After the first article (https://www.arosworld.org/infusions/articles/articles.php?article_id=3) and the first proposal (https://www.arosworld.org/infusions/forum/viewthread.php?thread_id=2063&pid=13971#post_13971) here is the second.

There are several items in the system preferences that can be complicated or difficult to understand for a non-Amiga user.

The suggestion is to rename these options more easily, so the first two are:
AHI -> "Audio Prefs" or "AHI Audio Prefs" or simply "Audio"
Trident -> "USB Prefs" or "Trident USB Prefs" or simply "USB"

Preferences


AHI


Trident

I cast my vote for yes but with a modification:

• AHI Audio
• Trident USB

No need to add the word "Prefs" next to the icons if you have already opened the Prefs drawer. It's redundant.

Once you open this Pandora box, I will add that the same happens with the Aros distros: Abi0, Abi 1, Abi11, Aeros, Tiny Aros, Aros One, Aros portable & Aros portable games, Icaros, Aros64 & 32, Amiberry, Aros riscV...

To be honest: that a mess! This must scare a lot of people which won't understand how to start and what to try. In Amiga groups (the ones that hate AROS) they make jokes about it

[quote name=x-vision post=13990]@x-vision - Once you open this Pandora box, I will add that the same happens with the Aros distros: Abi0, Abi 1, Abi11, Aeros, Tiny Aros, Aros One, Aros portable & Aros portable games, Icaros, Aros64 & 32, Amiberry, Aros riscV...

To be honest: that a mess! This must scare a lot of people which won't understand how to start and what to try. In Amiga groups (the ones that hate AROS) they make jokes about it[/quote]

Is this in terms of prefs layout? It would be rather wierd if AROS was dismissed by users of other Amigaoid systems over this given all of these have essentially the same prefs setup as each other, all reproducing the Amiga's original fomat.

I don't think the prefs are that bamboozling. Compare to Windows 11 - to make my Whiteboard program work on the college computers I had to just shut off Windows grabbing touchscreen clicks and putting up stupid visual effects just to show a press has occured when I already know I've pressed it! This had me hunting through pages of settings to track down some quite well hidden switches. Now that's a mess.

The only prefs which are trickier to set up are network, Trident and Zune, but the nature of the first and the flexibility of the others drive this; I agree some guidance would be useful here (so I'll have a go at writing that soon).

I don't think renaming the prefs is a good idea (it will confuse users comming from and Amigaoid background). However, like MorphOS you could add a 'cover plate' through which to access the prefs programs with more standard names please see attached image from MorphOS.

Cheers,
Nigel.

P.S. MorphOS style widgets in the screen bar (for prefs, wifi status etc.) would be pretty cool too...

It's nice to have a functional toolbar, but I don't like copying other systems. AROS needs to be innovative; I don't want to hear that AROS has copied something—I'd rather hear that AROS is leading the way in innovation!
If AROS is going to be the same as MOS, then I'll just use MOS instead,

What I integrated in my Aros 68k distribution are menu items to easily change icons, theme and background

you just select the menu then a predefined pref file is copied to the right place or in case of icons a set of icons is copied

then user has just to reset the system. No need for the preferences

Is this in terms of prefs layout? It would be rather wierd if AROS was dismissed by users of other Amigaoid systems over this given all of these have essentially the same prefs setup as each other, all reproducing the Amiga's original fomat.

I don't think the prefs are that bamboozling. Compare to Windows 11 - to make my Whiteboard program work on the college computers I had to just shut off Windows grabbing touchscreen clicks and putting up stupid visual effects just to show a press has occured when I already know I've pressed it! This had me hunting through pages of settings to track down some quite well hidden switches. Now that's a mess.

The only prefs which are trickier to set up are network, Trident and Zune, but the nature of the first and the flexibility of the others drive this; I agree some guidance would be useful here (so I'll have a go at writing that soon).

I don't think renaming the prefs is a good idea (it will confuse users comming from and Amigaoid background). However, like MorphOS you could add a 'cover plate' through which to access the prefs programs with more standard names please see attached image from MorphOS.

Cheers,
Nigel.

P.S. MorphOS style widgets in the screen bar (for prefs, wifi status etc.) would be pretty cool too...[/quote]

haha, there seems to be a missunderstanding here: I was just refering to the names of the distros, which IMHO should be more clear to new users (and better if we have some site with centralized and updated info on how to start and what are the options and consequences of every option), it was not about preferences which could improve but essentally they are miles ahead of other OSs

@x-vision

at least there should be a wiki page that explains what distributions exist, for which platforms, if there are 32bit and 64bit versions, what are the basic differences. And links to the different distributions

@x-vision OK I see what you're getting at. I actually covered this ground in my recent contributions to Amiga Addict, although those are now outdated with the arrival of RPi and Risc V versions; I'll put together a summarised version for an artiicle here and maybe for the wiki page of the current state of the AROS 'family tree'.

Saying that, there's something I'm unsure about; ABI1 is the experimental branch, ABI1.1. the stable user branch, but is there any level of compatability in terms of applications between these?

Cheers,
Nigel.

They are fully compatible on source code level but not on binary level. Applications from one cannot run on another - not yet at least.

PS. It's ABIv11 (eleven), not 1.1

I've voted Yes, but I don want to remove names such as AHI, ReqTools, Trident, Zune or ASL. We can simply extend them just like "AHI Audio" and "Zune GUI" and so on.

I think the icons make it clear what they are Though really should be asking people who are new to AROS
I wouldn't object to "Trident USB", "Sound AHI", etc Every OS has its own way of doing things AROS shouldn't lose its way or style