Reply to thread Gulli: I certainly agree with you that running RISC OS on an emulator undermines its credibility, making it look like a dead OS. But to me this is one reason why it's so important that the hardware market is kept alive. Converting to native x86 won't solve this problem, or necessarily allow more people to run RISC OS: in fact, even if it were ported, it would still probably make more sense for most people to run it under emulation. Running it on top of Windows shifts all of the hard work of maintaining hardware compatibility onto Microsoft. There are so many variants of x86 hardware that it would be impossible for an x86 RISC OS to accommodate them all. Most people would probably find that it simply wouldn't run on their x86 machine. One of the only reasons RISC OS can be made to work so well on the hardware that's available, is that there is so little variety in the hardware that it will run on. Regarding your point that people don't care whether or not the machine code is easier to program, I agree that this may be true for the majority of people. However, I for one remain with RISC OS in part because of the ease and control you get programming the ARM chip directly. An emulator wouldn't suit me for this without the real hardware also being available. Now this may not be what most people want, but I'd have thought the people most likely to care about this kind of thing are developers, and they are people that the platform will need if it's to remain viable. By the way, I'm not knocking the emulator, which is clearly very useful. I just think the hardware market is totally essential to keeping the platform alive. flypig on 23/08/05 01:08AM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ] Please login before posting a comment. Use the form on the right to do so or create a free account.

Search the archives Today's featured article Adventures with a Lego-cased A7K web server Having previously built desktop and laptop cases of out Lego bricks, model building Peter Howkins has turned his attentions towards crafting a slim box to slid his A7000 into a rack, alongside other rackmount servers. Having pieced together the housing, Peter puts a legacy RISC OS machine through its paces as an internet-facing server.  11 comments, latest by jess on 3/12/08 2:07PM. Published: 21 Nov 2008 Random article Every magazine has a silver lining Well not every, just CD mag RISCWorld. New issue details enclosed.  11 comments, latest by Snig on 9/10/02 12:35PM. Published: 3 Oct 2002 Useful links News and media: Iconbar • MyRISCOS • ArcSite • RISCOScode • ANS • C.S.A.Announce • Archive • Qercus • RiscWorld • Drag'n'Drop • GAG-News Top developers: RISCOS Ltd • RISC OS Open • MW Software • R-Comp • Advantage Six • VirtualAcorn Dealers: CJE Micros • APDL • Castle • a4 • X-Ample • Liquid Silicon • Webmonster Usergroups: WROCC • RONE • NKACC • IRUG • SASAUG • ROUGOL • RONWUG • MUG • WAUG • GAG • RISCOS.be Useful: RISCOS.org.uk • RISCOS.org • RISCOS.info • Filebase • Chris Why's Acorn/RISC OS collection • NetSurf Non-RISC OS: The Register • The Inquirer • Apple Insider • BBC News • Sky News • Google News • xkcd • diodesign

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