Re: [Emutos-devel] Splitting the 512K ROMs

[Vincent R. <vin...@fr...>]

On 10/02/2021 at 10:43, Jo Even Skarstein wrote:
> What's the *use case* for multiple languages? Multiple keyboard layouts
> I can understand, but languages?
> 
> I had to take a quick look at the discussion about this last fall, and
> the only real argument I found was that TOS did it. But Atari did this
> in TOS to cut costs, not because users needs or wants to switch between
> German and French. Having single-language builds for 512Kb too would be
> the easiest solution, wouldn't it? And the one that left most space for
> new features.

I completely agree.

Roger, go ahead for the split. This improves the situation, anyway. And 
things has to be tried early, to discover consequences. Then we can always 
take a decision: keep or revert. But at least, we must try.

Regarding to multilanguage ROM (or even worse: PRG), by thinking twice, this 
looks completely dumb nowadays. For the reasons summarized by Jo Even. It is 
assumed that anyone using EmuTOS nowadays can easily update it. So he can 
use his preferred language directly. No need to mess with the NVRAM.

Also, remember that the multilanguage variants are slower than 
single-language ones, due to the gettext runtime overhead (no idea how 
much). It is also bigger than the sum of all languages due to the presence 
of the hash table. It must be understood that multilanguage has a cost. Is 
it worth?

IMHO, the only real reason to provide a multilanguage ROM is to be 
equivalent to Atari Falcon ROM. But if you think twice, real-world users 
would only need a multilanguage ROM in very few scenarios (if any). In such 
case, it would be convenient to propose a web interface with checkboxes 
where the user could select the languages he really needs, and download a 
custom ROM. I already proposed that, and Thorsten made a proof of concept 
(with a few options, not languages IIRC). Definitely the smarted solution. 
That's another advantage of Free Software: I only take what I need.

I still see a scenario where multilanguage would be useful. A hard disk 
(i.e. UltraSatan) sold with EmuTOS preinstalled as autoboot. This way, when 
run on Falcon (not ST due to lack of NVRAM), it would use the right language 
and keyboard layout out of the box. Anyway, even in this case, the user 
would have a benefit to update the auto-bootable EmuTOS with a 
single-language variant in order to save some RAM.

Another related thing: on SourceForge, we propose the 512k variant as 
default. This has 2 drawbacks:
- Most people will only see English language, as they will for sure not know 
how to switch the language (as I did when I discovered EmuTOS, ARAnyM and 
Hatari).
- That 512k version default to US language, using 60 Hz. This can cause 
trouble for some European games and demos. Then people may think that EmuTOS 
is less compatible than TOS, when it is not necessarily the case.

I have been planning to change the EmuTOS download area for a long time. To 
be more user-friendly without all those ads, and to show people that EmuTOS 
is not limited to the 512k version and English language.

Well, these are my long-term felings.
For now... just go ahead for the split.

-- 
Vincent Rivière