on a certain one of my systems it'd disable the soundcard in Windows which was also on that computer. After the BeOS install I'd have to reinstall the soundcard driver in Windows. :)

      --
      At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
    11. Re:Looks interesting... by dr_dank · · Score: 5, Informative

      So, Be fans, what makes BeOS so special?

      BeOS was demonstrated to me during my senior year of college. The guy giving the talk played upwards of two dozen mp3s, a dozen or so movie trailers, the GL teapot thing, etc. simultanously. None of the apps skipped a beat. Then, he pulled out the showstopper.

      He yanked the plug on the box.

      Within 20 seconds or so of restarting, the machine was chugging away with all of its media files in the place they were when they were halted, as if nothing had happened.

      Damn.

      --
      Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
    12. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, maybe she's enthusiastic about it. And it's nice that she's not just another Linux fangirl...

    13. Re:Looks interesting... by jeti · · Score: 1

      > I only found such pleasure with the Zaurus Qt API... a long, long time later.

      I can't agree. I too have coded for BeOS and am now working with Qtopia.
      Qt/E shares most of the codebase with Qt/X and is inapropriate for handhelds.

      I f.e. was a bit shocked when I saw that a simple QString has UTF16 coding
      and an overhead of > 34 bytes.

    14. Re:Looks interesting... by mdwh2 · · Score: 2, Funny

      Who still cares about BeOS?

      Who still cares about, say, MacOS? I was never able to use MacOS on my 'puters, since none of my hardware was supported, and, once I started using Windows, I never looked back. So what makes MacOS so special?

      Well, you get the idea. This question seems to come up at every BeOS (and Amiga, come to that) article, but I never bother to ask the question on every Apple article, even though it applies just as much to me.

      As to graphics hardware not being supported, I guess this is sadly a problem with all non Windows OSs (eg, several Linux distributions I've tried have all had trouble with my graphics card - sort of working, but displaying flickering pixels).

      I like the way that BeOS is extremely good at recognising the hardware it does support - it seems to install the drivers it needs transparently and quickly. It doesn't throw a wobbly and spend ages reinstalling stuff when I upgrade the motherboard.

    15. Re:Looks interesting... by YourMissionForToday · · Score: 1, Informative
      You hate the Mac OS 9 GUI, but you love BeOS? That's like saying you hate the Win 3.1 GUI, but you love the Win 3.11 GUI. There is a reason that BeOS shipped with Mac clones, and that Apple and Be worked closely together for many years. It was supposed to be Mac OS 10...but Mac users got NeXT instead.

      That has its pluses and minuses, the biggest plus/minus being Steve Jobs of course...

    16. Re:Looks interesting... by Timesprout · · Score: 4, Funny

      some mention of why Be is better than Windows/Linux/BSD/sex/God.

      Actually since I met Eugenia at a party one night she has taken sex out of that list.

      --
      Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
      What truth?
      There is no dupe
    17. Re:Looks interesting... by malfunct · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I would say that BeOS had critical mass if it were an open source project. Linux would have died long ago if it was a commercial venture, luckily it started out as a hobby and had time to reach its maturity instead of getting its venture capital cut off in version 1.0 when it sort of wasn't too good.

      --

      "You can now flame me, I am full of love,"

    18. Re:Looks interesting... by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      It is becoming one (OK, OK, so it's an open source clone like ReactOS, but...)

    19. Re:Looks interesting... by ILuvUAmiga · · Score: 0

      Oh really? So thats: 24 MP3's 12 MJPG's and 1 Open GL teapot. And running simultaneously. Yer right. Spectacular feat considering, as was reiterated in the article, Be has no 3d support. 12 Movie Trailors?! Puh-lease, I could kinda believe you if you didnt mention 24 MP3's playing at the same time on what I presume is dated hardware. Not a chance, unless the machine was running a couple of ghz processors.

    20. Re:Looks interesting... by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      What he needs is:
      Gobe Productive
      Mozilla
      Whatever the hell BeOS comes with for graphics (it IS, after all, a good multimedia system)

    21. Re:Looks interesting... by Bish.dk · · Score: 5, Funny

      I used to code for BeOS : the API was stunningly easy to learn.

      ... And not without humour. I remember a function named isProcessorOnFire(). There was a quite detailed description of when it would return true in the API-reference. Apparantly, smoke coming from the processor was not enough to warrant a return-value of true. :)

    22. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tha difference is that even if you could do those things in Linux, you'd have to work (yuck).

      What's that bit with the soundcard? Seems more of a windows plug'n'pray problem.

    23. Re:Looks interesting... by drgroove · · Score: 2, Interesting

      BeOS was turned down as MacOS10, because the Be staff became greedy, and wanted more $$$ from Apple. Instead, they went under, and were bought out by Palm for less than one tenth of what Apple was willing to pay for them.

    24. Re:Looks interesting... by usotsuki · · Score: 1

      Speaking of Lunix...

      Be nice if Lunix could be ported to the Apple //e with 128K (65C02 CPU). :)

      -uso.

      --
      Dreams, dreams, don't doubt dreams, dreaming children's dreaming dreams. Sailor Moon SS
    25. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      BeOS had no *hardware* 3D support. It had a nice software OpenGL layer though. I dunno about the numbers, but I do know that BeOS was strikingly fast in its day, and very good for multiple apps. I don't doubt that it could run a fair number of MP3s, MPEGS, etc at the same time because I used to do that to mess around on it. They could very well have been demoing on a Daystar Mac clone, available with 4 processors...I could see that doing what he said.

    26. Re:Looks interesting... by Bulln-Bulln · · Score: 3, Informative

      The lack of programs is the problem. What he needs is:
      A office-like collection of programs (word, excell, etc)

      Like Gobe Productive?
      I'm not sure, but I think it's part of Zeta.

      Mozilla :)

      http://www.bezilla.org/ or http://www.bebits.com/app/2715. Shipped with Zeta.

      A image-editor like Gimp

      OMG, hopefully not. GIMP's UI sucks. BeOS/Zeta has Refraction (closed source), ArtPaint (open source) and a few others. At least shipped with Zeta Deluxe - not sure about ''plain'' Zeta.

    27. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Except BeOS on Macs wouldn't have been back up in 20 seconds due to slow SCSI and ram inits at the hardware level.

    28. Re:Looks interesting... by LurkerXXX · · Score: 1
      I used to demo it regularly running GL teapot and about 6 movies, 12 mp3's, and another mp3 running backwards, and a couple little game/demo apps going. Dual p333 system.

      Most of us uber BeOS geeks had dual CPU systems because BeOS took advantage of them so well. The entire OS was geared towards multimedia and user responsiveness. Even with all those things going on, when you clicked on a menu button, the menu would pop right up. No delay, even with all those other apps going. If you don't believe it, just find a copy of the free personal edition R5 demo.

    29. Re:Looks interesting... by axxackall · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Nice clean interface

      What *specifically* makes it more cleaner than Gnome or KDE?

      in fact, it has the only Drag'nDrop GUI I've ever seen that I would be willing to call uncluttere

      What *specifically* makes DnD in GNOME/KDE cluttered?

      --

      Less is more !
    30. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why? You looking to get some?

    31. Re:Looks interesting... by JesseL · · Score: 1

      Actually, BeOS did have accelerated support for the 3DFX VooDoo 3 cards. Not that that's a lot to brag about, but it did have *some hardware* 3D support.

      --
      "Prefiero morir de pie que vivir siempre arrodillado!"
    32. Re:Looks interesting... by joe_bruin · · Score: 2, Interesting

      heh, funny, i ran pretty much the same demo for a friend of mine a few years ago. 10 movies, 10 mp3's (at differing play-speeds), copying a few files around the harddrive, and *yank*, pulled the power cord. he nearly had a heart attack.

      the machine was a dual celeron 333 overclocked to 480, 128mb of ram, with scsi discs.

    33. Re:Looks interesting... by fredrik70 · · Score: 3, Informative

      yeah, if the computer was on fire, it returned the temperature of the motherboard, otherwise it returned a random value.

      Not to be forgotten was the mighty is_computer_on()
      which returned 1 if the computer was on, otherwise the returned value was undefined.

      --
      if (!signature) { throw std::runtime_error("No sig!"); }
    34. Re:Looks interesting... by easychord · · Score: 1

      I thought that it shipped on the BeBox and was heavily influenced by Amiga.

      Oh well.. Its not like Gasse was an Amiga fan, or that the BeBox was originally designed using hardware that is completely different to Apple Mac (680x0 or PPC).

    35. Re:Looks interesting... by iFlynn · · Score: 1

      Playing a bunch of apps at the same time, ok, I can buy that I guess. Lot's of RAM, a couple processors, sure, it could happen. However, let's consider how this yanking the plug and restarting right were everything left off deal would work... When the power is cut off suddenly, not even the mighty BeOS would have time to save the position of even one MP3, let alone a couple dozen. Therefore, if it were able to restart where it left off, it would have to have been keeping track of its place constantly, for ever app, on the HDD! That means everytime it read a byte from each MP3 file, it would have to write at least a byte, if not several bytes, as a place holder. Think about that for a second, reading a byte from each file and writing 2-3 bytes back to the drive, continuously, for dozens of multimedia files, that would be a ton of overhead. I could kinda see if it was supported thought hardware and was writing place holder information to battery backed RAM or something, but I can't see making hardware so that if the power goes out you can start your movie trailer in the place where you left off. Especially considering UPS would keep you from losing power instantly in the first place. I'm not saying it didn't happen, I wasn't there, and anything is possible. However, as I've said, the only way I can see it possibly happening would seem to me to create so much overhead that playing that many media files at the same time wouldn't be possible.

    36. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It booted fast but with proper tweaking I can make Linux boot just as fast.

      This just sums up BeOS, BeOS is the first comercially avaiable desktop OS I have seen, all other operating systems are operating systems that can be and are made to do things needed on an everyday desktop (well most things just yet, in the next version we will take away those old problems, I swear)

    37. Re:Looks interesting... by renoX · · Score: 1

      You're guessing too much, nobody said the apps restarted at the exact place playing movies or sound.
      It is just :
      1) an intelligent design from apps: from time to time they record to the HDD where they are
      2) a journalised FS (not something common at the time) so no fsck.
      3) a FAST boot time: around 10sec to boot the PC under BeOS.
      4) intelligent design of the OS which restarts what was running before the crash.

      About the fast boot time, everybody here shrug saying well I never reboot my PC, I say that you're lucky: I have the PC next to my bed and I must stop it at night, I get quite annoyed by the boot time under WindowsXP and it is twice faster to boot under XP than under Mandrake: and that is when I've removed every demon (both under XP and Mandrake).

      And about the design I'd like that Mozilla would copy something from Opera: if it has crashed Opera would ask you if you wanted to reopen the web pages previously opened, Mozilla crashes not too often these day, but it still happen, why Mozilla cannot do something similar?

    38. Re:Looks interesting... by SirDrinksAlot · · Score: 1

      Apple chose not to purchase Be because the OS was nowhere near mature enough. NeXT's OpenStep was a logical choice because its simply an amazing OS. If you've ever seen it (NeXTStep) running on a 40mhz 68040 you would know what i mean. It was even fantastic on x86 hardware. OpenSteps only problem with the x86 version was it was verry expensive and really only had one use to most people who would want it; WebObjects development.
      Granted apple could have improved it but since with the acquisition of NeXT they got both the OS and all their intellectual property. All together NeXT is far more valueble to them than just Be.

    39. Re:Looks interesting... by NeoOokami · · Score: 1

      Who said anythign about specifics? The qualities of the parts don't logically imply the qualities of the whole. Otherwise it's a fallacy.

    40. Re:Looks interesting... by axxackall · · Score: 1
      In order of being modded up you either say your points with facts or say your point with logic arguments or just give a funny joke here about the subject.

      I don't see any facts in your original post, neither any logic. So what did you try - to joke?

      --

      Less is more !
    41. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Be had a very responsive, very cool GUI, which Linux or other Unixex dont. The best GUI on a Linux/Unix is X-windows and its a very poor excuse for a GUI.

    42. Re:Looks interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      KDE and GNOME are very poor excuses for a GUI. Just buttons and pictures on the screen dosent make a descent GUI. It takes a lot more. Get out of the command line and use a descent GUI to teh fullest before you can understand the difference.

    43. Re:Looks interesting... by Herr_Nightingale · · Score: 2, Informative

      How is BeOS cleaner than KDE or GNOME? That's an easy one.

      A) EVERYthing is multi-threaded, so the BeOS GUI remains responsive at ALL times. Xfree, on the other hand, runs in a single process, and all X apps running must share a timeslice with X, which is neither guaranteed nor, in my experience, acceptable - hence the nasty GUI latencies of X. This is one of the biggest things keeping me away from Linux right now. Of course, unless you've used BeOS, you're probably not even aware that you're being killed with the death of a thousand cuts.

      B) There's no X server!! Bonuses here include low latency, low overhead (yes, X is a pig) and no window manager process running on top of X running on top of the kernel. In my experience Linux is like a chain of dominoes - just about anything can crash X, so all the programs vanish too, and I've lost my work. Whoops. BeOS isn't so fragile.

      C)BeOS boots in less time than KDE or GNOME take to load. On my laptop, it takes less than half that time.

    44. Re:Looks interesting... by mbogosian · · Score: 1

      BeOS was turned down as MacOS10, because the Be staff became greedy....

      I'm not sure if that's actually true. Rumor has it that Be was willing to sell for about a third of what Apple paid for NeXT ($400 million). It was probably more due to "Psycho" Steve Jobs edging out Jean Louis Gassee than Be wanting more money.

    45. Re:Looks interesting... by Sj0 · · Score: 1

      You know, if this was any other forum, I'd kick your ass. People say things like that all the time, and they're entitled to their opinions. A person says they like the Porsche 911 better than the Ford Pinto, and you don't need to even ask -- it's just a feeling that comes from quality engineering and design. It can be exremely difficult to qualify something like that, but it's there. Just look at the control panel in BeOS for an example. Or the way text files can have meta tags embedded in them. Or the way you can pause a movie, drag the image to the desktop, and have a screenshot right there. It's a thousand little things that make the an interface well designed, just like it's a thousand little things that make a 911 nicer than a pinto to drive.

      --
      It's been a long time.
    46. Re:Looks interesting... by Sj0 · · Score: 1

      Nope, that's not a multi-Ghz box, that's BeOS. I did that kind of thing on my k6-2 400 back in the day, and was incredibly impressed. This is part of the reason BeOS has such a fanatical following, and why even years after Bes demise, there are still people who are willing to defend it, and develop for it.

      By the way, the 3d demos were BROKEN in this release, which is why it was mentioned. There is software OpenGL support, which only makes the demonstration more impressive.

      --
      It's been a long time.
    47. Re:Looks interesting... by shellbeach · · Score: 1
      And about the design I'd like that Mozilla would copy something from Opera: if it has crashed Opera would ask you if you wanted to reopen the web pages previously opened, Mozilla crashes not too often these day, but it still happen, why Mozilla cannot do something similar?

      It can. Use the tabbed browsing extensions (sorry, can't be bothered finding the link - just do a google search) - there's an option there to save every tab open and re-open on a crash.

      However, since mozilla rarely crashes on me and since I also tend to have about forty tabs open at once (which would take about ten minutes to load simultaneously) I don't personally use the feature ... :)

    48. Re:Looks interesting... by renoX · · Score: 1

      Well I hope that this extension ask before loading the pages!
      Because if it loads the page automatically and it is the content of a page which crash the browser..

      I wonder why it hasn't been put directly into the browser instead of an extension.

    49. Re:Looks interesting... by fredrik70 · · Score: 1

      yeah, first BeBoxen was designed around 2 AT & T Hobbit CPUs, AT & T discontinued to produce them so they went for PowerPC CPUs instead

      --
      if (!signature) { throw std::runtime_error("No sig!"); }
    50. Re:Looks interesting... by shellbeach · · Score: 1
      Because if it loads the page automatically and it is the content of a page which crash the browser..

      Good point! (AFAIK it doesn't ask, although as I mentioned I don't use that feature) You could always suggest it to the extension's author ...

      I wonder why it hasn't been put directly into the browser instead of an extension.

      Well, that's the whole point of Mozilla, really - it's completely extensible so if you want a feature you can add it, and if you don't then you don't have to. (The extension's only a ~50kb download and installs automagically, so it doesn't take much effort to add it in ...) But I think that's the way Mozilla (at least, MozillaFirebird) is going: make a barebones browser with most, if not all, complex functionality provided by extensions.

      (... and I never thought I'd use the words Mozilla and barebones together in a sentence ... :)

  13. OpenBeos by hutman · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What does this mean for open beos people?? I would hope the YellowTAB people could keep their source somewhat in the open ala OSX at least.

    1. Re:OpenBeos by Bold+Marauder · · Score: 0, Troll

      Why should they? There's ZERO financial incentive for them to do so, and it may even be a business liability if they did open up their source code.

      I understand you "everything should be free because I have to spend my last dime on hentai DVDS" linux fanbois want the world handed to you on a silver platter...but let me be the first to tell you that in the real world, that shit just don't fly!

    2. Re:OpenBeos by bunyip · · Score: 4, Funny

      Yeah, we all love the idea of open Beos...

      But maybe there's at least 10 or 15 lines that look vaguely like some code SCO that probably took from BSD in the first place.

      I wonder how much SCO could extort from the Beos community? Gotta be at least $3.

      Alan.

    3. Re:OpenBeos by teamhasnoi · · Score: 4, Informative
      Zeta's not fully open because much of the code is licenced from Palm, especially network and backend gui code. What this means for OBeOS people is all good (as soon as it's released).

      There will be more interest, apps and support for BeOS. Right now the community consists of people who use it, and people who want to. Zeta will bring modern driver support, networking, and to BeOS, and that is something that has improved greatly in the last year. BeBits (in my sig) is somewhat like a sourceforge for BeOS, and the number of drivers written recently are all posted there.

      You can also try BeOS out on most modern hardware by grabbing BeOS max (link in my journal), a distribution with most necessary included.

    4. Re:OpenBeos by molarmass192 · · Score: 1

      How about because experienced programmers WANT to see the source code of what they're working with. I make full use of source code availability whenever I can because it lets me optimize my code to an extent that I couldn't otherwise. Also, the industry is replete with companies that license their products yet make their full source code available under basic NDAs. Granted, if you aren't a programmer but rather an end user, then it doesn't, and to some extent, shouldn't make any difference to you.

      --

      Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws-Plato
    5. Re:OpenBeos by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1

      Yeah, like this one:

      void main {

      THIEVERY!

      --
      Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
    6. Re:OpenBeos by be-fan · · Score: 1

      Dude. That's so 1993. It's

      int main {

      Well, figures that SCO would write non-standards complient code.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    7. Re:OpenBeos by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1

      Well, what do you expect? This is classic SVR4 code.

      --
      Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
  14. BeOS is dead. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

    And they've just zombified it in their pagan voodoo kitchen. I can just hear the start-up sound:

    "Braaaaiiiiiiinnsss!"

  15. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by BubbaTheBarbarian · · Score: 1

    As the Amiga has been dead MUCH longer then BeOS, I would counter that the Amiga guys are much more fanatical. How else do you explain dropping 2G's on 10 year old hardware? :)

  16. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by Lussarn · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Amiga at least was something sometime.
    BeOS still is a "never has been".

  17. Wasted effort? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    I greatly enjoyed BeOS when it was still in its viable days, even going so far as to purchase the BeOS 5/BeOS Bible combo when it hit the shelves, however Linux has come a long way since then.

    Sometimes I wonder if all of the Open Source resources should be pooled into one or two well-polished projects rather than scattered about as it has been. Zeta sounds neat and all, but I'd much prefer to see the developer effort go into making Linux a solid performer on the desktop.

  18. wait a sec... by Alpha_Nerd · · Score: 5, Funny

    You're telling me I have to pay for my operating system??

  19. BeOS was cute by GnuVince · · Score: 5, Informative
    It had a very nice GUI, it was fast and responsive, it was very light. I liked its design and feel, but I sticked to Debian due to the eternal problems that plague most new OSes:

    Lack of 3rd party apps

    Lack of drivers

    Lack of documentation

    Lack of some useful features (multi-user for example)

    This Zeta looks nice, but it won't be successful as long as it carries these problems.

    1. Re:BeOS was cute by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I liked its design and feel, but I sticked to Debian due to the eternal problems that plague most new OSes:

      # Lack of 3rd party apps
      # Lack of drivers
      # Lack of documentation
      # Lack of some useful features (multi-user for example)


      [laugh!!!] He's the real Debian Troll!!!!! I salute you, Sir. Your sarcasm is beyond compare.

      Sincerely,
      Debian Troll

    2. Re:BeOS was cute by AVee · · Score: 1

      How old are you. There must be people here that remember the days that was what people said about linux.

    3. Re:BeOS was cute by GnuVince · · Score: 1

      Linux was open, so instead of whining, people wrote their own drivers. With BeOS being closed-source, the same is not true.

    4. Re:BeOS was cute by Denis+Lemire · · Score: 0

      Though BeOS was closed source it did come with all the dev-tools and documentation needed for anybody with the time and experience necessary to write their own drivers...

    5. Re:BeOS was cute by ImpTech · · Score: 1

      Heh, that wasn't so long ago. Heck, people still say it all the time. I find that choosing an OS is a lot about to what degree do you want to give up on application diversity and driver support. Some people need the comfort of knowing that every product caters to them. Those people run Windows. Others don't need every product, just so long as they have a few of each type. Those are Mac people. When you get down to Linux vs FreeBSD vs BeOS vs whatever else, I find it comes down to which one supports most of my existing hardware and most of my apps, which is why I end up back with Linux every time. Beyond Linux, it becomes a question of what you can do without. And such is the saga of choosing OS's.

    6. Re:BeOS was cute by zonker · · Score: 0

      soo... because it is closed source, you aren't going to write drivers for it? mmmkay.

      i'll bet dollars to donuts that if you wanted to work on a driver that needed access to lowlevel plumbing, these guys would go out of their way to help you. if they are smart, that is...

      btw, people bitch and whine all the time about drivers for linux. if not the lack thereof, then the quality.

  20. First look? by DeathPenguin · · Score: 4, Informative

    Hardly. Below are two links that have video coverage of Zeta at CeBit2003:
    http://ddanneels.free.fr/Zeta-CeBIT200 3.avi
    http://gravity24hr.com/mirror/zeta/BeOS-Zet a-Prese ntation-CeBIT2003.avi

    1. Re:First look? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It may be helpful to note that, despite the different filenames, the above two files (both over 60MB in size) appear to be the same thing.

    2. Re:First look? by mmu_man · · Score: 1

      Those were _presentations_, that is run by yellowTAB, not by an independant *g* journalist.

  21. Re:Does it support Ogg Vorbis? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I don't run proprietary closed source operating systems.

    Whoop-de-fucking-doo...

    Go back to using Linux then! Most people are comfortable using closed-source operating systems & applications.

  22. Meanwhile by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A commerical company can get a free ad on Slashdot, but the first CD release of an interesting FOSS Operating System can't get a mention for love nor money?

    Remember AtheOS? Well now it (A continued development of it, anyway) has just released its first CDs.

    1. Re:Meanwhile by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have to laugh at the screenshots on that site. They are all literally screen shots. The show basically differerent background images. What a great demonstration of the OS. AFter all the background picture is the most important aspect.

    2. Re:Meanwhile by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are older screenshots that show more than just a background and some icons.

      There'll probably be new shots done for 0.4.4 I'm sure there will be more than a background image, just for you.

  23. Zeta? by h00pla · · Score: 4, Funny
    Bad name. I can see Catherine Zeta-Jones sueing. But as long as they don't take her picture, they should be all right.

    --
    I've been swashdotted -- Elmer Fudd
    1. Re:Zeta? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More specifically - a picture of her eating BeOS.

    2. Re:Zeta? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What? I thought she was included in the price!

    3. Re:Zeta? by Strike · · Score: 2, Funny

      No kidding, it's a good thing she hasn't decided to litigate the Greece school system!

      Say it with me kids: "alpha, beta, gamma, delta, epsilon, zeta (trademark 2003 by Catherine Zeta-Jones), eta, theta ..."

    4. Re:Zeta? by Azghoul · · Score: 1

      This "joke" isn't funny... it's begging for the Stupid mod category I saw on someone else's sig.

      Pedantic: Zeta is a greek letter, Ms. Jones has no claim to it.

  24. And in SCO news. by MongooseCN · · Score: 5, Funny

    SCO declares that YellowTABs OS "BeOS" is infringing on SCOs IP. According to SCOs CEO Darl McBride: "We ran the BeOS through a machine code debugger and found sections of 10-15 instructions that are the same as those used in our product." SCO says that people need to stop using the new BeOS or face lawsuits.

    Darl McBride also said that if YellowTAB were to buy a larger license, like the Entire-SCO-Company "license", the problem may disappear. When asked how a fledgling startup company like YellowTAB could buy SCO, McBride replied: "Right now even a few dollars is better than a counter lawsuit, besides I have my golden parchute. Hahah. Wait, is that tape still recodi...."

  25. Re:Let me be the first to say ... by frodo+from+middle+ea · · Score: 1

    at let it be conceived first.

    --
    for the last time people, I am "frodo from middle eaRTH", not "middle eaST".
  26. Germany? by Flabby+Boohoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why do the old systems go to Europe to die? Arn't the Germans responcible for keeping the Amiga alive?

    1. Re:Germany? by nick-less · · Score: 1

      Why do the old systems go to Europe to die? Arn't the Germans responcible for keeping the Amiga alive?

      The Amiga went back to the US awhile ago...
      Anyway, I guess thats why they called it "old europe" ;-)

    2. Re:Germany? by Timesprout · · Score: 1, Funny

      Probably something to do with a long held hope that one day it will rise again and achieve it's true place in history. I believe they are into that sort of stuff in Germany.

      --
      Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
      What truth?
      There is no dupe
    3. Re:Germany? by Bulln-Bulln · · Score: 1

      Why do the old systems go to Europe to die?

      Like Linux (Linux is from Finnland and Finnland is in Europe, in case you don't know)
      and KDE? (OK, KDE is a desktop environment and no OS, but also a German non-profit organisation)

      Mandrake is a French company. SuSE is a French company.

      You should get informed.

    4. Re:Germany? by Flabby+Boohoo · · Score: 1

      You completely missed the point, congratulations.

      Speaking of getting informed, SuSE is a German company.

    5. Re:Germany? by Bulln-Bulln · · Score: 1

      Of course. It was a typing mistake from me. I know that SuSE is from Germany.

    6. Re:Germany? by usotsuki · · Score: 1

      Hmm, French company with a German name, smooth deduction. SuSE's German.

      -uso.

      --
      Dreams, dreams, don't doubt dreams, dreaming children's dreaming dreams. Sailor Moon SS
    7. Re:Germany? by JudgeFurious · · Score: 1

      Why should he get informed? He didn't say that no new systems come from Europe did he? He merely stated (and was fairly accurate in saying so) that the old systems go to Europe to die.

      --
      Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
    8. Re:Germany? by Artifex · · Score: 1
      Why do the old systems go to Europe to die? Arn't the Germans responcible for keeping the Amiga alive?


      Europeans seem to make much better use of their machines than people in the U.S. This is not just a difference in how they treat hardware, but how they feel about software, too. Many people in the rest of the world don't have the budgets at work or home to have "current" tech, and they just have better sense in realising that learning to use your tools effectively makes you more productive in general.

      Face it, people here in the U.S. buy new machines every couple of years to play the latest FPS or run the latest bloatware. But they never fully realise what their machine is capable of doing.

      Meanwhile, Europeans do things like win contests for the best 1-k demo. Remember in the 90s, when some people worried that they'd lose their programming jobs to counterparts from the former Soviet Republics? Do you think they had anything like current machines? In reality, they learned to squeeze every bit (pun intended) from the 70s- and 80s-era hardware their universities had.

      I'm sure other people can detail this exhaustively, but the point is, people outside the US seem to be a lot less wasteful and a lot more productive with the tools they have.
      --
      Get off my launchpad!
    9. Re:Germany? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, SuSE is definitely German...

    10. Re:Germany? by zank · · Score: 1

      Europeans seem to make much better use of their machines than people in the U.S. This is not just a difference in how they treat hardware, but how they feel about software, too. Many people in the rest of the world don't have the budgets at work or home to have "current" tech, and they just have better sense in realising that learning to use your tools effectively makes you more productive in general.

      What the hell do you think? That western europe is part of the third world? The american ignorance is getting absurd.

    11. Re:Germany? by TheGreek · · Score: 1

      Don't forget The South.

    12. Re:Germany? by Dr.+Spork · · Score: 1
      Yeah, those guys are still listening to heavy metal, too! I guess it's a nostalgic continent...

      But just maybe, they're wise enough to recognize a good thing when they see it, and don't just give it up when the market has moved on.

      But on the other hand, there's David Hasselhof...

    13. Re:Germany? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Perhaps they are Jewish systems?

    14. Re:Germany? by fredrik70 · · Score: 1

      bah, we're listening to tech-house! or possible deep house

      --
      if (!signature) { throw std::runtime_error("No sig!"); }
    15. Re:Germany? by moebius_4d · · Score: 1

      Europeans seem to make much better use of their machines than people in the U.S. This is not just a difference in how they treat hardware, but how they feel about software, too. Many people in the rest of the world don't have the budgets at work or home to have "current" tech, and they just have better sense in realising that learning to use your tools effectively makes you more productive in general.
      What the hell do you think? That western europe is part of the third world? The american ignorance is getting absurd.


      Shit, I've been to western europe a number of times. When vactioning in people's homes (bed & breakfast) one comment I heard from almost everyone was about how Americans work too much and buy too many things, while they had short hours and lots of vacations but had to make do without the latest gadgets, giant houses, etc.

      So, fine. Everyone does it the way they like. But then you can't get upset when the perception is that Europeans don't have or even want to have the latest, fastest PCs and other assorted gizmos. Of course you have the idle rich, but that's a small enough population as to be insignificant.

      This notion that Americans are "ignorant" is getting pretty absurd, too. Of course people elsewhere know more about us then we do about them. After all, our movies and television are shown everywhere. The average American knows as much about foreign places as anyone, but it's just a small amount about a lot of places. A European may feel superior for knowing a good bit about the six adjoining foreign countries and their cultures, but in that same distance an American may not have any foreign countries. So we're not as likely to have that personal contact.

      You want to see some real foreign ignorance, go visit mainland China sometime. Get your translator guy to ask a regular-joe local about Europe. When you've got your jaw all healed up from hitting the ground, get back to me about ignorant Americans.
    16. Re:Germany? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Before I start my thread, i want to say that i'm german.

      We use the same software as you guys in the usa.
      If you look in the bed-room of a german teenager, there is nothing about efficient use of resources. My best friend just bought a pc case for about 400 (~430$), because i looked so cool!!!!!!
      And bought a Geforce4 for playing counterstrike even faster (His old card did never get to its limits in counterstrike). And most teenies in Germany are like him.

      Nobody i do know has ever used his computer to the limits (only my cousin with his C64).
      The only guys who real use there machines and "squeeze every bit" out of them are hackers and exist everywhere in the world.
      The only thing the germans use more efficiently is the fuel in their cars.

    17. Re:Germany? by zank · · Score: 1

      I don't know what piss poor familys you've been visiting, but in Sweden where I live I don't know anyone with an ordinary job that couldn't afford a new computer every other year if they wanted to.
      It would be like $1000, it's not a freaking fortune.

    18. Re:Germany? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why do the old systems go to Europe to die?

      Because only the finest old-world craftwmanship is appropriate for building the coffins for the growing number of Operating Systems done in by the Beast of Redmond. Sniff. BeOS, hardly anyone knew ye.

    19. Re:Germany? by LizardKing · · Score: 1

      Europeans seem to make much better use of their machines than people in the U.S.

      Not strictly true. There are a large number of old computer fans in the US, the kind of people who'll hire a truck and drive out of state just to pick up a crated up VAX. Check out the number of US based people on the NetBSD/VAX mailing list for example.

      Many people in the rest of the world don't have the budgets at work or home to have "current" tech

      Perhaps that's true in parts of Eastern Europe, but in general countries like Finland and Germany compare very favourably to the US. The standard of living is much higher in Scandinavian countries than in the US, although the high taxation that funds this means people live on enormous amounts of credit. The standard of living is more "even" as well - large parts of the US suffer from astonishing levels of poverty (Detroit and some of the rural Southern states from personal experience).

      Chris

    20. Re:Germany? by zonker · · Score: 0

      but how they feel about software, too

      yeah, like how they feel about those wacky scientologists mucking up windows. ;P

    21. Re:Germany? by Sj0 · · Score: 1

      Prime minister Poutine thanks you for your support in rebuilding our National Igloo. Rest assured, now that we have Grade 3 and FM Radio, every canadian will know who their congressman is, and their neibouring states.

      --
      It's been a long time.
    22. Re:Germany? by moebius_4d · · Score: 1

      Not to be too snide, but if you think that a $1000 computer every two years is "'current' tech" or "the latest gadgets" then I rest my case.

      I'm not trying to suggest that western Europeans are all living in huts, give me a break. But it's just simple economics that if you want six weeks of vacation and a 33 hour work week you can't create as much value as you can with one week of vacation and a 60 hour work week. Is the trade worth it? I don't see how a universal answer can exist.

  27. Re:OSNews...OSSpews by smittyoneeach · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Because, if you read the article, it was actually a detailed review by someone who is familiar enough with the subject to peer into the nooks 'n' crannies, yet critical enough not to tout it.
    In a day when 4 out of 5 dentists surveyed said reviews are merely ads in disguise, this is a breath of fresh air.
    Still trying to figure out why you'd use BeOS. Is there any security value in running, say, a web server, on a niche OS, so that the would-be cracker makes an ignorant blunder and exposes himself?

    --
    Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
  28. If by Timesprout · · Score: 1

    You just look at the screen shots it looks like a highly Configurable fax machine

    --
    Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
    What truth?
    There is no dupe
  29. But by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's not free, that's no good.

  30. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by pork_spies · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It's the people who you describe as zealots who are on the verge of transforming the IT industry and thus our world - who but a zealot would write their own operating system after all?

    Maybe BeOS hackers don't have the same transformative potential and Linux kernel hackers, but don't knock it, one of these days you could be running a bit of software they helped devise.

  31. LONG LIVE AMIGA!!! by thatguywhoiam · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Er... what?
    Oh..... sorry. :)

    --
    If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
  32. Now includes dead replicants! by Croaker · · Score: 2, Funny
    ... Other than that, the first boot in this beta version of Zeta greets you with two dead replicants, but that's easily fixable (as long you understand what a replicant is, which is a concept that new users have trouble with).

    Oh "understanding what a replicant is" is easy once you administer the Voit Kamph test...

    And which dead replicants show up, anyhow? Zora and Priss?

    1. Re:Now includes dead replicants! by qubex · · Score: 2, Informative

      BeOS has the unusual ability to embed one application inside another, these embedded applications are called "replicants". If you shut down the parent ("container") application, the replicants stay running, and even persist over reboot (think of it as "fork off and die" on steroids). In this case, I guess two replicant applications present themselves but are DOA for some reason.

      --
      "Place me in the company of those who seek Truth, but deliver me from those who believe to have found it."
    2. Re:Now includes dead replicants! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm very excited about the inclusion of the Pennfield Mood Organ 0.19b!

  33. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by ethzer0 · · Score: 1

    This particular Amiga zealot disagrees! Amiga's were one of the most Incredible Machines ever available on the market. If you never used one, you'll never understand.

  34. BeOS advantages over Linux, Windows, BSD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The GUI which was interesting 5 years ago no longer is unique - it's now a commodity in the days of KDE/GNOME. So what market is this OS appealing to? Businesses? No apps. Home users? They won't pay. Embedded Systems designers? Possibly, although Linux is free. I'm not trolling - any idea?

    1. Re:BeOS advantages over Linux, Windows, BSD? by teamhasnoi · · Score: 2, Informative
      Anyone who requires/demands resposiveness. Linux and OS X, user input takes a back seat to what's going on 'behind the scenes'. (Windows is sligtly better)

      BeOS has always been about instant reaction to the user, no matter what else was going on. Although most programs (with the exception of Mozilla/Phoenix) load too quickly to be intercepted...

      If BeOS stays true to it's roots as a media OS - musicians, video artists, animators and their ilk would switch from the ever more bloated, less free(DRM) windows. BeOS needs media, like media needs BeOS.

    2. Re:BeOS advantages over Linux, Windows, BSD? by Ores · · Score: 1

      BeOS has so many tiny features which you hardly notice. But they are just a nicer way of doing things. Then there are the other parts where they obviously decided they didn't have neough money and skimped on them like the VM amongst other things. But its nice to use an operating system which is well thought out and very productive. Sure you could spend a week or three setting linux up to have all these little tricks and shortcuts, but to me thats time wasted. Its not windows, and its not linux, but a lives somewhere inbetween, great for the lazy geek.

    3. Re:BeOS advantages over Linux, Windows, BSD? by rifter · · Score: 2, Interesting

      BeOS has always been about instant reaction to the user, no matter what else was going on. Although most programs (with the exception of Mozilla/Phoenix) load too quickly to be intercepted...

      If BeOS stays true to it's roots as a media OS - musicians, video artists, animators and their ilk would switch from the ever more bloated, less free(DRM) windows. BeOS needs media, like media needs BeOS.

      You know what, I like a lot of things about the BeOS, and I think that Linux could learn a lot from them. But I never understood this argument about BeOS's responsiveness and the claim that it is a "multimedia OS."

      Yes, I found it responsive, useful, and user-friendly. There were even many free-as-in-beer (and as in speech in some cases) applications. But none of them seemed to be multimedia applications; neither did I see any for sale.

      Maybe it is a Multimedia OS by 1990 standards, where pictures+sound with a CD drive means multimedia. But nowadays I would see a multimedia OS as a viable platform for creating and recording music, editing video, etc. I never saw a single application that would do these things. There is no animation software for BeOS, either.

      So if the BeOS is really popular with multimedia firms, what in hell do they run on it? NetPositive?

      This is not meant to be a troll. I really and truly would like to know because I want to like the BeOS, but I think it would be more useful with some applications that actually take advantage of the capabilities inherent in the OS. Unfortunately everyone who advocates the BeOS says it is great for multimedia creation, and neglects to mention a single application with which one could create multimedia which runs on the OS. AFAIK there are not any.

  35. Y Tu Gentu? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It's amazing how every single story about something on OSNews is submitted by Gentu.

    I have no idea how Eugenia got a free pass with the /. people, but I am pretty sure it isn't the quality of her writing, or her tolerance for dissenting views.

    Seriously.. this is ridiculous. Save for one story submitted by "Worried" on April 19th, I had to scroll back to March 28th to find one not by "Gentu." And even back that far, the Gentu thing is still the name on almost all of the stories. Its just stupid. Anonymity in story submission only works if you don't choose the same handle each time, sweetie.

    1. Re:Y Tu Gentu? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      I agree with you. This looks pretty sleazy. The fact that she's not using her real name is a good sign she wants to mask, at least to some degree, the fact that she's using Slashdot to dive stampedes of people to look at her OSO banner adds. What Slashdot gets out of it is an interesting question.

      I'd prefer that she could restrain herself from using Slashdot like that, but if she can't, she should have the guts to be honest about what she's doing. I agree with you that this is stupid.

    2. Re:Y Tu Gentu? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Who is Eugenia, and why should I care?

      Seriously, I'm curious.

    3. Re:Y Tu Gentu? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Perhaps the username Eugenia was taken and she didn't feel like getting Eugenia_666. Gentu has never _denied_ they were Eugenia. Your accusations are unfounded.

    4. Re:Y Tu Gentu? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Gentu is not a valid user account. It's just an anonymous typed in nickname. Eugenia has an account, and used to submit news under it. She was flamed all over the place for being a link whore, among other things. Suddenly "Gentu" appeared. Amazing.

  36. Re:Simple question by cybermace5 · · Score: 1

    They didn't invent a new computer to run this, no. Be already made that mistake once.

    --
    ...
  37. BeOS was great in its time by be-fan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As you can tell from the nick, I was a BeOS user back in the day. Technically, it was way ahead of anything at the time:

    1) The kernel was extremely low latency, and the scheduler was superbly designed for user responsiveness. This was at a time when the low-latency and preempt kernels simply didn't exist, and we were putting up with the 100ms+ second latencies of kernel 2.2. While Linux today has caught up with and surpassed the latency targets, it (even in 2.5) still hasn't managed to reach the same quality in the scheduler.

    2) The GUI was very fast and responsive. The theme I use today (dotNET on KDE) is probably similarly complex to Be's native look, but BeOS was still faster, even though I ran it on a lowly 300MHz PII, and I run KDE on my 2GHz P4. It was heavily multithreaded, which made a world of difference for a machine under heavy load. In BeOS, an app's GUI would never freeze up while the app did some background task. This was at a time when GTK 1.2.x and Qt 2.x weren't even thread-safe! Even today, KDE and GNOME have yet to make use of multitheading as effectively as BeOS did half a decade ago.

    3) It had a very fast journaled filesystem, with attributes and live queries and everything. This was at a time when ext2 would nuke your installation after a bad crash.

    4) It was pretty. It was simple, without being austere, and had a colorful asthetic. It had fully-antialiased fonts back when we had Win9x's "font smoothing" and Linux user's were just happy to be finally able to use TrueType fonts.

    5) Long before OS X came around, BeOS had the power of Unix with the simplicity of a Mac. The shell was extremely well integrated with the GUI, and you could even script GUI events from the command line.

    6) The API was awesome. It was simple, well designed, and well documented. This was back when GTK+' s documentation consisted of source code.

    Of course, these days, Linux has come a long long way from what it was then. It's got a kernel much better than BeOS ever did, KDE and GNOME are catching up in the GUI department, XFree86 has fully accelerated OpenGL, and is getting nifty features like XRender and Xr, FreeType/Xft has some of the nicest looking antialiased fonts out there, etc. But BeOS has stagnated for years, and is much the same now as it was then. It's still quite impressive, but not as shiny as it was in its heyday.

    --
    A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    1. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      While Linux today has caught up with and surpassed the latency targets, it (even in 2.5) still hasn't managed to reach the same quality in the scheduler.

      So BeOS has better scheduling than O(1)?

      Long before OS X came around, BeOS had the power of Unix with the simplicity of a Mac.

      Multi-user support was, and is, lacking. So it had the power of a Mac, combined with the simplicity of a Mac (before OS X).

    2. Re:BeOS was great in its time by cK-Gunslinger · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I think the coolest thing that wowed me about BeOS was when I loaded the GL-Teapot demo, watched it spin, then kept adding more and more and watched as they each *gradually* spun slower and slower. There was no locking up, none of them stopped, and the gui still responded just as fast. I didn't know a whole lot about programming back then, but I was impressed with how the whole system *scaled* usage.

    3. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Ed+Avis · · Score: 0

      7) ???

      8) Profit!

      (or not, in the case of Be, Inc.)

      --
      -- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
    4. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Time complexity has absolutely nothing to do with absolute latency. You could have an O(1) scheduler with ten minute latency...

      Anyhow BeOS had a scheduling policy better suited for multimedia, while Unix systems traditionally have scheduling policies better suited for multi-user time sharing.

      BTW: The Linux O(1) scheduler isn't exceptional, it's basically equivalent to what many other operating systems (e.g. Mach, *BSD) had since the 80s.

    5. Re:BeOS was great in its time by be-fan · · Score: 3, Informative

      So BeOS has better scheduling than O(1)?
      >>>>>
      Algorithmically, I would be surprised if it was even O(1). Probably O(n) give that it puttered out at about 400 threads system-wide. However, the scheduling for a high-thread count server load is very different from scheduling for a medium-thread count desktop. Basically, desktop use requires the scheduler to be able to give best service to the applications the user is working on at the moment. This is something of a black art, and BeOS did it better than anyone.

      Multi-user support was, and is, lacking. So it had the power of a Mac, combined with the simplicity of a Mac (before OS X).
      >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
      Multi-user support is hardly the defining feature of Unix, especially a UNIX intended for the desktop. BeOS had a UNIX-y filesystem layout, was reasonably POSIX complient, and had a whole lot of ported UNIX software, like gcc, vi, X11, emacs, etc. I can hardly use the terminal in Windows, because Cygwin is too laggy (on small apps) for my taste, and the Windows FS layout is hardly amenable to CLI navigation. In BeOS (when I used it) and KDE (now) I use terminals for most of my code editing and file management.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    6. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >So BeOS has better scheduling than O(1)?

      Time is not all that matters. It's also what you schedule.

      -Ancient Japanese saying...

    7. Re:BeOS was great in its time by mmu_man · · Score: 1

      Why always use the past tense ?
      BeOS still is !
      I use it everyday, and it gets the job done.

    8. Re:BeOS was great in its time by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Slightly ot, on the cygwin tip, I use X-Win32 on XP with cygwin and I run xterms with bash in them. You can also run an xterm with cmd.exe in it if you need a cmd window. xterms are much better than Win32 console windows, though X-Win32 does just spontaneously explode sometimes and my xterms all seem to have a console window associated with them, ostensibly for doing debug output. I'm sure one could fix that problem. Cygwin does come with a multiwindow X server, which is slow but functional, so if all you want to do with X is display xterms it would be sufficient.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    9. Re:BeOS was great in its time by ianscot · · Score: 1
      Multi-user support was, and is, lacking. So it had the power of a Mac, combined with the simplicity of a Mac (before OS X).

      You're just trying for a bon mot, okay, but multi-user support is hardly one of the first ten features we'd describe as "powerful" in any OS. "Flexible," maybe.

      --
      "Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
    10. Re:BeOS was great in its time by melatonin · · Score: 1
      Just wanna clear some stuff up. I liked Be a lot; a friend of mine had a BeBox and it kicked (and I was waiting for them to port it to a PowerPC that I actually had... they managed to port it to everything that I did not have...)

      1) The kernel was extremely low latency, and the scheduler was superbly designed for user responsiveness. This was at a time when the low-latency and preempt kernels simply didn't exist, and we were putting up with the 100ms+ second latencies of kernel 2.2. While Linux today has caught up with and surpassed the latency targets, it (even in 2.5) still hasn't managed to reach the same quality in the scheduler.

      Wasn't the kernel built on Mach? Actually, I'm very sure it was. I remember that being used to give it credibility.

      2) The GUI was very fast and responsive.

      My fav feature of the GUI was the ability to turn off both processors on a BeBox :) That of course would freeze the machine.

      5) Long before OS X came around, BeOS had the power of Unix with the simplicity of a Mac. The shell was extremely well integrated with the GUI, and you could even script GUI events from the command line.

      Not exactly, since Mac OS X is really just OpenStep v6. OpenStep/Mach and NeXT are much older than the BeOS, and they provide that functionality. Actually, the scripting-the-GUI part only came with OS X (thanks to AppleScript providing a scripting language to Cocoa), but one of the reasons why Apple chose NeXT over Be was their ability to hide Unix's complexity. And IIRC Be OS isn't multi-user. It's not exactly Unix either, or at least it wasn't 'back in the day' when I used it; it was more of a POSIX compatibility layer (OS wasn't built on or dependant on Unix, but the OS provided POSIX compatibility). I remember it being a pain to port stuff because the file system structure was different... wow those are old memories.

      6) The API was awesome. It was simple, well designed, and well documented. This was back when GTK+' s documentation consisted of source code.

      If you take a look at the API and compare it to OpenStep (now Cocoa), it's largely a rip-off. Perfectly understandable too, since most popular OO frameworks are based on something already (the two most common roots seem to be OpenStep (which itself is Smalltalk-ish), and Apple's MacApp). And in the case of the BeOS, it's probably the only good framework written in C++ :)

      --
      Moderators should have to take a reading comprehension test.
    11. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Cyno · · Score: 1

      Just imagine where BeOS would be if they had released it under a GNU license.

    12. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just imagine where BeOS would be if they had released it under a GNU license.

      24 different "standard" GUIs, programs installing themselves anywhere they want, and 700 config files of various formats strewn throughout the filesystem?

      No thanks...

    13. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Multi user support is the number one feature of any real OS.

    14. Re:BeOS was great in its time by haggar · · Score: 1

      For some odd reason (no, really, I don't quite know why) BeOS is much more responsive to me The User, than any of the latest Linuxes or Windows2K. I can think of 1000 reasons why Linux should be better than BeOS, yet BeOS just feels like it's created for me, not for the network, the disk, the odd daemon to whom attention must be given. The pervasively multithreaded interface and the near-realtime kernel might have something to do with it, but maybe it's some magical force hidden in the meanders of the BeOS code.

      The thing that still impresses people is how the hardware is supported, is supported magnificiently: graphic cards are recognized and configured, soundcards recognized and configured, etc. etc. and all without the user ever seeing one single "new hardware found ... BZZ BZZ ... do you think this might be the driver, yes?... BZZ .. now reboot till we find the next piece of hardware .. BZZZ.." or a single dinking on the command line, Linux-style. Take the hard drive with BeOS from one computer into another, boot and everything (that is supported) works!

      --
      Sigged!
    15. Re:BeOS was great in its time by be-fan · · Score: 1

      Wasn't the kernel built on Mach? Actually, I'm very sure it was. I remember that being used to give it credibility.
      >>>>>>>>>>
      Not at all. The BeOS kernel was written entirely from scratch. It was a microkernel by the loose definition of the term (GUI, networking, input in userspace, filesystem, memory management in kernel space) which is why you might have heard references to Mach.

      And in the case of the BeOS, it's probably the only good framework written in C++ :)
      >>>>>
      I don't disagree with the OpenStep heritage, though I must say that it had a slightly different design due to the use of C++ rather than ObjC. That said, I think Qt comes pretty close. It's more complicated, but still rather elegant.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    16. Re:BeOS was great in its time by be-fan · · Score: 1

      I don't know. The OSS community seems to be a bit *NIX biased, and never showed much interest in BeOS. And the BeOS community is less developer-heavy than the *NIX community. If an active OSS community *had* built around BeOS, though, that would have been wonderful.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    17. Re:BeOS was great in its time by Cyno · · Score: 1

      There is a bit of an OSS community with OpenBeOS, etc. But its not the same as the GNU community. But comparing BSD to Linux that may or may not be a good thing.

      Personally I believe in the GNU philosophy.

  38. What about the PPC version? by kommakazi · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I looked all over their site and cannot find anything about a PPC version, this is rather disappointing. Anyone know if they plan on continuing it as well?

    1. Re:What about the PPC version? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's a good point. Jean Louis Gassee is French. French people like to eat cheese and surrender. You need an American (like Steve Jobs or George W Bush or Bill Gates) if you want to get the job done.

    2. Re:What about the PPC version? by hoytt · · Score: 1

      BeOS existed for the 603 and 604 PPC CPUs, but when Apple switched to the G3/G4 and Steve Jobs didn't allow Be to switch their OS to these new CPUs, Be OS will not run on any G3/G4 Mac, which is rather lame, because it really rocked back in 1997 when I used the Preview 1 release on a 604e Mac.

    3. Re:What about the PPC version? by Cid+Highwind · · Score: 1

      but when Apple switched to the G3/G4 and Steve Jobs didn't allow Be to switch their OS to these new CPUs

      Well, that was Be, Inc's flimsy excuse. Linux, *BSD, and a flock of other operating systems have no trouble running on G3/G4 machines, even without help from the "secret information" that Apple wouldn't share with Be. It looks to me more like Be wanted to get out of the PPC market without offending their current users, and Apple made a handy scapegoat.

      --
      0 1 - just my two bits
    4. Re:What about the PPC version? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What he said. Also I'm sure Intel had a part of it, because at one point they were happy to get (and keep) OSes on their chips (they helped Be, NeXT, and I think they had a hand in Apple's StarTrek project too). Happiness was expressed with money.

    5. Re:What about the PPC version? by kommakazi · · Score: 1

      That isn't exactly something Steve Jobs would have had the power to do. Perhaps YellowTAB could make an initial port of their BeOS to G3/G4/beyond since they are in possesion of the entire BeOS source... Perhaps a petition would be appropriate for this?

    6. Re:What about the PPC version? by teamhasnoi · · Score: 1

      OpenBeos is working on a updated PPC version - it most likely won't get the attention of the x86, however.

  39. Why BeOS failed by Debian+Troll+Returns · · Score: 1, Funny

    The failure of BeOS as a mainstream operating system is attributable to 2 missing pieces:
    - a superior package management tool, such as apt-get.
    - visual basic, an essential requirement for any serious fortune 500 company.

    it could also be argued that jean-louis basse as a leader was seriously at a loss to compete with the likes of the uncompromisingly ambitious bill gates, the eccentric marketing genius of steve jobs, or the laughable irrelevance and sheer disregard for personal hygiene of richard stallman.

    1. Re:Why BeOS failed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The great thing about BeOS was that you didn't need a package manager.
      Most programs are installed in the following way:
      1. Locate program on the 'net(usually on BeBits.com)
      2. Download zip.
      3. Uncompress zip.
      4. Run program.

      To uninstall you simply remove the directory to which you uncompressed the files.

      Sure, apt-get migh be a bit easier, if you know EXACTLY what you want, if not you have to go throug roughly the same steps(locate,apt-get,run).

    2. Re:Why BeOS failed by NDPTAL85 · · Score: 1

      I haven't laughed at a RMS joke like I just did in a long time.

      Thank you sir!

      --
      Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
  40. no ppc support by jub · · Score: 1

    Looks like they haven't revived the powerPC port that Be once had. I tried out the first couple of preview releases on my old PowerComputing mac clone, and i'd really hoped to see a decent final release. Be was awesome of that machine (210 mHz), and even though it was incomplete (couldn't print at the time), the number of new ideas there were amazing.

  41. Off to a bad start by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    The woman states that she doesn't understand what the "Language" feature does, or what the "Strings" options do, then proceeds to bash these things she doesn't understand as stupid useless features... is she thick?

    Just because you're english, doesn't mean multilingual capability is a useless feature, egocentric lady...

    You managed to make yourself look stupid and have me utterly dismiss your review on the very first page! Good job!

    --
    -1 Uncomfortable Truth
    1. Re:Off to a bad start by Strike · · Score: 1

      She's not English .. she's Greek, if I recall correctly.

    2. Re:Off to a bad start by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 3, Funny

      Oops... attributed her with an excuse she didn't have.

      Guess she's just dense.

      --
      -1 Uncomfortable Truth
    3. Re:Off to a bad start by Ed+Avis · · Score: 2, Funny

      It's Eugenia Loli-Queru! For years now, new distributions have been reviewed on OSNews, a story gets posted to Slashdot, and one of the first comments is that 'Eugenia hates anything that isn't BeOS'. But now we have an official BeOS, or as close as possible, reviewed on her site and she still runs through a long list of complaints. Which seems to demonstrate that she's not that biased after all.

      --
      -- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
  42. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful
    This particular Amiga zealot disagrees! Amiga's were one of the most Incredible Machines ever available on the market. If you never used one, you'll never understand.
    What I understand from this is that you've never used, much lesss coded on, a NeXTDimension!
  43. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    As a fellow Amiga owner, I disagree. The Amiga had a spunky graphics chipset, and practically nothing else except the price and loads of games. The OS largely sucked, the hardware was developed too slowly, the incompatibility problems were a nightmare, the diskdrives were faulty half the time, the hard drive units cost too much, there was a lack of non-game software, etc etc.

  44. France by aspargillus · · Score: 2, Informative

    IIRC, BeOS originally came from France. (Old Europe at work here...) So it rather returns.

    1. Re:France by qubex · · Score: 5, Informative

      As a matter of fact BeOS' only connection with france was the nationality of Be Inc's founder, one Jean-Louis Gassé. However the OS (and the beautiful BeBox) was entirely developed in the USA. It is true that Be Inc later opened its european regional offices in Paris, but this is a far cry from "being born in europe".

      As for why old systems "go to europe to die", as a european, I guess it is down to a general appreciation of solid stuff that works as opposed to newfangled stuff driven by the corporate sphere... or maybe that's just me...

      --
      "Place me in the company of those who seek Truth, but deliver me from those who believe to have found it."
    2. Re:France by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      IIRC

      You don't.

  45. Haha, love Eugenias trolling by stratjakt · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    The fact that the user has the ability to select applications one by one ... is completely unnecessary and it brings a dreadful Linux-like feeling to the installation

    adding useless features like "Stings", application selection and "GCC version choice"

    What a dimwit. This is the worst review of anything I've ever read.

    --
    I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
    1. Re:Haha, love Eugenias trolling by a.ameri · · Score: 1

      Hey, it's Eugenia Loli-Queru!When you see an article by her, you should expect what you ae going to see! Ofcourse I really liked one part of her story: "I have a BeOS machine around, but I don't use it much anymore". haha! poor gal, she has suffered more than anyone in the world because of demise of BeOS.

      --
      -- /* Those who don't underestand Unix, are condemned to reinvent it poorly */
  46. Re:OSNews...OSSpews by AccUser · · Score: 1

    Still trying to figure out why you'd use BeOS.

    The multimedia capabilities of BeOS are excellent, and the hardware requirements are a lot lower than you would expect. Install BeOS on your Mini-ITX based box, and you will have yourself the beginnings of a Home Theater PC.

    --

    Any fool can talk, but it takes a wise man to listen.

  47. Who *EXACTLY* are "yellowTAB"? by swagr · · Score: 1

    All of the ex-Be-Developers and management? Just a few?
    Did "Be" basically buy it's OS back?

    What is going on here?

    --

    -... --- .-. . -.. ..--..
    1. Re:Who *EXACTLY* are "yellowTAB"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, no, and no. AFAIK none of the original Be engineers work for yellowTab. It's a german startup company which somehow managed to licence the BeOS source berore Be, Inc went down.

    2. Re:Who *EXACTLY* are "yellowTAB"? by no+reason+to+be+here · · Score: 5, Informative

      YellowTAB are a German group, completely separate from the original Be, Inc. Before Be went belly up, but after it had become obvious that they had put all their eggs in the Internet Appliance basket, yellowTAB approached them about licensing BeOS so they (YT) could distribute it. The nature of the contract between the two apparently made it still valid, even after Be, Inc.'s sale to Palm.

  48. Re:Simple question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thanks for answering with only a slight bit of sarcasm :) I was worried for a second all of slashdot was too jaded to let me know.

  49. links by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative
    1. Re:links by mmu_man · · Score: 1

      Remember R5.1d0 is STILL illegal, and clicking the link exposes you to lawsuits *g*

    2. Re:links by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't get it. What's the difference between the Dev 1.1 edition and beos 5 personal?

      Btw the way, nice forums. First post I read and the beos biggots there start ranting how beos is better than linux. :rollseyes: Sure the parent was a troll, but he said NOTHING about linux. These people are pathetic fanatics.
      Recent forum post

  50. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by jceaser · · Score: 0

    I second that.

  51. Reviewer is ridiculous nutcase by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    He's mainly pissed off because it doesn't work so speedy on an old, obsolete computer:

    "BeOS was created to run on computers like P90 and P100. I use BeOS and Zeta on this (fast machine by the BeOS standards) dual Celeron 2x533 (which is the machine most BeOS geeks preffered back in the day) and BeZilla/Phoenix is just _unusable_"

    http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=3692&pag e= 3

    So we have a guy who wants BeOS to come into 2003, but he's only willing to test it on a machine that was released in 1996.

    Idiot.

    1. Re:Reviewer is ridiculous nutcase by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Actually, you have a women who is pissed off that it doesn't work on her old hardware. You also can't even read the text you pasted, as she is complaining that the OS runs fine on that sort of hardware, yet the only useful browser runs like a pig due to the various limitations of the OS (Only 192 threads per process) and a poor port (Due to a lack of developers for it). She is saying that Zeta should sink some development time into helping out the BeZilla developers so that they have a decent browser to show off with their OS.

  52. Re:OSNews...OSSpews by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    " Because, if you read the article," .... you'd realize the reviewer is a moron.

    The article has that "I'm still going to college, and this is 1978, so excuse my high-school writing style".

    Break the reviewer's fingers before he writes again.

  53. That gal has fixation on her dual Celeron box... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... she brings it up in every review piece she ever wrote - as far as I can remember!

  54. Not really by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The OS largely sucked"

    Not compared to the competition....

    What was available in '85...

    DOS 3.3?
    MacOS 6
    Atart ST - GEM

    At least you could multi-task, have a command-line, play games, have a unix-like environment with lots of freely-available software.

    By today's standards, its pitiful, but by 1985 standards, it was pretty cool to see a PC running many programs at the same time.

    1. Re:Not really by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My my my... we really are glossing over things aren't we? The Atari had Mint at that time which was MUCH more advanced than the AmigaDOS/Workbench. The Amiga was a shit ass piece of a machine. About the only thing it was good for was games and HAMming around with some pictures. Today, ANY PC can do what an Amiga could. The Atari ST was way ahead of the curve where professional music production was concerned and it was no slouch for games either. Not to mention it was MUCH LESS EXPENSIVE!!! "Power without the price" was the motto and the ST sure lived up to that. The Amiga would put you in debt (especially if you were 17 back then as I was) for years. And the Amiga's only real forte was graphics whic didn't mean arse for a professional audio/music producer like me. It would have been a real waste of money for me to get an Amiga.

      I paid off my first Atari ST in six months. That ST helped me through high school, college and even into the beginning of my post college job hunt. I finally bit the bullet and bought a PC in 1994. So let's see... I spent $900 on an ST in 1987 and it was a usable and current machine until 1994. My software was a buy once, use for years scenario. And I got so into the ST that I actually bought two more to have them do other things (besides professional audio work). By the time I bought the secondary units the ST could be had for $100-250 and was still just as powerful and usable. There was no forced obsolecence. Now it's 2003 and I've been through 14 PCs because of ever growing hardware requirements from MS. And those 14 PCs were purchased between 1994 and 1998... At about $4000 (for the first PC) to $800 (the cheapest of the bunch) to total somewhere around $10000. Just so I could do the same stuff my ST did... Hmm??? The bottom line: PCs and Amigas suck. Fortunately, today I have Linux which saves me in the neighborhood of $12000 a year on software. I actually sat down and totalled up how much it would cost me to migrate my entire network at home to Windows and have it do everything that my Linux based network does. When all was said and done, I was going to need three new machines to do the work of my solitary Linux server and four copies of Windows Server 2003. Then my six workstations would have all needed copies of Windows XP Pro. Even buying the Volume Licensing Edition would have cost me close to $2000. Not to mention that at least three of those workstations are to underpowered to run XP with any usable speed. So tack on another cost there for new PCs and laptops. Then all the applications I use have fairly expensive counterparts on Windows. I would wind up spending anywhere from $40-$1000 per application/per workstation for what I currently download and compile from the internet. I also totalled in the amount of time it takes me to maintain my Linux network at my estimated hourly rate of pay at my day job: $50/hr. Even with the amount of time that I put into maintaining the machines per year it's STILL less than $1500. My uptimes are tremendous: My main server (a Celeron 400 with 64 Megs of RAM) has a current uptime of 700+ days. (I only update the kernel if I really need something that a new one has... so far I haven't needed to update at all for the past few years) I've even had high uptimes on my laptops thanks to the ability to suspend. My highest laptop uptime so far has been: 255 days. Sorry, but Windows just can't compete in my environment on price alone. In terms of performance, it will NEVER beat Linux. So to make a long story short; The Amiga sucks, Amiga users suck, Windows sucks, Windows users are retarded. Linux is the only way to go. I know this might come off sounding like a troll, but the Linux figures I mentioned above are true. Oh yeah... and GEM on the ST was a GREAT windowing system. It's unfortunate that it was hobbled for PCs by Apple.

      And finally: ...it was pretty cool to see a PC running many programs at the same time...

      BWahahaahahaha!!! You've apparently never seen the alternative OSes for the Atari which totally blew away the Amiga and the Mac. And they could boot off of a floppy too!

    2. Re:Not really by zakezuke · · Score: 1

      Agreed!

      I often times hear complaints about AmigaOS by todays standards, for example the lack of virtual memory. Simple responce, "the fucking thing didn't need it". Most applications were designed to operate on a 720k floppy disk, and what you couldn't do in a floppy, you could shove in a ram disk.

      The Amiga was remarkable for the time period as it had "multi-media" before it was coined as a phrase. I got into it a touch late my self, I was operating a 386 along side of an amiga.

      My PC was running ms-dos 4 with desqview and the amiga was well just running it's native OS. As an all purpose machine, the amiga's multi-tasking ability was far suprior to even desqview, not to speak of windows 3.1. I could access an online resource via dialup modem, and run a somewhat decent WYSISYG word processor, and run a game at the same time. Windows 3.1, forget it.. desqview, well I could but users of my BBS would notice it.

      And not to speak of the fact that most monitors supported video input, both standard and chroma luma (SVHS video). People were just blown away by flicking that switch in the back and getting TV on your computer monitor... a feature that today is buggy at best.

      I could live with the fact that main stream applications never came my way, nor my ability to find x-server software that wasn't cost prohibitive. What I couldn't live with was the fact the best a stock amiga offered was 8bit aga graphics, though with a few tricks could do above and beyond 256 colors, but not for a .jpg or anything other then it's own standard.

      I couldn't live with the fact that trivial upgrades cost an arm and a leg, while you could use a serial mouse via 2rd party support, it was pretty cost prohibitive to get a 2nd serial card. The whole VGA monitor thing, while there were a few models that an amiga could use, it's not like your modern 15 inch would work, just doesn't sync down to that level. Now if you know where to get a replacement monitor for the amiga, let me know, mine blew up.

      I think I was using mine as late as 1992 or so before I gave up and said, "it was dead jim".

      --
      There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
  55. Good luck, Sir Clive! by Ed+Avis · · Score: 1

    Good to see that Sinclair Research has made another comeback with the Zeta. I wonder if they will port it to the QL or to tricycles?

    --
    -- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
  56. It might be the greatest desktop OS ever... by skryche · · Score: 3, Interesting
    ...but nobody's going to use it when there are alternatives that are cheaper, more free, with more apps, and are better supported.

    Without the GPL or, say, a Win32 emulation thingy, it doesn't seem viable.

    1. Re:It might be the greatest desktop OS ever... by teamhasnoi · · Score: 1
      I recall some people saying that about Linux a few years ago.

      Zeta doesn't need the GPL, OpenBeOS is taking care of that. Zeta will have the advantage of being done and increasing the user/developer base while OBeOS is working on covering the re-writing bases.

      Just keep in mind that there are a lot of niches not covered by the 'big' OSes and distributions that OBeOS can fill. (If there wasn't, why would we need YALD - Yet Another Linux Distribution?)

    2. Re:It might be the greatest desktop OS ever... by burns210 · · Score: 1
      " ...but nobody's going to use it when there are alternatives that are cheaper, more free, with more apps, and are better supported."

      Ironicly, these were the same problems that plagued the BeOS the first time around... Well, that, and some questionable tactics by a Redmond company to discourage BeOS being bundled with computers...

  57. I don't know why, either by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dual CPU boxes are generally too expensive for the performance gain; you'd better off buying a new computer ever 18 months to get better performance and lower cost.

    But hey, when you're using a 233mhz dual-processor celeron, I guess you think the world is your oyster.

    (hell, the CPU's on Palm devices are faster than that these days)

  58. Re:Does it support Ogg Vorbis? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It actually does support Ogg Vorbis. Or at least I can't see why it wouldn't since Vorbis works just fine on BeOS R5. I compiled it from CVS without any hassle a few days ago.

  59. BeOS for Linux?! by hey · · Score: 1
    I'd like to see a BeOS GUI (desktop environment) that can run on Linux.

    It would have lots of advantages: use the drivers, packages for Linux, the best GUI for users and programs, no X.

    Disadvantages: not open source, doesn't really belong in either world.

    1. Re:BeOS for Linux?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no "desktop environment" in BeOS. The GUI is the OS, it does not sit on top of anything. You could make one that looks like BeOS's Tracker, but it will never act like it.

    2. Re:BeOS for Linux?! by Zan+Zu+from+Eridu · · Score: 1
      It would have lots of advantages: use the drivers, packages for Linux, the best GUI for users and programs, no X. Disadvantages: not open source, doesn't really belong in either world.

      Main disadvantage: lose X and you lose all X apps. This is the he main reason for GUI developers to stay on X, not because they like it so much. Be showed before that a great GUI isn't enough, you need those apps.

  60. Is the reviewer a cross-dresser? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "http://www.osnews.com/editor.php?editors_id=1"

    I think she's hot.

    But you tell me what you think.

  61. ... what about BeBox'es? by torpor · · Score: 1

    More important, what does this mean to the BeBox users out there?

    C'mon, don't make me run Plan9 on my BeBox... I wanna play with Zeta too!!! :)

    --
    ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
  62. Yeah, what about for us BeBox users? by torpor · · Score: 2, Interesting


    No fair. I wanna play with Zeta on my Bebox too.

    --
    ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
  63. Zeta sorority? by lpret · · Score: 1

    What about zeta tau alpha? Or more commonly known as Zeta? My gf is zeta and wouldn't care (she loves AOL *sigh*) but it's interesting.

    --
    This is my digital signature. 10011011001
  64. You are a complete ass. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Read it again. The BOOT TIME is not speedy. And BeZilla speed is piss poor on ANY MACHINE.

    BeOS DOES need to come to 2003, but it also needs to run on machines more than a few years old. Anyway, since when is a dual celeron not a modern machine?

    You're a troll with an axe to grind.

  65. Wasted efforts? by teslatug · · Score: 2, Interesting
    But it is a great help that Zeta is the true and only direct BeOS descentant, so they are currently years ahead in development than the other teams who try to reproduce the BeOS, like OpenBeOS, B.E.O.S, BeFree and Cosmoe.
    Damn! Just how many BeOS clones are there out there in development??? Also, what's up with adding Zeta all over the place. Most people who will buy this are familiar with the name BeOS. Does Palm own the trademark?
    1. Re:Wasted efforts? by burns210 · · Score: 1
      "Does Palm own the trademark?"

      Yes, yes they do.

    2. Re:Wasted efforts? by Justen · · Score: 1

      Sort of.

      Be, Inc. (what's left of it, anyway) retains the rights to the phrase and trademark "Be" and "Be, Inc." "BeOS" and "BeIA" (their attempt to create an Internet appliance platform), as trademarks, were taken over by Palm.

      justen

  66. Wow. You're such a conspiracy theorist! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Big fuckin deal.

    Gentu == Eugenia.

    Who doesn't know that?

  67. Re:Simple question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I didn't mean that to be a flamebait post at all. Sorry for wasting your bandwidth.

  68. num-lock??? by mydigitalself · · Score: 3, Insightful

    i found this a bit of an odd request...


    6. No fix for the numlock bug which makes BeOS to not remember if the NumLock was set to ON in the previous booting. Sounds trivial and stupid but really annoys a lot of people.


    now i don't know about you, but i generally don't know the state of Num/Caps/Scroll lock every time i reboot my computer. the behaviour i DO care about is that they are consistant every time. numlock status is a CMOS-level (its been there for YEARS!) consistant feature.

    so i read the whole review with a pinch of salt if somebody wants their numlock status to persist after reboot, really...

    1. Re:num-lock??? by mmu_man · · Score: 1

      what she means is BeOs always sets NumLock to off even if it was on at boot.

    2. Re:num-lock??? by jonadab · · Score: 1

      I remapped my keyboard so that there is no numlock; it's just
      always off. (Actually, what I did was remap it so that the cursor
      movement keys located physically on the keypad look to the computer
      like the other cursor movement keys that don't double as numbers.)
      I touch-type numbers on the top row, so the keypad has always been
      about cursor movement for me.

      --
      Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
    3. Re:num-lock??? by joe_bruin · · Score: 1

      i remember having a tiny app in my startup script that turned the numlock on at bootup. here is an app that does the same.

      listening to eugenia (the reviewer) is always a mistake. this is the same reviewer that complained that be (back when they were alive) was not planning on supporting machines with more than 8 cpu's and 4 gigs of ram (back when they had silly things like 'video card support' to work on)! she really is a blight on the beos community.

    4. Re:num-lock??? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The reviewer is a silly person. Cannot be taken seriously.

    5. Re:num-lock??? by Suppafly · · Score: 1

      listening to eugenia (the reviewer) is always a mistake... she really is a blight on the beos community

      Amen.

    6. Re:num-lock??? by mydigitalself · · Score: 1

      haha - i didn't know that!
      i also didn't realise, at first, that she was a she which got me to thinking "who let a chick onto BeOS?!" *duck*

  69. interesting... by pyr0 · · Score: 1
    In the review, he mentions that he has a dual Celeron 533 system. From the article conclusions: "Even with Mozilla so slow when operating clogging up both my CPUs, mp3 playback did not skip (while it does on Red Hat Linux 9 on the much faster AthlonXP 1600+). " All I have to say is....WTF???

    I've got an AthlonXP 1800+, and I've never ever ever ever had an mp3 skip (both windows and linux) unless the mp3 file was actually corrupted itself. Hell, even when I was using my old pentium 233 I only rarely had a skip. I can even have my CPU usage run up to 100% compiling stuff and mp3's still don't skip. I'm just not sure I buy this.

    1. Re:interesting... by misleb · · Score: 1
      I've got an AthlonXP 1800+, and I've never ever ever ever had an mp3 skip (both windows and linux) unless the mp3 file was actually corrupted itself. Hell, even when I was using my old pentium 233 I only rarely had a skip. I can even have my CPU usage run up to 100% compiling stuff and mp3's still don't skip. I'm just not sure I buy this.

      It may be a matter of DMA not being enabled on the IDE drive in Linux. PIO/IRQ masking disk access can choke even the fastest machine.Makes me wonder how many people who complain about slowness in Linux are running IDE without enabling DMA.

      -matthew

      --
      "THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
    2. Re:interesting... by pyr0 · · Score: 1

      That's possible. I do use hdparm to set my UDMA mode to 100. I've also seen (heard?) computers skip mp3's when using a crappy sound card (namely some old non-creative isa cards).

    3. Re:interesting... by jovlinger · · Score: 2, Interesting

      RH 9 has a woefully sucky kernel, and it WILL cause skipping under consistent IO load.

  70. From the review.. by PS-SCUD · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Non rectangular window support."

    Now that would be interesting, round windows. Would be difficult to read text in lol.

    --


    "Much work is lost, for the lack of a little more." -Edward H. Harriman
    1. Re:From the review.. by Abcd1234 · · Score: 1

      Now that would be interesting, round windows. Would be difficult to read text in lol.

      Actually, this is no different than XFree86's SHAPE extension which is used by a LOT of applications (mplayer, xine, xmms, many window managers, etc) to create oddly shaped windows.

    2. Re:From the review.. by burns210 · · Score: 1

      mac osX has this supported, so i hear. There examples of it in the sample code that apple gives out to developers, but i guess noone has found it useful enough to put into their product...

      Not many practical uses, but it would be cool to have a round, bounderless window of a globe rotating... maybe for an atlas program or something.

  71. Re:Simple question by Chelloveck · · Score: 1

    Yeah, but it was a pretty sweet piece of hardware for the time. IMHO the magic of Be was the BeBox, not the user interface. Gotta love that geek port! I was really hoping it'd become the next Amiga.

    Instead, it just skipped the "success" stage and went straight to Amiga's "defunct" stage. *sigh*

    --
    Chelloveck
    I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
  72. Be was one of the best operating systems ever. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Built in single user FTP/Telnet access (good enough for the average user).

    Built in web server (single site, but worked very well, and was easy to configure).

    Very responsive UI (which most WMs and DEs have given up on).

    Excellent multi-tasking (WinXP still can't do this safely and effectively from a desktop standpoint).

    For its day, it ruled, don't knock it unless you've actually used it (and its "competitors" at the time). With some heavy development/porting, the new BeOS could be a real winner. Unfortunately, that exactly why it ran out of gas five years ago.

  73. Blue Eyed OS by Jack+Comics · · Score: 2, Informative

    Your wish was already granted. Take a look at Blue Eyed OS, a relatively new take on BeOS. It uses the Linux kernel with BeOS APIs. BeOS apps will run on it, so long as they are re-compiled. It combines the best of both worlds... Linux's stability, network capabilities, and far better device driver support, and BeOS's user interface, among other things. A bootable CD was recently released a month or two ago. You can get it from the web site if you want to try it out.

    --
    "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." - Oscar Wilde
    1. Re:Blue Eyed OS by hey · · Score: 1

      Wow, thanks.
      Very interesting!

    2. Re:Blue Eyed OS by hey · · Score: 1

      (Replying to myself)

      I tried it out (downloaded, burned, booted).
      Sorry to say, it was not as impressive as I had hoped. Sure the windows appeared but none of the
      controls worked. All-in-all it seems a bit wonky.
      I guess it was just a very eary demo.

  74. Re:OSNews...OSSpews by tincho_uy · · Score: 0, Troll

    Didn't want to waste my perfectly good karma, but well...

    I don't have anything against Eugenia, but her reviews are only good if all you care about is eye candy and rounded windows. From a technical standpoint, they are completely worthless. She's a web designer, and it surely shows in her way of reveiwing. Personally, I don't give a flying fuck if the Zeta logo is ugly... I tend to care about performance and stability. And no, saying that it boots in 23 seconds in her fabled dual 533 celeron is not a good benchmark.

    I do read her reviews, mainly to see the snapshots... If I want a good technical review, I won't go get it from OSNews (nor from /. for that matter). It's a bit like reading Roblimo's articles... from a technical viewpoint they're worthless, but they're sometimes fun... that's it

  75. audio mixing is Be's forte by DABANSHEE · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Ever heard of the Edirol - Roland UA100, the iZ Tech - RADAR 24 & the SX-1 Integrated Audio Production Station? They all use BeOS

    1. Re:audio mixing is Be's forte by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      The UA100 is an ordinary USB Audio device, the hint is in the initials "UA". Rather than installing BeOS (for which there is limited support), I'd suggest getting Linux or OS X for use with this toy.

      The RADAR24 and SX-1 use BeIA (ie just the kernel from Be, with custom software). Arguing that the existence of BeIA audio mixers implies BeOS is good at audio mixing would rather suggest that Windows Server 2003 ought to run well on PDAs, after all, doesn't Windows PocketPC run on PDAs? And that's got the same name, so logically....

      All nonsense, unlike software manufacturers, who bailed out as soon as they realised Be Inc weren't serious, the hardware people were stuck with BeIA in their existing products. You won't see them rushing to make new products based on Zeta after such a bad experience.

  76. Rolling eyes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The first AC was correct, the reviewer is an idiot.

    and by the way, to answer your question: "Anyway, since when is a dual celeron not a modern machine?"

    Since 2001 son. Since 2001.

  77. Re:OSNews...OSSpews by The+Phantom+Buffalo · · Score: 1

    If you weren't such a moron, you would realize the reviewer is a she.

  78. This reminds me of something... by Lord_Pain · · Score: 2, Funny

    I know!
    AmigaOS! That OS is the poster-child for zombie OS'es! And now BeOS will join it. A few people will attempt to drag it's lifeless corpse around in hopes of reviving it but not have the drive, skill or money to make it happen. It'll keep going on and on in limbo.

    Too bad. This was a clever OS (Amiga and Be).

    --
    -- What's this '-r *' file doing here? -- Oh well, a simple 'rm' should do the trick.
    1. Re:This reminds me of something... by teamhasnoi · · Score: 2, Interesting
      AmigaOS is tied to expensive PPC hard(vapor)ware, whereas BeOS works with what you've got - crappy old x86 pentium 120 machines. ;) Anyone can try it, or use it.

      So don't count it out yet - there are a lot of tireless crazies out there who are working hard to make BeOS into the next Linux (only better)...

    2. Re:This reminds me of something... by Lord_Pain · · Score: 1

      Well I actually hope so. The more platforms the better!
      I miss the old days when you picked up a game off the shelf and could see the screenshots of the game on various platforms.

      --
      -- What's this '-r *' file doing here? -- Oh well, a simple 'rm' should do the trick.
    3. Re:This reminds me of something... by JudgeFurious · · Score: 1

      Works with what you've got? Tell that to the video card that refused to work with it.

      BeOS was a tad less "BYOB" than that. Still I guess you're right in principal. Simply the fact that it's x86 means that it's got a much better chance than AmigaOS.

      --
      Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
  79. Does that excuse bad writing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "you would realize the reviewer is a she"

    so that explains her lack of writing skills?

    Huh?

    1. Re:Does that excuse bad writing by The+Phantom+Buffalo · · Score: 1
      No, it doesn't. But you couldn't be bothered to read the name of the person you're criticising.

      She is not a professional writer, and English is not her native language.

      I was able to understand the points she was trying to make, and the information that was provided. Even if it was not up to your standards of writing, it was still informative.

      I am not a professional writer either, so if you have a problem with my writing skills, get over it, because I don't care.

  80. Biased? No way! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Which seems to demonstrate that she's not that biased after all."

    After reading it and not realizing this person is infamous, I have to say that for most people, when you do something long enough (in this case, writing reviews), you get better.

    If this is the best, the worst must be scary.

    She's:
    a) not technical
    b) stuck in a weird 1998 time warp
    c) a web designer

    And she writes reviews of operating systems?

    Maybe she just stayed in a Holiday Inn last night.

  81. Because it's Mac OS for intel. by node+3 · · Score: 1

    So, Be fans, what makes BeOS so special?

    You know how everyone seems to be clamoring for Apple to release Mac OS for intel? Well, that's basically what BeOS is/was.

    1. Re:Because it's Mac OS for intel. by Kenzai · · Score: 1

      ...but only better - beats classic MacOS easily.

      Still use BeOS to day on my old Dell Dual P-PRO Server (handles dual processors beautifully!) and on my ASUS laptop (PII-366). Gave new life to both machines and when I want to get work done - writing, e-mail and Internet (research) BeOS offers a clean fast and trouble free experience. Sadly I have to use W2K, OSX (nope - do not like it) with Linux being the only relief during my regular work hours - so at home BeOS is a true pleasure - the games are fun too and there are still several programs out there.

      Looking forward to the return of BeOS, may it stay true to its roots.

      My 0.02...

      --
      - Kenzai, Master of the Little Penguin. "Long Live BeOS...ehhh, where is everybody going!?"
  82. Re:Uh... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This doesn't seem like HTML to me though:
    http://www.bebits.com/devprofile/1716

  83. Zeta pins! (not OS-related) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    neither OS nor college-related, these guys have Zeta pins.
    To show their love for fuzzy sheep.
    And I do mean love .

  84. Yes ... but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It does not have to be with money. It can be with time.

    Test it, report bugs, fix code, write documentation, praise it, help people install it.

    There are many ways to pay for a free OS and the least you could do is appreciate the developers and do one or all of the above.

    You can also sponsor projects or send in donations if you like.

    Take Care

    Sanjay

  85. Someone mod this +1, Funny by JudgeFurious · · Score: 1

    Dude, if I had some mod points right now you'd be getting a plus 1, Funny. "the poster child for zombie OS'es" is priceless and soooo true.

    --
    Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
    1. Re:Someone mod this +1, Funny by Lord_Pain · · Score: 1

      Why thank you! ;)

      --
      -- What's this '-r *' file doing here? -- Oh well, a simple 'rm' should do the trick.
  86. Re:BeOS was cute, but no Xfree86? I'll take it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Internal problems? Maybe, but BeOS never had X! IMO that's reason enough to like it.

    BeOS was designed to be the fastest, most responsive desktop OS available. BeOS boots in ten seconds or less on my old hardware - I'd like to see Linux try that. Also, the GUI is about twenty times more responsive than Linux could ever be, by design - and resource usage is a scant fraction of Linux w/X +KDE (which barely runs on my machine). Keep your Linux servers, but try YellowTab when it hits town.

  87. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Uhhh... me too.

  88. Re:Biased? No way! by Ed+Avis · · Score: 1

    But 'not techical' people are exactly the target market of Linux desktop distributions or BeOS-Lazarus or Mac OS X. I think OSNews does a good job of pointing out things that people don't want to hear - that often, things are broken or unintuitive out of the box, and that saying 'just run vi and edit this file in /etc' isn't an acceptable answer.

    For real end-user testing you need people a lot less technical and a lot more stupid than the average developer.

    --
    -- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
  89. Re:Ahh, BeOS zealots by teamhasnoi · · Score: 1
    Silence, worst of all, Anti-Zealot Zealot! I will contine to drive my Sparrow to work where I help homeless ferrets find new homes, while I wait for my Chicory coffee to be brewed on my homemade percolator, powered by the sun, wind and geothermal energy!

    I will continue post only positive things about BeOS until I can afford a Macintosh with OS X! Damn your eyes!

  90. Waiting for a final release? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Preview releases? What the hell?

    R3, R4, R4.5, and R5 all were released for PowerPC.

  91. Tell us how you really feel... by dcuny · · Score: 1
    It might have been an interesting review, but it was so cluttered with opinions that it was hard to actually find the content.
    • I don't use BeOS much anymore, but I do have a good grasp of its excellence in some points and its suckiness in others, so please forgive me for being opinionated.

      It takes about 15 minutes to install Zeta and it is not difficult at all. However, it is more involved than Be's original Installer and in my opinion, it shouldn't have been.

      YellowTAB should have concentrated on fixing this limitation of BeOS' Drive Setup instead of adding useless features like "Stings", application selection and "GCC version choice" that only bloat the installation and do not follow the paradigm that Be had and everyone loved: "keep it simple".

      However, what is immediately disappointing is that Zeta takes 23 whole seconds to load on this machine (a machine which has had BeOS 5 on it forever and loads it between 9 and 10 seconds).

      First and foremost, Zeta comes with some 400 fonts. Personally, I find this ridiculous.

      It takes about 15 minutes to install Zeta and it is not difficult at all. However, it is more involved than Be's original Installer and in my opinion, it shouldn't have been.

    Come on, Eugenia... tell us how you really feel.
    1. Re:Tell us how you really feel... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      it's a review. It supposed to be an opinion.

  92. My god... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    She's taken all the Apple Basic programs we wrote in 1978 and ported them to BeOS.

    Its like taking a stick and jabbing yourself in the eye.

  93. Why steal from that corpse, too? by RatBastard · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Don't you guys steal enough from others already? Every damned GUI I see for Linux always wants to look like something else with Windows XP and OS/X being the top two cloned interfaces.

    I remember when Be Inc. went under. The largest reaction in the OSS/Linux arena was "so what?", the second was "Will they release the OS under GPL so we can rape and pillage their IP?"

    This isn't a troll, this is a serious concern of mine. Don't copy BeOS, don't copy Windows XP, don't copy Mac OS/X! Do something ORIGINAL! Do something new that is Linix/OSS from the ground up. Stop playing catch up and take the lead for once!

    --
    Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
    1. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by sultanoslack · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Don't copy BeOS, don't copy Windows XP, don't copy Mac OS/X! Do something ORIGINAL! Do something new that is Linix/OSS from the ground up. Stop playing catch up and take the lead for once!

      This is just pointless hubris. To quote Igor Stranvinsky, Good composers borrow, great composers steal.

      This is to say that doing something original is pointless; building upon what has already been learned is the direction of progress.

      All of these desktops have common elements for a reason -- it's a pretty decent way of navigating through a computer. Yes, of course innovation is nice and sometimes you want to temporarily ignore some of what you've learned to try a new angle on things, but the most certain way to fall out of any meaningful cometition is to start ignoring everything that your competitors have done right.

      If you don't think that original ideas are coming out of the Linux desktop (and subsequently being copied on other platforms), then you aren't watching very carefully.

    2. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by FooBarWidget · · Score: 1

      What, is EvilWM not original enough for something?
      1-pixel window borders, no icons, keyboard navigation for all features, I haven't seen that in any other graphical windowing system.

      Wait, but there has to be a reason why most people don't use EvilWM hasn't it?

      Repeat after me:
      Original is not always Usable.
      Original is not always Good.

    3. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1
      keyboard navigation for all features, I haven't seen that in any other graphical windowing system.

      Windows?

      And I'm not talking about the extra 'windows keys' on the keyboard. Any program that follows the win32 usability guidelines can be completely controlled without ever touching the mouse.

      --
      Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
    4. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by bigpat · · Score: 1

      "Do something ORIGINAL! Do something new that is Linix/OSS from the ground up. Stop playing catch up and take the lead for once!"

      Why?

      Seriously, very few people have original ideas. And even fewer have original ideas that might benefit others. What is wrong in taking the works of others and building upon them? Everyday I use tools created by others, these tools lend themselves to solve problems certain ways, I doubt that many of my solutions are unique. In fact I can accept that some solutions are probably better than mine and I am willing to learn from them. Some solutions are probably the best they can be and I am willing to share them with others.

      I am familiar enough with the BeOS to know that some things they did were done well and it would be a shame to not learn from them and even incorporate some of their ideas into Linux where they can be.

      Children are sometimes told it is wrong to copy other people's work, really it is only wrong to lie about it. It is the sythesis of ideas that defines learning and science.

    5. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by IWantMoreSpamPlease · · Score: 1

      Sure but- ...Good composers borrow, great composers steal. ...

      Linux is not a great OS, it is merely a so-so OS with very little original within.

      There are (or were) several major OSes that didn't copy from each other...why can't *nix do the same?

      --
      So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
    6. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't copy BeOS

      The only way to really copy BeOS is to build an OS from scratch that does what you want by design.

    7. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by ozzmosis · · Score: 1

      > ...he second was "Will they release the OS under GPL so we can rape and pillage their IP?"

      I disagree with this, only because I feel if something works and works well and if we have the chance not to rewrite it, why waste the time in doing so?

      > This isn't a troll, this is a serious concern of mine. Don't copy BeOS, don't copy Windows XP, don't copy Mac OS/X! Do something ORIGINAL! Do something new that is Linix/OSS from the ground up. Stop playing catch up and take the lead for once!

      I'm just curious, what would you do different as not to copy from win, os/x, beos?

    8. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by FooBarWidget · · Score: 1

      > "Windows?"

      So tell me, how do you minimize and maximize with ONE keyboard command?

      > "And I'm not talking about the extra 'windows keys' on the keyboard. Any program that follows the win32 usability guidelines can be completely controlled without ever touching the mouse."

      I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about 100% keyboard control using only ONE keyboard command. I don't see that feature in Windows.

    9. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by FooBarWidget · · Score: 1

      > There are (or were) several major OSes that didn't
      > copy from each other...

      Can you name a few?
      MacOS? Nope, copied from Xenix.
      Windows? Nope, copied from BeOS.
      MacOS X? Nope, it's OS 9 + various ideas from BeOS/Windows/OtherEnvironments/Hollywood computer GUIs + new artwork + Unix.
      Windows XP? Nope, it's Windows 2000 + ideas from MacOS X/KDE/GNOME/Unix.

      Xenix? Too old to remember. But that was like the first graphical interface or something, so of course it's original.

      > why can't *nix do the same?

      Because it's proven? Because it works? Because the direction of progress is to build on what has already been learned?

    10. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by __past__ · · Score: 1
      I'm talking about 100% keyboard control using only ONE keyboard command.
      Doesn't this imply that there is only one function to control in the whole OS + apps?

      Seriously, as every Emacs user will tell you, the problem with finding usable keyboard shortcuts is the that current keyboards just have way to few keys. To keep with that example, in my not-too-heavily-used Emacs session in that other window over there, there are 3881 functions I can interactivly invoke (would be more if I used some additional modes after the last restart). I'm to lazy right now to figure out how many unique keyboard commands (defined as "collection of bucky bits + one regular key) there are on my keyboard, but even if it would suffice, I strongly doubt usability engineers would be too impressed.

      You can't have "100% keyboard control using only ONE keyboard command" unless you are OK with crippling apps. That's not to say that "Alt+Space x" is a particularly bright choice for one of the most frequent functions, of course (I bet that guy who came up with that isn't a touch-typist). Usable defaults is the key.

    11. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by IWantMoreSpamPlease · · Score: 1

      I can easily name a few:

      OS/2 and BeOS.

      The thing is, *nix is always playing catchup with everyone else because it's too busy copying Windows to bother to be innovative, original, or just plain clean.

      Too bad too.

      --
      So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
    12. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by FooBarWidget · · Score: 1

      Which was my point since the beginning:

      Original is not always Usable
      Original is not always Good

    13. Re:Why steal from that corpse, too? by FooBarWidget · · Score: 1

      > OS/2

      Dead.

      > and BeOS.

      Dead. A big part of the system is based on POSIX. The GUI has a lot in common with Windows and MacOS X (window-based, UI controls like buttons and menus).

      > The thing is, *nix is always playing catchup
      > with everyone else

      And MacOS X's underlying system is based on Unix but you don't hear anybody complaining that OS X is playing catchup with Unix.

      > because it's too busy copying
      > Windows to bother to be innovative, original, or
      > just plain clean.

      The way of progress is to build on what as already been learned. Why throw proven methods away and build everything from scratch? Only for the sake of being "original"? Innovation can be build on top of existing things too.

      No OS is truly original. You may find a few original things but none of them are truly original.
      You're acting as if being original and innovative is a good thing or the ultimate goal or something. It isn't. If it is, Windows wouldn't be the #1 desktop OS.

  94. BeOS Stocks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I bought BeOS stock after I first used the OS. Too bad I still have 10 shares of the damn thing. Thought about selling the stock certificates on eBay to some weirdo. Anyone need some oragami material?

  95. Re:ooooh! Now I get it! by The+Phantom+Buffalo · · Score: 0, Offtopic
    No, it's like watching a amateur football game and whining like a fucking baby because they're not as good as the pros. It has nothing to do with PC, it's about not being such an asshole that you have to point out someone's flaws just because they took the time to write a review and asked for nothing in return.

    And because you've been such an asshole, I'll point out that its is the plural of it. Perhaps you should have done your English homework last night.

  96. Roy's gonna be pissed! by visgoth · · Score: 2, Funny

    Other than that, the first boot in this beta version of Zeta greets you with two dead replicants Good to see Decker is still taking out the trash.

    --
    My patience is infinite, my time is not.
  97. Zeta boxes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Imagine a Beowolf Cluster of THESE!!!

  98. Irrelevance.... by Junta · · Score: 1

    Be tried to sell BeOS, it failed miserably, then gave it away for free in a last ditch effort to increase interest in the platform, and while extremely neat, the commercial interest remained weak.

    Now, it is in the hands of another company trying to sell it again. At the same time, so many groups have extended in very good ways the free edition of BeOS5, and thus this somewhat improved commercial BeOS faces very similar, yet free competition.

    I really don't see much hope in this, but it would be interesting to see how they fare.

    --
    XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
  99. Silly kiddie by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You can't steal IP.

    When we had sane courts and laws, this was understood, but some morons think ideas can be patented. So we have the current mess.

  100. Re:Who *EXACTLY* are "yellowTAB"4 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    t's a german startup company which somehow managed to licence the BeOS source

    While the slashdot-summary says that they licensed the source code, this is not true. They currently have a binary-only redistribution license. This is why Zeta is mostly a patchwork of a leaked version of BeOS and freely available drivers and applications, along with some apps that YellowTab developed.

  101. Sorry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    On /. you're suppose to use the officially gay "en" form of plural for box -- boxen.

  102. Hmmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Well if I enjoyed using "Pc's" at all i'd probably use BeOS as it is most like my os of choice. It does most of the things I care about b.

  103. Does it? by t0ny · · Score: 1

    Does it play Ogg?

    --

    Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.

    1. Re:Does it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Only if you interface it directly with your rectum.

    2. Re:Does it? by Enahs · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      About your sig:

      Heh. To tell you the truth, though, I use OS X Server at work and I've been pretty impressed. It's still plagued with a few problems (filesystem code bugs, apparently, from the problems I have on various machines) but by and large it just sits there and does what it's supposed to, which is, in my opinion, what a server ought to do.

      It's a great system for an admin-less business, or a small business where the "admin" has to take on another role.

      --
      Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
    3. Re:Does it? by lunatik17 · · Score: 1

      BeOS is a POSIX compliant system, so yeah you could compile the ogg tools all along. In fact, look here for the Ogg encoder, decoder and Cl-amp plugin.

      --

      Here's my DeCSS mirror, where's yours?

    4. Re:Does it? by t0ny · · Score: 0
      Well, to be quite honest, I support dozens of Win2k server. And, quite honestly, they all just sit there and do what they are supposed to do as well.

      What kind of filesystem bugs do you get? IMO that would be a showstopper right there as far as using a mac server.

      I put the comment in my sig because I have thus far been unimpressed with either- the mac 'server', and I use that term loosely, seems like little more than a glorified mac. As far as supporting server class hardware, I think it leaves much to be desired.

      --

      Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.

  104. Re:Zeta? - killer robot in disguse by Graemee · · Score: 1

    What! no Batman Beyond watchers, and you call yourselves geeks!

  105. Atari ST? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The Atari had Mint "

    The Atari ST had GEM as the standard. Oh sure, there were add-ons, but there are add-ons for any OS.

    You forget Sys V unix was an official port for the Amiga. Yes! Unix was offered on the Amiga, and Atari had GEM. Oh. And Mint.

    As for booting off floppies.... guess what... both machines booted off floppies. HD's were expensive back then (floppies were expensive back then), and so until late 80's these machines primarily were floppy only.

    You do know the Tramiels only put together the ST when their Amiga purchase fell apart, right? Yep...the Amiga was supposed to be an Atari, but Commodore bought it out at the last minute. There was even a lawsuit Commodore had to settle with Atari.

    The Atari ST was the wanne-be machine. If you couldn't afford an Amiga for the toaster you got an Atari. If you couldn't afford a mac for music, you got an ST.

    And *yes*, the Amiga was obsolete by 1990, but what 5 year old technology wasn't? Certainly the Amiga had far better games.

    Don't get me wrong, in 1986, the Atari ST was fine, but aside from the Tramiels, the Amiga was acknowledged to be superior, and the Atari ST never had the following the Amiga did. It was Amiga-Lite. I just can't believe anyone still defends the ST.

    [god, I haven't flamed like this in 15 years! its like old times again. Lets keep it going!]

    1. Re:Atari ST? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Cool! An ST vs. Amiga flame war!! :))

      Well, from what I remember (I had both systems) I liked the games on the Amiga better. But I really liked the ST to do serious MIDI work on. I made it through four years of music school with the ST. :) I've heard all the stories about the origins of the Amiga and the Atari, but I still like both systems anyway. The Atari had a nicer desktop IMHO because it was very reminiscent of the Mac. The Amiga did have that sliding desktop feature, that I've only seen in Enlightement as of late tho. Ah, the good old days. I kind of miss them. :) :) :)

    2. Re:Atari ST? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I remember pretty clearly both machines had their pros and cons. The ST (I owned a 1040) had good MIDI capabilities and was used by artists of the day for professional recording. Its graphics were pretty good as well.

      The Amiga had fabulous graphics; it could display all 4096 colors at once in low res mode. I saw a demo at Federated Group once and was impressed but remember distinctly the color was washed out and the monitor suffered from an annoying interlaced flicker in high res mode.

      Both boxes were mean machines in their day and much cheaper than their competition.

  106. It wasn't a 'he' by denjin · · Score: 1

    A woman wrote the review...

    Anyway, for all we know, her faster computer didn't have DMA. And, I do get skipping sometimes in RH9, but I don't have that problem in Mandrake 9.1 (on an Athlon XP 2100+).

    That said, BeOS is -very- fast on older hardware, I think that is the point she was trying to make.

    1. Re:It wasn't a 'he' by pyr0 · · Score: 1

      Hmm, guess I didn't take a look at who wrote the article, but that means nothing. In fact, if indeed she didn't have DMA enabled on her faster computer, that says to me that she is possibly not qualified to review an OS and compare it's speed with linux. Another poster replied to me saying that the default kernel in RH9 is really slow. Why is that? You would think they would provide a kernel that provides good performance (pre-empt and low latency anyone?). I guess that's why I like compiling everything myself with optimizations.

  107. Where is my sphincter? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I have heard that it is behind me, somewhere in proximity to my buttocks.

    When I am not busy writing Linux software, I attempt to come up with strategies to view my sphincter, most along the lines of of jumping in the air while making kind of a twisting motion, such that upon landing I end up facing about 180 degrees from my original position. Then every effort is made to land in a crouched position.

    To date, I have yet to see my sphincter, even though I squint and quickly glance in random directions as I land.

    Although I did catch a whiff of it once...this happened after a particularly straining attempt at this "sphincter pirouette". It was accompanied by a short sqeaking sound...not sure what that was all about. Maybe I'm getting closer?

    Should I ever succeed in my quest, I think I shall name my sphincter "BeOS". On-topic, muthuhfuckuhs!

  108. A perfect tribute to BeOS - from a Gundam fan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Believing a sign of Zeta
    beyond the hard times from now"

  109. Damn, that was low... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    (and reminded me of the southpark-episode with
    Kyle's even more jewish cousin, who can't concentrate in class...)

  110. Mmmm Be by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1

    I love any company that manages things like this.

    --
    Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
  111. Re:BeOS was cute, but no Xfree86? I'll take it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    Linux can boot to single user mode in 3 seconds.

    The second link you gave is to where they talked about fixing issues in the 2.5 development series with preemption. Perhaps you meant to give a different link?

    At this time Linux has as good or better responsiveness than any other OS in the world, short of real time OS'es. It certainly blows windows away. The preemption patch combined with the O(1) thread patch put Linux right on top.

    I certainly never hear anything skip when I am playing 5 divx's at the same time and I grab a window and move it around.

  112. BEOS....i'm-not-quite-dead-yet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    AmigaOS....neither am I

    Yoda....but you're both as close to being dead as to not make any difference.

  113. How could you tell? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I thought she was hot though...

  114. Re:BeOS and....apt-get? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Watchew talkin bout, syphillis?

    --3dfx troll

  115. No by RevSmiley · · Score: 1

    You are correct but still a biased fuckwit.

    --
    As you can see I don't care about my karma.
    1. Re:No by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 1

      Where did you get biased from my post, fuckwit?

      --
      -1 Uncomfortable Truth
  116. Europe by RevSmiley · · Score: 1

    Europeans seem to make much better use of their machines than people in the U.S. This is not just a difference in how they treat hardware, but how they feel about software, too. Many people in the rest of the world don't have the budgets at work or home to have "current" tech, and they just have better sense in realising that learning to use your tools effectively makes you more productive in general.

    Maybe it's because they are taxed to poverty.

    --
    As you can see I don't care about my karma.
  117. Fuck. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Fucking M$ lamers. You can't stand Linux because you might have to actually know something about your operating system besides Bill Gates name. That is why you are fucked up in the head and anti any other OS. Free or not Linux eats windows lame little ass. Since I pay for my distro it's not exactly free. So far this year $150 USD. What is free about that? Oh I know it must be the "viral" GNU license. Has all you MSCE lamers pissing in your pants. BEOS rules. BEOS will kill Windows. Your Windows users are commiting suicide on the walls of BEOS. Fucking windows lamers we will make your mother cry tears of blood.

    BEOS kicks ass. Linux kicks ass. M$ sucks goat balls. SCO is dead. Long live UNIX.

  118. eugenia is crazy.. by Suppafly · · Score: 1

    Another great thing that I love about the Dano/EXP codebase -- now found at Zeta -- is the "smooth window dragging", which is explained here better (only visible on CRT monitors, LCDs won't feel the difference). MacOSX is the only other OS that has this feature

    This feature as it is explained at the link is also present in windows. So Windows, MacOSX and Beos all have the same feature.. its not really worth talking about in a review unless you are making fun of pre X macos.

  119. Re:YES! YOu have to STOP LEECHING OFF SOCIETY by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Troll feeding time:

    Hey you fuck! There is no law anywhere that says anyone has the right to take my money or time away from me for their own benefit. If open source and GNU/Linux are things I want to spend my time and/or money on, that's my own right as a human being. Microsoft, the music and movie industries and the the hardware industry don't have any right to make a profit from me. If I want their crap, I'll buy it. If I don't, then I can use the money that I don't spend on them elsewhere. More than likely that money will be spent on things that provide me with personal benefit. No one has a right to profit from anyone. It is a privelege to profit, and that is what has been forgotten these days. All these fucking companies with their vile grabs for my money. The more they try to take it from me, the less likely I am to spend it. Open source enables me to do this, therefore, it is a good thing. If anyone is a drain on society, it's the companies trying to get me to buy their useless pathetic products by holding FUD over my head. Fuck them. Fuck you. And fuck anyone who comes to your defense. I don't need Windows XP. I don't need a fucking SUV. I don't fear the "terrorists" (there aren't any in the US). I am a fucking rebel because I choose to walk a different path from the sheeple that call themselves Americans.

  120. We need to get this on BitTorrent. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The faster the better.

  121. haha.. by Suppafly · · Score: 1

    YellowTAB comes by default with a number of useful Tracker add-ons, including a brand new one named "Fax these files", which loads a new FAX-It application created by YTAB+friends especially for Zeta.

    Because one often needs to fax files to someone, it is important to have an easy way to do so.

  122. ...or hideously broken by HiggsBison · · Score: 1

    I must have done something wrong, but: The copy I had was a store-bought 5.0 version . It was too elite to do any drive formatting . When I gave it a Windows partion to chomp on, it cheerfully accepted it, and then accused me of not having the correct files on the distribution CD. . It came with a big honkin' book which dedicated the first 100 pages to the praises of some leader, including a story of how some programmer screwed up his leg big-time on a retreat, just to show dedication. I do not mean to troll here. I had a bad experience with BeOS. Maybe one of you can help me salvage it by telling me where I might have gone wrong.

    --
    My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
    1. Re:...or hideously broken by be-fan · · Score: 1

      Hmm, did you initialize (format) the Windows partition with BFS? It doesn't seem humanly possible to have trouble installing BeOS. There are something like 5 options in the entire installer! All supported hardware is autodetected. OTOH, you might just have bought a bad CD. If you're interested, check out the BeOS 5 PE (personal edition) which is flying around on the net. It limits you to 512MB, but you can install it to a file in your windows system (if you have a FAT32 system lying around) which is enough to give you a taste of how it works.

      PS> The manual was cool. The JLG worship is a little creepy, but so is the Jobs worshiping from the Mac camp. Either way, the manual was quite detailed, and very instructive for those new to BeOS, or computing in general.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    2. Re:...or hideously broken by HiggsBison · · Score: 1

      Thanks! I must have missed an obvious step, but you've given me a good clue. I'll dive into the manual again and give it another try.

      --
      My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
  123. Re:Germany? - to die? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Isn't it "old Cathedrals"? or is it "old Bazaars". America has just too much new and unneeded crap.

  124. Re:BeOS was cute, but no Xfree86? I'll take it! by fredrik70 · · Score: 1

    Why do all people talk crap about X when they mean Xfree? Have you ever tried a commercial X server?

    --
    if (!signature) { throw std::runtime_error("No sig!"); }
  125. Re:YES! YOu have to STOP LEECHING OFF SOCIETY by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 1

    Hey you fuck! There is no law anywhere that says anyone has the right to take my money or time away from me for their own benefit

    Unfortunately there is... it's called taxes...

    --
    -1 Uncomfortable Truth
  126. Re:YES! YOu have to STOP LEECHING OFF SOCIETY by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You are wrong. Taxes have always provided *me* with benefits. The roads are taken care of so I don't have to pay any tolls on freeways. If I had children, a base level of education would be freely available to them instead of having to pay exhorbitant fees for a private school. I don't have to buy every book I read, every CD I listen to, every movie I watch or subscribe to magazines or newspapers thanks to free public libraries (one of the THE greatest institutions in the modern world). My trash is picked up with no monthly fee of any kind. Chances are that if none of this was taken care of by taxes, I'd have to pay monthly overinflated prices to private businesses so some fat corporate asshole could get a nice salary and I'd get a shitty service in return. If I take the amount that I pay yearly in taxes and divide it up recently between all public free service I get from it, I'd say it benefits *me* quite nicely. So your argument has no teeth.

  127. Funny but insightful. by jotaeleemeese · · Score: 1

    OSes are becoming a comodity, they will not ve sold to the general user (specially once Linux and other FLOSS OSes triumph) but will be available for anybody to install them and then add up products and services on top.

    This BeOS clone is swimming against the current.

    --
    IANAL but write like a drunk one.
  128. Specific examples of KDE being cluttered. by MarcQuadra · · Score: 1

    Are you KIDDING? KDE is absolutely godawful in terms of performance, opening Konqueror takes over five seconds on my 1.4GHz Athlon! BeOS file manager opened in under one second on my 500 MHz K6-2. Also, be didn't have for hunderd-bazillion options in every menu, it was CLEAN. I swear, if I had the know-how to rip out the unneeded menu options in KDE I would. A real feat would be to have KDE 'learn' what sets of features you want to use and remove the others.

    I know that every option was added because SOMEBODY needed it and had the know-how to put it there, but really, KDE is total overkill.

    When I drag a file from one window to another, I don't want it to pop up a menu EVERY TIME, just friggin' MOVE the file, or COPY it if it's on a different physical drive, when I select multiple items and click one to move them, why on earth does KDE de-select all but the one I clicked on? KDE can do it all, but it seems to do everything in the most obfuscated non-intuitive way possible. Linux Human Interface coders should talk to some old-school MacOS users, the MacOS has hands-down the most sensical handling of file management and drag-and-drop on the market, amd has since the debut of Mac System 7.

    I don't have much experience with GNOME, as I never really liked what I saw and switched to WindowMaker and Krusader.

    You obviously haven't played with BeOS enough, or you don't have an appreciation for simplicity and 'less is more' computing. I think BeOS is what the Mac would have evolved into if apple decided to ditch their Classic environment five years earlier.

    --
    "Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
  129. Re:YES! YOu have to STOP LEECHING OFF SOCIETY by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What? No response? I guess you can't deny that taxes are useful to about 90% of the population in areas where there are taxes. The private sector has no interest in doing anything for the public unless it's going to make them money. And what little they do offer is of the lowest possible quality in order to maximise profits. Taxes vs. Private Sector? Give me taxes any day.

  130. Re:Who *EXACTLY* are "yellowTAB"4 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > This is why Zeta is mostly a patchwork of a leaked version of BeOS...

    Care to expand where you got this from?

  131. Re:YES! YOu have to STOP LEECHING OFF SOCIETY by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 1

    Delayed response... I don't live on slashdot you know, I have a life.

    Your benefits are optional. Taxes are not.

    I think that pretty much takes care of your argument...

    --
    -1 Uncomfortable Truth