DFLINT02@ULKYVX.BITNET (10/01/87)
Tramiel and many members of his staff have considered the 8-bit machine, enhanced, as a competitor for the ST. Also the Game machine image of the ATARI 8-bits machines does not seem to warrant any type of upgrade. I have stated that i would support any upgrades that ATARI would develope for the 8-bit. Besides a little criticism never hurts. Tramiel does not take the 8-bit to seriously. JWT and Landon Dyer are the most helpful people atari has on this net. Answer this question why did a ATARI try to block the release of the PD 8-bit emulator for the ST????? Don't quote Propietary OS. Mike Buford (Novice Hardware Hacker!) (An ACTION Programmer!) Dflint02@ulkyvx or Cl150652@ulkyvm.bitnet
neil@atari.UUCP (Neil Harris) (10/05/87)
In article <8710012029.AA22072@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>, DFLINT02@ULKYVX.BITNET writes: > Answer this question why did a ATARI try to block the release > of the PD 8-bit emulator for the ST????? Don't quote Propietary OS. The answer is easy. We didn't. Contrary to popular rumor/reports, Darek's biggest problem when getting ready to release the emulator was getting through to the right person here. He ended up with myself and Richard Frick. We took the story to Sam Tramiel, President of Atari Corp. The three of us agreed that we had no problem allowing the release of the emulator, but in return for this we wanted Darek to release his source code as public domain. The emulator as it currently exists is too slow to be useful, not to mention the lack of support for important features like player/missile graphics. At any rate, Darek was reluctant to do this at first. He seemed to want sole credit for the emulator. The impasse was resolved on GEnie, in a series of messages between Darek and myself with audience participation. Then Darek asked for permission to sell an article on the emulator to an ST magazine so he could make a little money for the project. This was granted. The emulator was recently published in ST-Log magazine (September issue) and is available for download on GEnie and other places. These days, Darek is getting along with Atari a little better. I think he's not a bad negotiator -- he was stirring up public sympathy for himself in order to get what he wanted from us. On the other hand, we got the source code released, so we're happy too. Let's hope that the project ends up resulting in an emulator that does what we all want it to do. -- --->Neil Harris, Director of Marketing Communications, Atari Corporation UUCP: ...{hoptoad, lll-lcc, pyramid, imagen, sun}!atari!neil GEnie: NHARRIS/ WELL: neil / BIX: neilharris / Delphi: NEILHARRIS CIS: 70007,1135 / Atari BBS 408-745-5308 / Usually the OFFICIAL Atari opinion
hans@umd5.umd.edu (Hans Breitenlohner) (10/08/87)
In article <863@atari.UUCP> neil@atari.UUCP (Neil Harris) writes: > ... >We took the story to Sam Tramiel, President of Atari Corp. The three of us >agreed that we had no problem allowing the release of the emulator, but in >return for this we wanted Darek to release his source code as public domain. > ... What a noble thought. I think the idea of releasing source code is great. Did this idea come from the same company which has steadfastly refused to release (or even to acknowledge requests for) the source for the XL operating system? How much better a world this would be if the left hand and the right hand could agree on the goodness value of things. Note that I am not suggesting that the OS source be put in the public domain, only that source should be available. Of course I can disassemble the ROMs (and have done so), and most of what I want to know can be extracted that way. It just hurts to think of the more productive things I could have with that time!