Some people claims that in this retro computing hobby we can name SW, HW projects, solutions as we like it, not caring about used words, terms meaning, that name may be misleading ...
Then, lot of retro computer people has problems with terms, terminology . Would it be better if those who work development, on some informative WEB pages would take more care about terminology.
And more: would it be better if those making mistakes and being corrected, would say 'tnanx' and learn something instead getting insulted, reacting harshly, in style 'how you dare to say I'm wrong' . Well, that's even bigger mistake acting like can not make some error/mistake .
I have pretty much experience with such: in 1983 in my small city where I leaved then home computer club was formed - mostly C64, Sinclair Spectrum users/owners. And beginners in it. On first meeting someone mixed terms byte and bit, and when I corrected it he came with 'how you dare' - and I was not surprised as I knew him. Similar cases, just with not so basic terms happened at Atari forums in 21-st Century . And reactions were really miserable in many cases. Moderators/admins did not react properly in many cases.
I guess quantity of posts is more important than quality for them.
Let's see some 'product', SW, HW names:
'HD Driver' (Seimet) - it is just shortage of general term 'hard disk driver' . That self is proper as name, but it should be something unique, not abbrev.
'GemDrive' - should mean something like hard disk driver under GEM . What is GEM ? graphical environment manager. Here some little confusion is done by Atari, I think - better would be to call disk related part of TOS TOSDOS instead GEMDOS - for instance as there is lot of SW not using GEM at all. So, TOSdrive sounds for me better.
'Sidecartridge' - yeah, cartridge goes at side of Atari ST :-) What about naming by what it does ?
Oh yeah - TOS emulator - huh . It is not it at all. See other thread here for more ...
'ULS' - universal loading system - name would be OK, if it would be really universal. Truth is that it is good only for SW what does floppy access with own code, and not TOS functions, and not only disk access - SW what does not using TOS at all after it is started . And percentage of TOS using games is some 65% min.
But what to expect from people who claim that they are best in it. They did not mention that whole concept is takes from Amiga WHDLoad system. Sure, why do it ? I did not see mentioning in Hatari DOCs that their GemDrive concept is same is 'Hard disk' in Steem (2005) .
Then, when we are at games: it was usual that games sold in past as pirate copies were called 'cracks' - as it was needed to 'crack' copy protection. Later came era of hard disks/Flash cards, so some called it 'patches' . What term 'patch' means - fixing some part, doing some correction so it can work in different environment (HW) . Well, that's pretty much OK for ULS . But what about games calling TOS functions ?
It needed much more - among others some TOS v. in RAM, where are some changes for better works, easier making games working in new conditions. And there may be many of it. So, I call my releases adaptations or adapts - and that just includes all needed changes, add-ons ... Then, some call it 'conversions' - very bad and not respectful - it is not conversion, and of course no SW what can do it. And will be not. All it is lot of 'manual' work and biggest help for it is some better Atari ST emulator with trace and debugger functions - yeah Steem Debugger . It makes all searching in machine code way easier, as one of main tasks is to find parts of code responsible for disk access, for input read (keyboard, mouse, joystick), copy protection too - and even if using some crack (what I do only if no other source) may need to remove all remains of floppy access in it - as we want now that it work on machines without floppy drive (or Gotek and like) . And of course there are many special cases, strange programmer's solutions, code ...
Calling it just patch, crack, conversion just does not cover all needed and involved .
But some don't care - 'I will do it as I want, it's my right' - Yeah, it is it. And my right is to openly say that it is just bad, disrespectful, sign of not reading available pages about it, not taking any time to think little about , or maybe just contact author about it ...
I agree that there are a lot of confusing terms out there.
Confuses me anyway (and yeah, I know - that don't take
much)... :)