Update (6. Oct.)

Our Response
(6. Oct. 97)

Finally the Amiga has its PowerPC. Everyone of us owes Phase 5 a lot of gratitude for that. Because it was them who steered the CPU-discussion into the right direction. Through their PowerUP¨-boards they ensure that the Amiga will regain its rightful position at the top of technology.

The PowerPC-technology offers a maximum of technological security for the future. Under the banner of their motto „NO RISC NO FUN", Motorola have already taken the first step that Intel processors have yet to make. Due to this decision, CPUs with a clock speed of up to 350 MHz are now available. And a limit to this is not in sight.

Hardware-development is only one side of the coin in this respect. Without the appropriate software even the very best hardware is not really worth much. Therefore the biggest burden is currently carried by software developers all over this world. They are pondering the question whether porting their software to the PPC will pay off. Switching to a new CPU involves porting and maintaining the software for two different kinds of CPU. It is due to this fact that many software developers (despite promising announcements) still sit back and watch the market before starting the effort of doing a port.

What makes the right decision easier is a software-interface to the hardware which guarantees that future hardware-developments can be utilised by the software without changing it (it does not matter whether this hardware will be a new PowerPC-board from a third-party manufacturer or a PowerPC-Amiga from Amiga International Inc.). Exactly this functionality is offered by WarpOS which was developed on the Phase 5 dual-processor boards by our authors Sam Jordan, Michael Rock and Jochen Becher.

WarpUP forms a so-called hardware-abstraction-layer (HAL) between the hardware and software-applications. This HAL guarantees the proper function of these applications on different PowerPC-concepts. To every software-developer this offers a risk-free start into a new era of software-development for the Amiga.

WarpUP forms the interface between the 68K-, PowerPC-hardware, the 68K-operating system software and the software-applications. The premier issue is of course to optimally exploit the speed provided by the PowerPC-CPU while at the same time making applications as easy to port as possible. For the first time on the Amiga, WarpUP allows using native PowerPC-applications as well as applications and shared libraries in mixed- and fat-binary form.

The StormC C/C++ developer system offers the possibility to compile an AmigaOS-application as a native PowerPC application by simply setting a compiler option. The necessary switching between the 68K-AmigaOS and the PowerPC- functions is handled by the WarpOS-kernel within WarpUP. This is a valuable advantage for the software developer. The reason for this is that even a direct port of the software achieves a sufficient performance increase. Conceptual changes to the software only become necessary if even the last bit is too be squeezed out of the system.

WarpUP offers the following advantages:

• Highspeed communication-interface between the 68K- and PowerPC-CPU.
• Entirely native multitasking, native memory management, semaphores, list-/tag-management, signalling, message handling.
• Facultative memory protection: tasks are given the option of allocating protected memory areas.
• Virtual signals, i.e. signals are CPU-shared and are always redirected to the correct CPU.
• Inter-CPU message-system: messages can be passed between the CPUs
• Optimal use of the PPC-MMU and the PPC-Cache
• MMU/Exception-handling support for applications
• PowerSave-function that shuts down the PPC if no applications use it
• PowerPC-Enforcer (protects the first page)
• Detailed crash-requester that optimally aids the developer in finding errors
• Integrated debugging system to make bug-tracking easier.
• Special support for highly optimized software such as games and demos.
• Support for Amiga-compliant applications.
• PowerPC native, mixed- and fat-binary applications and shared-libraries.
• Also usable for alternative developer systems such as Modula- or E-compilers with PowerPC-support because objects are not mandatorily created in ELF; instead the tried and tested Amiga-compliant hunk-format can be used as well.
• Easy installation
• Hardware-independent
• Optimal future prospects

This is our contribution towards a brighter Amiga-future.

Further information can be obtained from:

HAAGE&PARTNER Computer GmbH
PO. Box 80
D 61188 Rosbach
Germany

Tel.: ++49 6007 930050
Fax: ++49 6007 7543

E-Mail: warpup@haage-partner.com