The Sinclair QL Forum

At what end of which rainbow will we find Stella?

Tinyfpga wrote: But:- it is not for me to make the code available. The reason for starting this topic is to try and find out why
no one from the QL world has ever expressed much interest in TT's proposals. (For one of them, read "QL Today").

I read QL Today, about Tony Tebby's proposals, but at that time, I was being subjected to targeted criticism about software piracy. This was clearly incorrect.

I am still hurt by this rubbish that published, I wonder why I still continue to support the QL World/Community,

For that reason, I did not respond the proposals.

Tinyfpga wrote: SMS2 was rejected by QLers, and clearly still is, and SMS2 was the second expression of TT's theories.
The third, that is Stella, probably only exists as the working system I have in Atari ST format, and no one today is going to work on system that runs on an Atari ST. suggested, to Tony Tebby, that FPGA is the way to go..

All theory and talk, so easy say one thing and not do anything.

If have a working version of Stella can you post pictures of the system working,?

I basically don't know anything about Stella except the one document from Arnould. I guess this was written around 1995 or so, where Linux was still in version 1, so the sentence "Linux is a hacker's toy" might be forgiven. In any case it was a long time ago and the basic assumption "In mono-processor systems (e.g. nearly 100% of all installed systems)" is now completely out of date. Things with a single CPU core are now almost the exception. But usually this means you need some sort of synchronization primitives after all, the very thing Stella apparently tries to avoid.

Well, lock-free data structures do exist, maybe he meant something like this with the INTSAFE stuff, but these are frigging complicated to get right, even I am too dumb for it. Especially if we're talking about out-of-order CPUs with weaker memory models, those make my head hurt. Doing stuff that mostly works is easy. Doing stuff that always works 100% is very complicated. Example? Quick, how do you calculate the middle point between two integers? If you think "easy, that's (a+b)/2" then I have a one hour video for you explaining why you're wrong: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBtAGxBh-XI

We're here because of nostalgia and because this is a system that we can still understand. Windows, just for comparison, has 3.5 Million files, the GIT repo is said to compromise 300GB. There is not a single developer on earth who understands every part of it. I on the other hand know almost all files in SMSQ/E, and that's already more than 2000. That's the nice thing about all this. I don't for a second think that SMSQ/E is still relevant in any way, it's just a nice toy. A toy that can be understood and tinkered with. What would the purpose of Stella be? I have no idea.

What would the purpose of Stella be? I have no idea.

Now there's a challenge. I will give it a try at some point. How about Peter Graf likes it (or maybe he doesn't).
Does not the target system (68000 in FPGA) contain a single core processor?

Meanwhile might I entertain you with the following from a TT document:-

Stella Performance against vxWorks2
This comparison table gives some measures of the performance: timing uncertainties, external event handling (interrupts) and operating system calls. These figures should not be taken as representative of real performance, but they do serve to illustrate that the flexibility, capability, accessibility and reliability of Stella have been achieved without sacrificing efficiency. To answer Derek's request. I will see what I can do. Remember the Stella I have has no user interface. As you say, "talk is cheap", but maybe in this case entertaining. I hope Tony Tebby was not accusing you of piracy.

Postby ones' complement » Mon Feb 14, 2022 7:44 pm
At what end of which rainbow will we find Stella? According to Google it is on the edge rather than on the end.

I'm not at all pessimistic.

Stella doesn't exist. Tony Tebby is retired and busy enjoying France. He will not have the time or resources to make it reality.

We're here because of nostalgia and because this is a system that we can still understand. Windows, just for comparison, has 3.5 Million files, the GIT repo is said to compromise 300GB. There is not a single developer on earth who understands every part of it. I on the other hand know almost all files in SMSQ/E, and that's already more than 2000. That's the nice thing about all this. I don't for a second think that SMSQ/E is still relevant in any way, it's just a nice toy. A toy that can be understood and tinkered with. What would the purpose of Stella be? I have no idea.

This is the best statement of this thread and is very true.

I work for a team that designs CPUs. Even the CPU design is now so complex it's hard for a team to understand it let alone one person. And out of order execution no-one truly understand, see Spectre/Meltdown for the proof of this (and note the exploits are still coming in).

Dave wrote:Stella doesn't exist.

Exactly my point of view. I only believe it when I see the code, in whatever form.

When TT sent me the SMS2 disk, which created a bootable system disk for the Atari ST, he immediately wrote that he couldn't take care of SMS2 any further because he had no time and no resources. Then there will hardly have been any updates, will there?

The factor here is that Stella would be a 'retronew proto-community' based around a platform with:

No community
No software
No history
No experts
No installed user base

and most of all

No tools.

I am 1000% exited about the possibilities Stella held. However, without a way to port software in, and without the deft hands of TT at the wheel, nobody will have the stamina to do the work needed by themselves. As soon as you add in multiple personalities you'll have conceptual and personality conflicts that will be more work than the project itself.

I promise I am not trying to poop on your thread.

It's a cool bit of digital archaeology.

Will Stella run Quill?

Derek_Stewart wrote:Will Stella run Quill?

And the prize for most important question goes to Derek!