http://www.drobe.co.uk/ Latest RISC OS news and information http://www.drobe.co.uk/images/rss.png http://www.drobe.co.uk/ Ahead of tonight's Micro Men programme, which charts the rivalry between Sir Clive Sinclair and Acorn Computers in the early 1980s, drobe.co.uk spoke to the film's producer, Andrea Cornwell, to find out more about the show - and now you can read our review of the film Thu, 8 Oct 2009 19:48:12 GMT chris@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2546 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2546 An experimental build of the RISC OS port of Firefox that promises a smoother experience has been released for people to test. You'll need the latest 2.0.0.20 version and then replace its executable with the one from here. The technical bit: developer Peter Naulls has moved the browser's polling for user interaction into a separate thread to aid multitasking with the rest of the RISC OS desktop. Tue, 8 Sep 2009 00:33:49 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2544 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2544 Archive editor Jim Nagel summarises what to expect at the retro-themed show. Official website here [Update 2] A report by iconbar.com's Phil Mellor of the sell-out show is here - with pictures Tue, 8 Sep 2009 00:24:35 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2543 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2543 Drobe man Martin Hansen has updated his personal web publishing endeavour, RISCOScode.com, with a new issue for the autumn. It includes interviews with an organiser of the inaugural London RISC OS show, to be held in October 2009, and Richard Hallas, plus more bits and pieces. Go check it out. It's free. Fri, 4 Sep 2009 03:51:09 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2542 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2542 RISC OS USB guru Dave Higton has released drivers for two remote-controlled gadgets: an 'executive mayhem' tank and a mini car. Get ready to order your armoured, missile-firing kit into position and destroy your office colleagues, or instead swap your computer's circuits for your own race track with a remote-controlled banger. The source code is available and the software should work on Simtec and Castle USB stacks. Thu, 3 Sep 2009 23:30:56 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2541 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2541 In an interview filmed at Manchester University on August 17, Prof Stephen Furber CBE talks about his involvement with the Mk14, how he became involved with Acorn Computers, the success of the BBC Micro, the development of the ARM processor and his latest project: SpiNNaker. Thu, 3 Sep 2009 23:07:31 GMT jason@computinghistory.org.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2540 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2540 An anonymous editor has revealed he or she plans to produce an online quarterly magazine for RISC OS users. There will be no subscription charge as readers can instead pay per issue. The publication will be called Drag 'N Drop and downloadable in PDF format. Drobe has tried to contact the publisher, but there was no immediate reply: we were curious as to who was behind the venture, how much each issue will cost, what it will look like and why the decision to go for PDFs rather than a normal website of articles - this is beside the point of why should writers contribute to a completely new mag when there is a great alternative still going. Feel free to send in your screenshots and short assembler demos, though. Thu, 3 Sep 2009 23:04:48 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2539 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2539 US-based company Genesi, which builds ARM Cortex-powered appliances that could be compatible with the RISC OS Open Beagleboard work, is said to be in talks with RISC OS companies over a possible port of the OS to its products. It's hoped ROS 5 could be made to run on the lightweight EFIKA MX Open Client, which sports a 800MHz Cortex-A8 processor, 3D graphics hardware, 512M RAM, wifi networking and more. Genesi analyst Matt Sealey said: "RISC OS is really popular in the UK and the last dedicated RISC OS box - the Iyonix - has been discontinued for six months. We are currently questioning the relevant companies in the UK, including [ROS 5 owners] Castle, about collaboration and marketing efforts, and the support they'd need to make it a reality." The EFIKA MX Open Client costs about 160 quid in real money. Sun, 30 Aug 2009 18:37:08 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2537 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2537 RISC OS Open has appealed for someone familiar with shared source RISC OS 5 to give a speech about the project at this year's Acorn World show. ROOL chief Steve Revill said: "This is an exciting opportunity for us to talk to people who may not be regulars on the RISC OS show scene about the shared source project and all of the interesting community developments that have come out of it. Unfortunately, for a number of reasons, we here at ROOL find ourselves unable to attend. We are frustrated by this development but rather than pull out completely, we would like to invite one or more enthusiastic members of the community to go along and represent us." Sun, 30 Aug 2009 18:26:03 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2536 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2536 A new version of the RISC OS port of open source web browser Firefox was published earlier this month, making it the eighth such release. This bug-fix update brings the software in line with Firefox 2.0.0.20 for other platforms. Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:30:36 GMT news@drobe.co.uk http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2535 http://www.drobe.co.uk/article.php?id=2535