Hello,

We would like to share with you, the AROS Community, the results of the 2016 survey. First however, we would like to thank everyone who participated in this survey and gave us their feedback. We totaled 54 participants in the survey across AROS-Exec, AmigaWorld and some national Amiga sites. Thank you!

Now, for the results!

First part of the survey was composed out of there very specific questions.

1. How long do you use AROS weekly?

2. What is the way you use AROS (multiple selection allowed):
a) AROS Linux hosted
b) AROS Native on real hardware
c) AROS Native on virtual hardware
d) AROS 68k under Win/FS UAE
e) Other (please describe)

3. What are your 3 main activities in AROS?

Weekly usage

When it comes to time spend on weekly basis with AROS, 20% of you spend more than 10 hours a week with the system. 80% of you know what AROS is but use it occasionally. The 10 hours mark is what clearly divides users from tinkers.




Installation type

More than 60% of you use native x86 installation of AROS, either on real or virtualized hardware. The remaining installation base equally divides between AROS hosted and AROS 68k. Also interesting is that in most cases you use more than one type of installation.




Activities

In this case, there is a clear division between users and tinkers. Those of you who use AROS for more than 10 hours a week, use it mainly for Browsing, Programming and Multimedia.




If you spend less time with AROS, you spend it mostly on OS Tinkering but also, surprisingly, on Programming! We have a lot of hidden programmers out there :)




Second part of the survey was an open question.

4. Think about the things that would make you use AROS more? Please be descriptive, but focus on things you,not community would need nor "in general would be needed" - in sense that if it was available, you would use AROS more.

Here it was a bit difficult to categorize the responses as they were quite spread in the topics. All in all this gave a very interesting picture. Listed below are in the order of importances (number of similar issues raised)

Needed applications – This was a big group. SSH client/server, Office tools, Video editing and Python were among the most frequent requests.

System – Stability definitely is number one topic for you. New network stack, better 68k support and more functional Wanderer are other important factors. 68 applications integration is highly important. Uncertain future of ABIv1 is seen by many as you as a real problem.

Development tools – including better Shell, a functional IDE and a native debugging support

Hardware support – surprisingly this is the last category. RaspberryPi support is on the list as well as several specific hardware configurations.


Closing words

Thank you again for participating in the survey. It gave us insight on what is needed to more ahead and also confirmed that some developments that will be happening this year will be a valued improvement by the community!

Thank you for the summary. this gives a good insight : )

Thanks for doing this, very interesting indeed.

If I may offer an opinion about the hardware support, I think many people who want to run AROS natively are also willing to find the hardware required to run it. I think it's more important for AROS to provide top quality support for a limited range of *available* hardware, as supporting a broad range is way too large a task.

Of course if that support included the R-Pi or an Odroid, it would be pretty cool. :)

Also a big thank you from me for having done the survey and the presentation of the results. It is a most interesting read

The conclusion regarding activities could be a bit mailformed because of the restriction of 3 items (i understand that you had to draw the line somewhere).

I would love to see such kind of surveys (and results) as a recurring item as imo it makes AROS more approachable (for newbies, existing users and developers).

In that regards i also would like to use this opportunity to thank you for taking the time to write and publish the weekly and monthly progress reports.

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Currently i have the same opinion on that matter (even though you directly seem to go a bit overboard with the paragraph that followed ;-p )

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System – Stability definitely is number one topic for you. New network stack, better 68k support and more functional Wanderer are other important factors. 68 applications integration is highly important. Uncertain future of ABIv1 is seen by many as you as a real problem.


Certainly Wanderer improvement is something due. I fill the need preferring to use it rather than Magellan. Bounties for Wanderer improve are lie down from some time. It is time to have a refresh on them.

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I'm glad you find the survey and my weekly/monthly updates valueable :)

Hi deadwood,
Many thanks for the feedback and I agree completely on the value of the weekly reports.

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That's one heck of a teaser...

Cheers,
Nigel.

Ditto from me on the weekly reports, they are a great resource and an inspiring read.

Very good. Very pro..

Now we need some up to date laptop hardware for AROS and it will sell like hot cakes :D

@nikolaos
News about the new AspireOS ?