21st February, 1999
RISC OS 4 failed to appear in January, but indications are that work is still continuing. RISCOS Ltd appears to be taking this opportunity to further improve the new operating system before releasing it. The first product is likely to be an upgrade for RiscPC owners, although the exact hardware requirements are unclear. As a minimum, all StrongARM RiscPCs will be able to use RISC OS 4.
RISCOS Ltd has also begun work to ensure support for the new system. A RISCOS Foundation has been announced, to take the place of Acorn's Clan and provide support for the many freeware coders. The company has also begun a register of freelance and part-time developers. The intention is to provide a directory of programmers available to work on new projects.
Jason Tribbeck's ChiOS project has been making good progress. On the hardware side, the third prototype is thought to be working correctly. The software is currently the subject of discussions between Jason and other, un-named parties. If these deliberations are successful, Jason believes it will be a substantial boost to the project, both in terms of compatibility and the development schedule. It is likely to be March before further information becomes available.
Attempts to contact Forbidden Technologies have proved unsuccessful. Whether that project is continuing is unknown.
The plan to rescue the Phoebe RiscPC 2 hardware has been abandoned, in favour of concentrating on RISC OS 4.
The Steering Group has announced the formation of a new company, RISC OS Ltd, which intends to licence the operating system from Acorn. Whether the deal has been signed or negotiations are still in progress is unknown. Element 14, the former Acorn Computers Ltd, are unlikely to give away the rights to RISC OS, as it still the forms the basis of their set-top box products.
To be useful, the licence must allow fundamental alterations to the software. It may be possible to fit RISC OS 4 to existing RiscPCs without modification, and the reported replacement motherboard could be designed to be compatible. However, for the future development of the platform, dependence on Acorn's custom chipset must be removed. This is a pre-requisite of the ChiOS project.
Without a rejuvenated Phoebe, there are now three potential platforms: Chaltech's CATS motherboard, Chaltech's PCI card, and the ChiOS project's ChiBER.
The CATS has been available for some time as a RiscBSD platform, and an ARMLinux port is in progress. This would, potentially, be able to run Forbidden Technologies' RISC OS-like window manager under Linux, and may also be an option for ChiOS.
Chaltech's PCI card is a relatively new product, although pictures of the hardware are shown on the company's website. The ultimate aim of this project is to produce a PCI card capable of carrying a number of StrongARM or ARM10 processor daughter-boards. Forbidden Technologies are believed to be studying this design - whether they consider it a potential platform for their software, or a proof of concept, is not known.
The ChiOS project's hardware is somewhat similar to the new Chaltech design. It will be a PCI card carrying a single StrongARM and local memory, designed to reside in a PC host. Operation will be much like the RiscPC's PC Card, with the ChiBER having access to the PC's hard disc, memory and other PCI devices. The ChiOS website reports that there were problems with the initial prototypes; a second turn of the board was expected during January.