Update:

>>> how did Jens and Thore come to be in possession of unauthorised sources for MUI,
>>> who supplied the sources?

>> See link in comment #129 (as written in comment #175) for the story as told by a
>> MorphOS team member.

> Another different version of the story (based on early MUI4.0, sources provided by Stuntzi):
> http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.a1k.org/forum/showpost.php?p=974487

This last version of the story has also been told a week ago by Jens Maus in a German forum. According to him, there are no legal issues with their MUI4 or MUI5 because they have Stuntz's permission. He says their MUI4/5 is based on MUI4 source code from 2009 which they got from Stuntz and for which they have his permission for further development.

http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.os4welt.de/viewtopic.php?p=28869%23p28869
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.os4welt.de/viewtopic.php?p=28916%23p28916

How did they get that?

> How did they get that?

Maybe as hexadecimal program listings printed on paper? I mean, how's the exact handover process relevant?

Quote:

I'm curious as to how they came into possession of this and what format it was provided in.
Stuntz has done us no favor letting this project use the same name and version number as our package, since the two packages are not compatible.
Perhaps in future versions we should consider renaming the user interface, as it has really become the MorphOS User Interface (still MUI) rather than Stuntz's Magic User Interface (after all, to the best of my knowledge, Stuntz had nothing to do with the development of MUI5 - even MUI4 is only partially his work).

>> how's the exact handover process relevant?

> I'm curious as to how they came into possession of this
> and what format it was provided in.

I'm still curious regarding the relevance of this.

> Stuntz has done us no favor letting this project use the same name and
> version number as our package

Strange, isn' it? After all, he's a current MorphOS team member according to the official website, which is an aspect another team member has emphasized as recently as one week ago.

http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.os4welt.de/viewtopic.php?p=28908%23p28908

> Perhaps in future versions we should consider renaming the user interface,
> as it has really become the MorphOS User Interface (still MUI) rather than
> Stuntz's Magic User Interface

See Yasu's comment #180. What would be the point? Sounds to me like the 'Origyn Web Browser vs. Odyssey Web Browser' debate.

> to the best of my knowledge, Stuntz had nothing to do with the development of MUI5

According to the MorphOS team member mentioned above, MUI for MorphOS is still Stuntz's matter, to which other team members have merely contributed over the years.

The fun part is that the '5' isn't about MUI itself at all.

Quote:

The form of handover is totally relevant because it could clear up the whole story, the legality of the past releases and the future releases of Maus/Böckelmann (M/B from now on). There are so many different versions of this story around that we do not know the real one.

- Did they get it officially or not? From stuntzi or someone else?
- Under which conditions and which license?
- If “official”, why did he give right to create a second official version using the same name misleading people?
- OR did someone “unintentionally” send M/B a source archive?
- Or intentional although not allowed/”just in good will”?
- Or was it “dropped” somewhere and they got informed about it?
- Was it one single archive or a permanent access to the CVS? Did stuntzi (or someone else? Who then?) send them a single arichive with a version of an old MUI4 beta?

This makes huge differences and creates questions like:
- Was that onoly for the purpose of getting OWB to work or to do with it whatever they want?
- Did he (or someone else) give M/B access to the CVS? Where they allowed to use versions later than the archive that they got (in case they got one)?
- Do they still have access to the CVS? If so, why?
- Did stuntzi grant them the right to create an (official?) MUI fork (knowing or accepting to become incompatible) based on this single beta archive or based on any other distribution like the CVS repository?
- Or … or … or …?

These are all different distribution channels of “they got the MUI source” and this is why Yasu’s question is so relevant. But how it was? Eeveryone says different, so only stuntzi could clear this up and tell how he did it and what his purpose/what license/right he gave out. Only then we could understand what happened and why this conflict came up.

Quote:

And even worse: it led to at least one developer asking the official MUI team to implement features the way the unoffical team did it, so to break the official MUI the same way as the unofficial one was broken. So it confuses everyone using MUI no matter if on OS3, OS4 or MOS.

Maybe he didn't expect all this to come out.

Quote:


That would be stupid and once more worse than now. Giving up the name because someone else got another license to develop conflicting versions would look like “they (MorphOS team) gave up on MUI, now the “MUI for AmigaOS” team is the official maintainer of MUI and all versions that they publish are official, so what they do or say must be correct”. Especially OS4 and OS3 users would rely on this and in the end that would even lead to people blaming the MorphOS team for creating incompatible versions although it is the other way round. And users or developers from OS3 or OS4 would maybe even more often ask the MorphOS team to implement features in MorphOS the way they work In M/B MUI. It would also lead to changing the official product description to change to a sentence like “MorphOS uses the MorphOS User Interface, formerly called Magic User Interface” or “ … compatible with Magic User Interface until version MUI5 beta x.y”. That would be the worst signal the MorphOS team team could send out. It would even support the license and compatibility break of the OS4MUI team as a kind of agreement and acceptance.

Another problematic thing is that MUI is also a part of the official OS4.1 of Hyperion: http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=145:amigaos41update3&catid=36:amigaos-4x&Itemid=18

>>> How did they get that?

>> how's the exact handover process relevant?

> The form of handover is totally relevant because it could clear up the whole story

It seems we're talking past each other. I've been thinking Yasu's question refers to this part of my posting: "MUI4 source code from 2009 which they got from Stuntz", which would mean that he wants to know how they got the 2009 MUI4 source code in the context of the story as told by Jens Maus. And in the context of his story, the exact handover process shouldn't matter one single bit.
I may of course have wrongly assumed that Yasu's posting was made in context of my posting :-) I assumed as such because asking this question without context (after all, he didn't refer to any prior posting) wouldn't make sense.

> There are so many different versions of this story around that we do not know the real one.
> [...] Eeveryone says different

I'd say it's either Henes' (as representative of the MorphOS team, which also Stuntz is said to be a member of) version or Jens Maus' version. There's no reason to assume that anyone else (except Stuntz himself, who so far has decided to remain silent) has better information.

> Did stuntzi [...] send them [...] a version of an old MUI4 beta?

...or a then-recent (= 2009) non-beta MUI4 version?

> Where they allowed to use versions later than the archive that they got
> (in case they got one)?

There's no indication they used versions later than the archive that they got (in case they got one).

OK, I sometimes forget how linear your logic is Andreas.

As far as renaming the user interface goes, I have no problem abandoning the name if it ends the confusion between these two software packages.
The fact that we have common naming and revision numbers for for incompatible products only leads to confusion.

And AmigaOS users apparently have no problem borrowing whatever they need to re-implement something we've already done, so giving us a additional layer of propriety (even if its only in the name) can't hurt.

>> Perhaps in future versions we should consider renaming the user interface,
>> as it has really become the MorphOS User Interface (still MUI) rather than
>> Stuntz's Magic User Interface

> That [...] would look like “they (MorphOS team) gave up on MUI, now the
> “MUI for AmigaOS” team is the official maintainer of MUI

As Jim wrote, "MorphOS User Interface" would still be MUI :-)

> MUI5 beta x.y

Is MUI5 for OS4/OS3 denoted as "beta"?

> the license [...] break of the OS4MUI team

So we know already which version of the story is true?

>>> Perhaps in future versions we should consider renaming the user interface,
>>> as it has really become the MorphOS User Interface (still MUI) rather than
>>> Stuntz's Magic User Interface

>> See Yasu's comment #180. What would be the point?

> I have no problem abandoning the name if it ends the confusion between these two
> software packages. The fact that we have common naming [...] only leads to confusion.

I doubt renaming it to "MorphOS User Interface" wouldn't lead to confusion as it would still be called "MUI" most of the time.

> AmigaOS users apparently have no problem borrowing whatever they need

If they have a proper license, as they say, I surely wouldn't call it "borrowing". So far it's debatable what's apparent and what's not.

>If they have a proper license...

And so far we only have their word on this.
All it would take is a comment from S.S., to be assured this isn't BS.

But so far, no comment.
I know he's off somewhere on his bicycle, but if he really is still a team member, why has he been silent about this?

> so far we only have their word on this.

As we have only Henes' word on the contrary.

> All it would take is a comment from S.S., to be assured this isn't BS.
> But so far, no comment.

This could be interpreted as Stuntz having no problem with MUI for OS3/OS4, which in turn would speak for the existence of a proper license.

> if he really is still a team member, why has he been silent about this?

I'm waiting for geit to answer this :-)

Quote:

Which confusion?

Are there any cross-platform projects using MUI5 (or however it might be called)? Most projects are for one of the platforms today, even applications with free sources are forked today, few are interested in porting software between platforms. The MorphOS team with MUI had the chance to set the GUI toolkit standards but they decided not do so (that would have required porting MUI but they wanted to keep it exclusive to MorphOS). Today it is only violating "honor" of MorphOS fans because they use the same naming as on MorphOS. In reality it is not relevant...

@Connor

nobody in the OS3 community will blame anyone... most existing 68k software is based on MUI 3.8, in fact there is no 68k software needing newer versions. Even outside 68k there is not much software needing MUI5 at all and if the software is exclusive to MorphOS anyway. You guys are creating a problem where none exists. To me it looks more like you are insulted because by imitating MUI5 (including naming) someone is violating your superior feeling... enjoy your platform and ignore the other project. Best would be if MorphOS team would support other platforms with compiled binaries of MUI but of course that will not happen.

I seem to get conflicting information. On the one hand MUI 4/5 is supposed to be an MorphOS exclusive, developed by the original author (Stuntz), but on the other hand Stuntz then gave away the source code in 2009 to the informal MUI Team to do what they want with it. And then gets surprised that they released MUI 4. It doesn't make sense.

As I understand the discussions and posts they got legal access to 3.9 but there are claims that they used a MUI 4 beta source snapshot instead they also had access to at that time.

Quote:

Obviously you believe our development team should share something they PAID for with the OS4 community.
And as to confusion, it should be obvious to the unbiased, MUI4/5 under OS4 is not the equivalent of the MorphOS package (for which Stuntz is still considered an active developer).
As to cross porting, you have our version of OWB, where are the OS4 packages we might benefit from? Oh yeah, your developers don't reciprocate.
And you think YOU'RE setting the GUI standards (by cloning our user interface)? Reaction may have more of the Amiga look and feel, but Ambient was designed to be BETTER than the standard Amiga interface. And, btw, while our support of OpenGL could definitely use an upgrade, yours is virtually useless.

This has nothing to do with honor. Its about intellectual property rights. We were here first, we have a proprietary OS, and you are simply copying anything from it you find appealing.

You like to take pot shots at our community as if somehow we are the instigators of all this friction.
I can assure you that everyone here could not care less, unless they are attacked, ripped off, or abused.

We're both focused on offering an upgrade path to AmigaOS 3.1, so your dismissive comment about what is relevant is immaterial. You represent the competition, and if you are copying us, obviously we must be doing something right. That's relevant.

Quote:

I am Aros supporter...

And you benefit of the work of Deadwood who is developer on Aros (neither MorphOS nor 4.X). You seem to put anyone not sharing the views here in 4.X camp but you are wrong there, I could not care less about 4.X but also not about MorphOS. BTW the only competitive port of OWB is on Aros (X86), I do not need to remind you about JIT-benchmarks comparing non-X86 platforms with X86/X64 or even smartphones. If you read my comments carefully again you would understand that the MorphOS team missed the chance to set the standards, now there are none. Most software is for only one platform, in cases sources are open most projects are even forked unfortunately. Competition? Competition would mean you win new users from other camps or from outside, is that anywhere the case? People have their preferences, they would never change to a different platform even if that platform is better. And new users from outside? Stay serious...

I would not have used the same naming as MorphOS team to avoid this discussions but perhaps they like to provoke and people in MorphOS camp (mostly users not the core developers) feel hurtened in their soula and bite. It is really a silly discussion popping up every couple of months now.

> Are there any cross-platform projects using MUI5 (or however it might be called)?

Hollywood's MUI Royale plugin, for instance, which is the software connor referred to in comment #233. So in effect every cross-platform software that is created with Hollywood's MUI Royale.

http://amigaworld.net/modules/news/article.php?storyid=7808&start=40#98202

> most existing 68k software is based on MUI 3.8

Most existing 68k software is not based on any version of MUI :-)

> As I understand the discussions and posts they got legal access to 3.9 but [...]
> used a MUI 4 beta source snapshot instead they also had access to at that time.

That's what one side claims. For the claims of the other side see comment #226.

Quote:

I was not precise enough

most 68k software is not based on any GUI toolkit or use what was available in the original OS. But because there was only one OS anyway porting it to other platforms was not necessary at all

most software that is available on more than one (amiga) platform today uses MUI

> Stuntz [...] then gets surprised that they released MUI 4.

Source?