Javascript on the website

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

The new website has a much clearer look to it but I have some serious problems with it.

When posting messages my carrage returns are ignored making formatting impossible, but I find a line break tag of the html form is working.

As a result I am using a double tag to format this message. Is there an alternative method?

As javascript is used for much of the navigation I am now unable to navigate easily and the archive are unavailable.

There is a concept in web circles of "degrading gracefully" which is to allow full access by other means when more advanced coding is used which may not be available to all users. Using this idea should correct all problems.

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[quote]The new website has a much clearer look to it but I have some serious problems with it.

When posting messages my carrage returns are ignored making formatting impossible, but I find a line break ta...[/quote]

"There is a concept in web circles of "degrading gracefully" which is to allow full access by other means when more advanced coding is used which may not be available to all users. Using this idea should correct all problems."

Or alternativly you could "upgrade gracefully" your web-browser. If downloading something as huge and useless as IE gets your goat, then there are several alternatives, such as Opera (www.opera.com), Firefox (www.mozilla.com) and many others, the above two are relativly small doanloads IIRC..

Tim

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

Indeed that is a good idea and an upgrade is due soon.

I am using Oregano2 produced by Oregon for the interactive TV market. Mine is the desktop version running on Risc OS 4.

It is worth noting that there are many brouser out there which do not have many of the "new" facilities often originating from Microsoft, as I understand it, who do not like others to have access to. If you follow the policy of the commercial companies who almost always manage to accomodate all their customers in their websites, its not impossible.

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

Indeed that is a good idea and an upgrade is due soon.

I am using Oregano2 produced by Oregon for the interactive TV market. Mine is the desktop version running on Risc OS 4.

It is worth noting that there are many brouser out there which do not have many of the "new" facilities often originating from Microsoft, as I understand it, who do not like others to have access to. If you follow the policy of the commercial companies who almost always manage to accomodate all their customers in their websites, its not impossible.

[Dick Smith]

Am I right to assume, Dave, that that is the reason why the site doesn't work in all respects for MacOS - differences in Java interpretation? Seems like very sloppy programming if that is the case.

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

Hi Dick

I can't say if that is the case for Mac OS as I don't use it but I suspect that my problem is possibly an incomplete javascript interpretation, as opposed to Java, but the main point is that alternative coding should be available for browser without the latest facilities, whether that is sloppy programming or not I don't know.

The fact that I am having to use some html code within this message in order to format it does suggest some serious shortcomings.

[Buntina]

Yeh, have to agree, I get JScript errors in the control panel

Also - any chance of changing the stylesheet so it uses EM's instead of PT's that way I can adjust the text size - I would think a few people have trouble reading this forum

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Risc OS, is that not the one that runs on Acorn hardware? Bit old-skool now no?

let me know if it's any good, I'm always interested in trying different systems

Tim

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

[quote]Risc OS, is that not the one that runs on Acorn hardware? Bit old-skool now no? let me know if it's any good, I'm always interested in trying different systems Tim[/quote]

It is the decendent of the Acorn system, Risc OS 5 being the latest version of the operating system. It is under current and active development and is the only British computer system available.

Castle Technology is the company with the rights to it now and you can take a look at their website at www.iyonix.com for full details.

The big advantage is that it is imune to all the windows viruses and other nasties due to it being a minority system so keep quiet about it, we don't want the world to know in case the idiots hear.

[Dick Smith]

Wow - I looked up your RISC site! I thought I was profligate buying Macs, but £1400 for a 600Mh machine, and £500 for the screen - wow. That's serious dedication.

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Sheesh, not on the cheap side then is it!

I'll bet that someone somewhere has it running on an ibm-derivative though!

Time to look for a second hand acorn methinks

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

One important aspect of Risc OS computers I forgot to mention is that they last far longer the and windows computer, it is reconed you need to replace them every two years as the hardware is not often compatable with the new OS and software. No wonder the dealers like them and hate Risc OS

I don't know about Macs in this respect.

The latest incarnation, the Iyonix, uses the new X scale processor which, I believe, is the only one to do so to date.

The computer I am using is eight years old and has been updated from its original OS3.7 to OS4 and I could upgrade it further but as I'm now retired I have no reason to as it will keep going for years yet.

So, if you want to compare it with a windows machine costing £500, in ten years that would be £2500 so £1400 is a good deal.

[Dick Smith]

We make much the same arguments on Macs, of course. If it wasn't for speed hikes and software bloat they would work even longer, but as you say, a PC can be down the Swanny in a couple of years. Is your machine 32 or 64 bit?

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

My Risc PC is running Risc OS 4 which is a 26/32 bit system. Risc OS 5 on the Iyonix with the X scale processor is a 32 bit system. what it works at inside I don't know but I suspect its a 64 or even 128 bit somewhere.

Another interesting point to note, as you mentioned bloat, is that the OS is stored in ROM with only a few upgraded modules and other minor bits in RAM. Mine uses two 16Mb ROMs for the OS.

I think the Iyonix is the same size.

What is the size of the windows or Mac OS and how vunerable is it?

[Dick Smith]

The MacOS is a Unix kernel, so it's pretty well bombproof, and 64-bit. It's pretty big, though, with about 512k being the minimum RAM if you want to do anything serious (256 for normal use). It's pretty well invulnerable to attack, there have been some security issues but they were sorted fairly fast. I don't think there are any threats to the OS at this time, and no spyware or adware issues.

I don't know about the size of Windows, but it seems to be huge, certainly in terms of installation time.

I still have an old Apple II (c1984 and working well) which has 2 5-inch floppies, one for the OS on a single diskette, the other for data. I think it has 16kb of RAM. When computer-techie No2 son saw it he asked how much memory it had got. I told him. 'You mean Meg' he said. 'Nope'. "How big is the hard drive?" "Hasn't got one". He made a sort of gurgling sound and left the room...

Looks like RISC has carried on with that principle, in a way, of cutting back the OS to allow processing space. What do you lose in the interface, though?

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Well, Win XP has a minimum install size of just under a gig IIRC, with an average install size of roughly 2 and a half gig, so definatly pretty huge. Alot of the less-good linux distro's have aproximatly the same thing going on - Red-Hat from about 7.0 onwards is at least one gig, if not more, SuSe about the same, Likewise more recent versions of 'Drake.. Debian and Slackware and others are far more compact and far more customisable.
I've been a fan of Mac's for ages, but sadly never owned one, but I've become even more interested in them since the release of OS X - mainly becouse as Dick says it's derived from *nix.. I read a quote somewhere recently (I think on Slash-dot) where a well-known linux guru described OS X as his all-time favorite Linux distro!

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

After all I have said about Risc OS, I would like a Mac laptop for portability and the video editing package. There is a windows emulator which is designed to work on a laptop but from what I know and have experienced with windows I don't fancy one at all. I have heard that there may be someone working on a Mac emulator, if that ever appears I definately get one.

There have been attempts to produce a Risc OS laptop but they always seem to fall down on the case design and production run for it. The market for one seems to be too small for a viable production.

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Yea, I'm also after a Mac Laptop (powerbook) - being impoverished however means I wont be getting one
I'd say given a powerbook running either OS X or a linux for power-pc such as yellow dog or SuSe ppc, that would be perfect for me .. 

An alternative option for you Dave might be a PC laptop with windows installed on a minor partition, linux on a major partition and just run wine under linux for when you do need those windows programs..

Just out of curiosity - you say that RiscOS is embedded into ROM right? Does such a thing as a Risc-installed palm/i-paq type thing exist?

Tim

[Dick Smith]

My Mac laptop (G4 Titanium) has been a godsend. It isn't very fast by today's standards, but is so simple and reliable it is amazing - especially after using cheapo govt-issue PC laptops where, if you lean on the case, you flex the trackpad... Of course another Mac advantage is that they all come with fast ethernet built in, so to transfer files I just have to hook them together and I've got a small network.

Video may be my next project - converting hundreds of old VHS tapes to DVD. Pretty simple using iDVD and an analogue-digital converter. I'm told.

I've used PC emulators on Macs (I wash them afterwards) and it works OK, but no good for gaming or anything that requires real speed. I did see a Mac emulator for PC but it was pretty poor. What I am looking for at the moment is a ZX81 emulator. I fancy a game of Manic Miner.

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Probably easier to find a proper ZX81.. Half the people I know had one.. I had to make do with a crappy Amstrad complete with green-screen.. Still, I guess it's no wonder as to why I get a kick out of playing MUDS

[TvcamdaveDave & Sue Lawson]

[quote]Yea, I'm also after a Mac Laptop (powerbook) - being impoverished however means I wont be getting one I'd say given a powerbook running either OS X or a linux for power-pc such as yellow dog or SuSe...[/quote]

Hi Tim

There used to be a laptop version many years age and there are file sharing systems with a assortment of other handheld models. I understand there are many cases of Risc OS being used in commercial equipment without the used being aware of it. The main advantage is the lack of power needed to run the processor, a small fraction of that needed by the typical windows machine. If it wasn't for the heat generated by the hard disc and other bits you wouldn't need a fan at all let alone one bolted to the processor. Ideal for small handheld applications. The problem is market penetation. Since the UK school were vertually forced to replace their acorn computers, some over ten years old and still going strong, with the "industry standard" windows computers, the market has dropped making expensive development difficult for some companies. The schools are also suffering by having to replace computer more often than before.

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YEa, Acorns were great little machines, very quick as I recall. I never when to a school that had them though, all my schools had god-horrible RM networks running either Win 3.1 or an early win NT/Win for workgroups.. They were so hackable it was hysterical, opening MS access and then using an easy-to-write macro to get full DOS access was a matter of three minutes work.
Flooding the print-server was an oft-used trick as well, the teacher would have to go into the print-room to sort the problems out, leaving us to play Quake aaah how I miss those days..