========= INTERVIEW ========= This issue we have interviewed a programmer who is not reknown for his work on the Amiga... well not yet... this guy will become the guru behind many Amiga owners prayers, he is the programmer of the AMOS basic language - a new breakthrough for the Amiga, he is Francois Lionet of France... Interview conducted by Martyn, Newsflash UK. PART ONE. FRANCOIS LIONET - THE MAN. ==================================== M: Ok, so lets firstly hear a little bit about yourself before we move onto AMOS... Where do you live, where were you born etc? F: I live in YERRES, a small town 12 Miles from Paris, at 4 on the clock (south East). I was born the 06/07/1963 in Maubeuge, a small town near Belgium. I have two bothers, one dentist married, one cardiologist - single, living in Tahiti (!). I am 26, married with my wife Carine, we have a dog called Daisy! I gained my diploma of veterinary surgeory in 1986 (And NO! I'm not kidding!), but I do not practice as I prefer to program! M: What about food and things like that? F: Best food... all that's good! I like lots of things, and I also love to go to a VERY good restaurant every two months. Its really worth the money! I don't really know about a worst food, maybe some sea food like crude sea snails or things like that! M: What about your musical tastes? F: Best music... In general, the last compact disk I have bought!!! I really need music when I'm programming, I work much better. I do not mean music as a background, very quiet, but much louder through headphones! I even need a light to tell me someone is calling on the phone! Worst music, you must not know them in England (fortunately) they are called "Les Muscles"! M: What is your favourite and least liked places ? F: Place most liked: Mountains. Least, ugly small cities! M: What was THE event of the `80s for you? F: 1980's... Don't know... Maybe like everybody the revolutions in Eastern Europe? M: What are your hopes for the future? F: Hope that Gorby is still there even next year! M: What about your personal hopes? F: Best thing to me... We want to have a baby! Lets hope it will work! Worst thing to me: next year, I have to do my military service! Oh NOOOO! M: What 5 words could you use to best describe your character? F: Perseverant, happy, messy (not in my programs though), I can't find any more! M: Ok, add enthusiastic! What about your favourite films? F: Maybe BRAZIL and all Monty Python... M: What kind of things do you dislike ? F: Hypocracy, lazy people, stupidity... M: What other interests and hobbies do you have? F: SKIING (soon, soon hahaha!!!) Squash, Tennis, Piano, reading SF and comics (French comics, not the one you know!), sail boat, holidays, beach, sun, girls, ... sorry not the last one, my wife is here! M: Which place would you most like to visit ? F: North of USA and Asia. M: If you were re-incarnated, what would you like to come back as?? F: I want to come back as my dog! She sleeps when she wants, eats and plays all day! What a life! M: What was the best news you ever received? F: STOS has sold 35000 copies!! M: And the worst ? F: STOS has only sold 35000 copies!!!! PART 2: PROGRAMMING AND THE AMIGA ================================= M: Whats your favourite programming subject ? F: Sprites, bobs, all that can be seen or heard! M: Your least favourite ? F: SORTING items, and structures handling! M: Which other programmers do you admire (if any)? F: Jez San, beacause he has created a structure around him, with other programmers. Lots of others, like Yves Lamoureux (mister Captain Blood on CPC Amstrad, Didier Bouchon Mister Captain Blood etc... Wait for their new production at Virgin, you'll be amazed!) M: For you what are the best and worst features of the Amiga? F: Best thing about the Amiga: the CHIPS! Worst thing about the Amiga: AMIGADOS, and the fact that it is REALLY C oriented. If you want to use machine langage, have fun with the pointers! M: What is your opinion on the piracy problem ? F: Piracy has a few years left. In five years, all the games will be out on cartridges! We are living the last years of micro computers! Pirates have won the first set: no more real computers. But authors will win the second one: no way to copy. And wait for the CDI games! M: What other programs were you responsible for? F: The other programs I have made, you must n't know any of them!!! - SUPERBOARD II (6502) - these programs haven't been sold! We must have been 3 of the people in France with such a computer! I think that they could have been sold in GB! They were really good! Amazing how we played with them... Galaxian, Orbit, Defender (in 8K),Pacman - ORIC (6502) Driver, Bombyx, Bering, Chicken chase - CBM 64 (6502) Chicken Chase, Katuvu, Serenade, Ole! Some demos for companies Captain Blood (yep its me!) - AMSTRAD CPC (Z80) Chickin Chase + listings for magazines - PC (8088) Captain Blood (again??) Some serious programs - ST (68000) Expressing Stos Stos Compiler + Articles for magazines - AMIGA (guess what? Z80, 80386?) AAAAAMMMMMOOOOOOOOSSSSSS M: Prior to Amos, what was your best acievement? F: Stos of course. 1 year of work in it! M: How did you take to using the Amiga after the ST ? F: At the beginning, I was REALLY lost! I thought I would NEVER get through. I hated it! Then I began to understand the circuitery. I loved the chips, but I still hated the built in software! Now I begin to understand the software, mainly because I have some good documentation (at first, I just had the Abacus books!). Now I think the EXEC, INTUITION are really good pieces of software. I still HATE Amigados (it is really a shame that they have not put a proper disk access into such a machine), HATE graphics.lib: the functions are really not powerfull, and eat a lot of memory. AMIGADOS is really a pity! I can't believe that they did not put 2 or 3 resident commands for the start! Just COPY, DIR, not much! I got stuck with one drive, and no startup sequence ready. I needed 50 disk swaps top get out of it! Still AMIGADOS! I needed 3 full days to install my hard drive! I can't imagine how the average user does. So my opinion on the Amiga is balanced: a wonderfull hardware, an extremely bad disk access, apart from that,good built in software. More, the Amiga is built to be expanded. I wonder how the 2010 amiga will look like (because there will still be Amiga in 2010, and no more St!) . So guess what... In fact I love it! PART 3: AMOS ============ M: What are you going to tell us about AMOS?? I`ve got a preproduction copy and its mind-blowing (thanks to Richard at Mandarin!). F: I'm not going to state all the programs characteristics, as they are written in Mandarin adverts! And believe me, the final product has all, and much more! M: What exactly makes AMOS so special when compared to other languages? F: It does not use the intuition graphic interface. So I was really free to invent my own environnement. AMOS system is based on SCREENS, these screens, instead of Intuition, are limited in the bottom. So when a screen ends, you can see the one that's under it. (I know why Intuition does not allow that: it was terribly hard to program!!!) You can of course have different resolutions in each screen, set the priority, do fine scrollings. You can even set the screen position in X. M: What do you say to people who accuse you when you don`t use things like multi-tasking etc? F: I hear lots of people saying: he does not respect the Amiga, shame, kill him, burn him! No sir, I really respect the Amiga! It is clean programmation: you can get out of Amos,and use another piece of software. It DOES multitask, but you won't see the result of the other task. So AMOS does respect the system, and make a proper use out of it. M: How are you managing to squeeze all these features into a usable program for a 512K Amiga? F: As I do not use WB, you can have the instruction Close Workbench which will save 42k of memory. As everything is built in Amos, you can have the barefoot startup sequence on you 500, and then have up to 240K to work with! M: What will you be able to program with Amos? F: Amos will allow you to do almost anything. But remember that it is promoted as a game creator (or for educational software). You'll be able to use it to produce databases or word processors, but it is not its main point. To do such software, I think you'd better use GFA or C. M: What features have you put into AMOS that no other language really supports very well? F: I have really put in Amos all my dreams of the ideal langage for the Amiga: - procedures, structure, auto indent - good editor, fast, lots of key combinations - direct mode, fast screen system - intensive use of the custom chips: blitter, copper - intensive use of interrupts: colour animations, sprite/bob movements and music. (Soundtracker style) - Easy-for-the-user sprites, bobs, double buffering - Really professional menu system (much better than the default Amiga system, you can even call a procedure to draw a menu item!!!) - More than one program in memory, basic accessories (like in Stos). All the accessories are editing the data of the main program: no need of disk! - direct IFF loading - the basic instruction set can extended by simply copying a file into the AMOS folder: lots of new things to come; 3D, Math functions, etc... - etc... Its really my hearts content! M: When do you hope that AMOS will finally be released? F: The final release date is said to be at the start of March... I hope, but I think that unfortunately we will be a little late... M: Have you any idea how many you expect to be sold? F: I don't know how many we plan to sell. STOS has sold 35000 copies on the St. The Amiga market is twice as big as the St, and AMOS is the only one like this. So I'm very very optimistic. And all the reaction of people having seen Amos (when they come back to us after falling down) are encouraging! The Amiga community is so much more friendly than the St! M: What does AMOS basic do that no other does? F: Amos does lots of things other basics don't!!! The main one is -I think- it really exploits all the Amiga power, directly into the chips, like all the games and demos! It is fast (no so fast than Gfa, but approaching - that because Gfa has only one instruction per line, and does not use any interrupts at all), has more than 400 commands (I don't know yet how many, but I think around 450!) ... etc ... M: How difficult was AMOS to program ? F: Writing AMOS was really hard at first. I was at the bottom of the Mont Blanc! It is always difficult to start a such a big product. You do not know where to start! And for me, I had to begin with the hardest part: screens! 15 days after having my Amiga, I was coppering! M: How much of the STOS program have you used to develop AMOS? F: Stos was a line numbered basic. In fact, I just kept a few routines from it: strings, evaluations. All the rest is new code. So it was not at all an adaptation! M: What problems did you have? F: The problem with me, is that I can't tell you how the product will really look like BEFORE making it. Before Amos, I could just tell you that it was going to be nice (I was sure of that!) but not how! All the ideas come to me when I program. Anyway, the product is really miles over my wildest dreams. Mandarin wanted first, just an adaptation of the St Stos, using the Amiga speed. It has come up with a totally different product, with a better environment and far superior features to take total advantage of the Amigas hardware. M: How long has AMOS taken to develop? F: AMOS will have taken me 1 full year to make (AMOS itself, the Sprites designer, the Music Designer, AMAL editor and a few other accessories...) I started it at the beginning of APRIL 1989. M: Where you pleased at the success of Stos? F: Of course I was pleased with STOS. But you know, Stos is only starting in France nowadays. I knew that Stos was popular in England, but could not see it! So for me, it was as if it was not! I was not known at all in france as a programmer. When I told to somebody that I was a software author, and i had written Stos, he said What? Sots? tSos? What is this? Very frustrating for me! Now Stos is "booting" in France. It goes better now. The same thing will happen with the Amiga: unfortunately there are not many Amigas in France, so Amos success (if so) will not be very close to me! It will be fun to think that my name will pop in front of thousands people all around the world! I should make a rough approximation of how many times the Amos editor loop will have turned in a year on all the Amiga machines! The number will be stunning! These bytes must be erased at the end! PART 4: THE FUTURE ================== M: What does your immediate future hold, what other projects are you planning? F: For the future... my military service! It starts on March the 19th. I'll have 5 weeks of hard work (to get a good situation in the army as a vet), so no way to program during these 5 weeks! After this, I'll get a much more cool job, so I'll program during it on my portable pc! M: What about plans for AMOS? F: - first the compiler (finished in June) - then Amos version 1.1, including all the users complaints! - then StosPro on the St: the AMOS adaptation to the St!!! M: What are your views on the software industry ? F: It is still young, not many crooks. Most of the people are under 30, very friendly, so I really can't find anything bad about it! And it is one of the rare domains (as with music) in which you can get the bingo with a hit! I'm really happy! Don't worry, be happy! PART 5: FAREWELL ! ================== M: If you weren`t a programmer what would you be? F: I'd be a.... vet! M: Any messages to Newsflash readers? F: A demo of Amos can be found. It is public domain. Anyway you have chosen the best machine! (when I look to my St, I get mad! How could I have stood programming this for one full year???) Hi to everybody I know in UK! M: What messages have you to other Amiga programmers? F: To other programmers, I can say WORK! Do not think you are the best, as the best, its me :-) no I'm kidding! All programmers when they finish a product are really proud of themselves. I was too. Then I met some really good ones that made me feel so little! Believe me, you can't imagine how some few people are good. Don't get too big headed, you can always do better! M: What`s your message to the Amiga world?? F: My message to the world: BUY AMOS! Even if you don't have an Amiga: you really NEED it! M: Your message to AMOS purchasers when its finally released?? F: Thank you, now buy the compiler!!! There we are, I`d like to extend my thanks to Francois for being so co-operative and also to Richard and the guys at Mandarin software for some great support. Expect to be kept RIGHT up to date with AMOS on Newsflash, look out for routines, listings, tips etc. AMOS will change a great deal of peoples minds about the Amiga believe me! Just wait until you see a demo of what it can really do, its awesome.. When you watch it and think "My god this is a BASIC program" it really blows your socks off! This guy has managed to put into a interpreted language what 50% of the commercial programmers haven`t managed to do in game releases!! Expect to see lots (and I mean LOTS) of Amos demos too! If you`ld like to see a programmer/programming team/artist or musician interviewed on Newsflash then drop me a line and I`ll do my best to bring you it! We`ve lots more planned too!! Ok, see you in the interview room next issue.. Bye! Martyn.