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Please introduce yourself. What's your name, how old are you and where do you come from?

My name is Benjamin VERNOUX, i'm 26 years old I live in France, in Valence (near Lyon).

What job do you have?

I work in software development for helicopter's recorder (army and civilian helicopter). Recorder is like a blackbox (but is not certified for crash) who record all internals helicopter's information seen by the pilot.

Tell us a bit about your Amiga project(s).

My main Amiga project is OpenPCI and drivers for 68k and MOS.

How long are you active on the Amiga and which were your first software projects?

I'm on Amiga since December 1992 when i have bought my first Amiga an Amiga1200+HDD. My first software project (in 1998) was PhonePrice a software for calculate internet connection's phone cost it was writed in Blitzbasic2.

Where can we find your projects?

You can find my projects on my WWW page : http://www.chez.com/titan for OpenPCI projects there's a direct link : http://www.amigapcibus.fr.st

What was the idea behind OpenPCI?

The idea behind OpenPCI is : Make an official, free and complete PCI API without any NDA requirement, who support all kind of PCI/AGP/PCIX Bus (except Elbox hardware) on Amiga/Pegasos computer because there was nothing on Amiga for that.

Who and what supports OpenPCI?

For the moment there's AmithlonTV (http://www.vmc.de/amithlon/amithlontv/ done by Guido Mersmann) who support OpenPCI API, but there's lot of other projects who will support OpenPCI in a near future. OpenPCI support :
Amiga/Amithlon/Pegasos (GrexA1200/A4000 (require cybpci.library)
Prometheus (require prometheus.library v2.x)
Amithlon (require powerpci.library v1.76)
Pegasos (require Pegasos+MorphOS))

Did you get enough feedback concerning your project?

Yes i have received some good feedbacks even if i will don't say huge tons of Email feedback because the Amiga Community is more and more small, it's very hard to find motivation :'(.

What is your current project, you are working on?

I'm working on lot of projects : Amiga libdvdcss project:

Unlock DVD device for read Video DVD protected.

OpenPCI:
New public version of openpci.library for 68k and MOS PPC Native
New OpenPCI SDK with skeleton and more driver samples.

AHI driver :
SB128 and FM801 sound card.

Network driver :
New version of openpci_8139.device who work with AmiTCP.
New network driver, i can't reveal the chipset of this network card for the moment.
Poseidon OHCI driver

Picasso96 driver:
openpci.card driver for Picasso96


Any new projects for the future?

Probably some new drivers, like GFX Card driver for MOS, but for the moment I want to finish old projects. And since my 2 Amigas are dead my development and motivation is slowdown

What kind of Amiga system do you use?

My Amiga(s):

Amiga1200 Atéo Tower (motherboard dead)
A1200 Elbox Tower (motherboard dead)
Blizzard 1230IV 50Mhz+32Mo
Blizzard PPC603e240+040/25+128MB+FSCSI2
Mediator PCI Bus
Grex PCI Bus (dead, it has burnt :'()
Extern ScanDoubler
2.1 and 20GB Hardisk
CD Burner X2, CD SCSI, Fast ATA 33
Sound Sampler 8bits DSS8+
Infrared module on Amiga Joy port (hardware make by me and my brother .
Pci Card:
Voodoo3/2000, RTL8029 10Mb, RTL8139 10/100Mb.

Amithlon/WinUAE :

AthlonXP 1800+
512MB 133MHZ SDRAM
2 HDDs: 60 GB and 80GB
DVD Burner Pioneer
CD Burner Yamaha 20,10,40
GFX Card: ATI Radeon 8500 reserved for my future Pegasos .
Pci Card:
SBLive1024, SB128, FM801, RTL8139 10/100Mb, USB OHCI...etc.

I use only Amithlon now since my Amigas are dead :'( In all case i prefer to use Amithlon for development like PCI driver.

Which Amiga-software is essential for you in everday-use?

Software for listen MP3 else i can't work ToolsDaemon, AmiTradeCenter, Amirc, Yam, Ibrowse, Voyager, developer tools (text editor, SASC 6.58, GCC MOS ...etc)

Which language do you use for coding?

I use C/C++ language only now, because it's a must for make portable code. Before i was using BlitzBasic2, ASM 68k (Devpac).

What do you find most exciting about the Amiga?

The OS, the API

What do you wish/miss on the Amiga?

- Tons of tools for developers like complete IDE, a (Windoz) Editplus 2 clone because it's easy and intuitive to use it.
- Some good and fun 2D/3D Games like Knight & Merchant (thanks to EPIC, Paul Burkey and all other guys who develop good games) .

Your opinion on the -so called- Amiga community?

I see too much insult/complaint/war on Amiga forum like www.ann.lu i'm very disappointed by this attitude, i just think the community will be better if all this guys will do usefull things like develop software, make graphics etc...

Do you think Amiga is going the right direction?

If you are talking about AInc i think they are dead. Since lot of years they have never did anything for the Amiga Community they are just t-shirt and coffee mug reseller. About OS4 I don't think this OS will have a future or will be available one day.

What do you think about the current Amiga situation (Amiga ONE, Pegasos, MorphOS, AmigaOS, Amithlon, etc.)

Amiga ONE: I have never see a "real" OS running on this computer we will see.
Pegasos: I think it's a very good computer.
MorphOS: The "real" new Amiga OS awaited from long time.
Amithlon: A very good things for developer and 68k users who have a slow Amiga or a dead Amiga like me :'(

Which Amiga-magazines (online or printed) do you like best?

I like AmigaImpact (www.amigaimpact.com) a very good french online magazine (hein Steag VGR.com the Webmaster RobR is a very crazy guy and a good friend. GFXBase web site.

What kind of music do you like?

In fact i like all sort of music with guitar, battery, real instruments and humans behind I like Joe Satriani, Megadeth, Metallica, Dream Theater, Aimee Mann (Platon42 , Dire Straits, Eric Clapton and tons of other groups.

Which books do you like?

In fact i never read books because i have no enough time for that I read only boring hardware datasheets (for driver)

What do you love to do in your freetime?

I like sports : tennis, basket, (beach-volley in vacation

Your opinion on the GFX-BASE?

It's a very good WWW site i like to read news and interview on it. Maybe you could plan some interview of some MOS guys (We will do our best - ed)

Thank you very much for answering our questions!

Interview by Stefan Otmar Leitner aka SOL-Invictus