Google Drive for AmigaOS4.1 on X1000

Today I want to take a look at the recently released Google Drive for AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition. I decided to try this out on the X1000.



For those not familiar, Google Drive is a cloud based file storage solution for saving/retrieving/sharing of files from the internet to/from any computer that runs the Google Drive application, including smartphones like iPhone/Android, iPads, Windows PC, Mac OS X computers and more.

Recently there has been releases for Google Drive for MorphOS and AmigaOS 3.x systems, and finally we now have Google Drive for AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition! The author of this program is Norbert Kett. You can download the program from here.

The program requires registration of 10 Euro to the author (see the readme in the archive for details) to unlock all the functionality. I decided to try it out as it is provided on Aminet here, to make sure it works well. I am pleased to say it does!

The archive contents is below - note that there is no installer so I extract to RAM first to do a few things for the installation.

Fortunately the instructions in the readme are clear and explain the process well.

Here is the Google drawer:

Update: Note that I am running a later Patch 7 release of Odyssey 1.23 web browser to fix memory leaks and Google login to blogger. The updated patches are an ongoing patch effort which you can follow in the Amigans thread here. It includes the download links for the Patch 7 (just the Odyssey executable to overwrite the original file) and newer releases as they become available. I have not tested earlier versions of Odyssey for compatibility with this next step.

I copied the url from the readme into the Odyssey web browser to allow the Google Drive application on the X1000 to access my Google profile:

Once I allow it, I get the client code that we need to paste into the _client_code file in the Google drawer.

Here is the code pasted in:

Note that for obvious security reasons I blurred the code. I also regenerated the code afterwards to a new code in case I missed it somewhere.

Having saved the _client_code file, I then copied the Google drawer to the DEVS folder on the System: drive:

I then added the assigns needed for Google Drive to mount under AmigaOS 4.1 into the s:network-startup file using Notepad:

 After a reboot I could then open a shell to mount the Google: drive mapping manually to test if it works - and it does!

I can see the contents of my cloud based Google Drive from The X1000 - fantastic:

Now that the drive is mounted, I can see the icon on the Workbench and can view the contents as per any other drive on AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition (Don't forget to view all files first):

You can open the files directly from Google drive but there is a delay while it traverses the network, which depends on the size of the file.

I then copied across one of the files to my X1000 which worked perfectly:

As a final touch I then set the Google.mountlist to activate the drive on startup of AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition:

Now the drive is available everytime I boot the X1000.

Since it works so well, I will shortly arrange to pay the 10 Euro to the author to unlock the functionality to copy files to the drive (without this, the drive is read only) and export functionality.

I am very glad to see this software available for AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition in 2016!

SimpleMail 0.41 Gmail IMAP on X1000

Recently I took a look at SimpleMail 0.41, released in December 2014 for AmigaOS 4.1, on my AmigaOne X1000.

AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition includes SimpleMail 0.35 with it, but since then SimpleMail has been updated to support the latest SSL protocols to fix the issues with Gmail not working since their security upgrades removed support for the older AmiSSL connections.

You can download the latest SimpleMail 0.41 with the fixed openssl library from here. Once downloaded and extracted you get the following drawer.

As your email can use a lot of space over time, I recommend putting this drawer on a separate large WORK partition rather than the System: partition. In my case I created an Applications drawer on WORK: and then extracted the SimpleMail 0.41 archive to there.

There is a good Amigaguide document included with the SimpleMail program to explain it's requirements and how to use it.

As they mention, it is BETA software and not completely finished, but the IMAP functionality to use Gmail is what I want to use it for, which works fine.

Note that SimpleMail requires a MUI class called PopPlaceHolder which is not included with AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition or with the included 0.35 program or the 0.41 update! The other requirements (MUI classes) have links shown in the Requirements guide below.

I already had all the MUI classes listed as requirements except PopPlaceHolder.

Update 4/11/2015: If you have the latest MUI 4 (30/9/2015) installed, you will have PopPlaceHolder.mcc installed (newer version), but it causes problems with SimpleMail 0.41 as it needs the older version below - otherwise it will crash when you click on the Configuration option in SimpleMail.

To fix this problem for newer MUI 4 versions, use the Shell to copy the popplaceholder.mcc file located in MUI:Libs/MUI/popplaceholder.mcc to another name like popplaceholder.mcc.newer, and then delete popplaceholder.mcc and install the older version shown below. Then it will work.

You can download PopPlaceHolder from AmiNet here. This is the PopPlaceHolder drawer once extracted, ready for installation. Just double click on MCC-Install to walk through the standard Workbench installer.

Even though the program is for 68k Amigas, it will work fine under AmigaOS 4.1. This requirement is needed to be able to use the Configuration window within the SimpleMail program.

Speaking of which, here is the SimpleMail 0.41 program window on initial open:

The structure and layout of the email program is very familiar to people who have used YAM (Yet Another Mailer) before on Classic Amigas or AmigaOS 4.1.

Under the Right click Menu, select Settings > Configuration.. to get the window below. You will need to configure your email accounts in here to be able to download/send out your emails.

As you can see there are plenty of settings covering most email settings you would expect. But lets look at adding a Gmail account into SimpleMail, by selecting the Accounts area of the Configuration window (in the left pane):

Click on Add Account to start putting in the configuration. I have included the settings I used to get IMAP Gmail account working in SimpleMail - minus the pixelated email address - please substitute your own Gmail email address.

In the Receive mail section you can specify how often mail is checked - I changed this to every 3 minutes.

In the Signatures section I could create my signature for my emails sent from Simple Mail:

There is a comprehensive Spam section to check incoming emails for Spam, and to add senders to black list (block) or white list (allow).

Mail sync then gets underway:

Mail synced and I now have Gmail IMAP working using Simple Mail - names and emails blurred to protect the innocent!

It is great to be able to use Gmail IMAP support on my AmigaOne X1000 using Simple Mail. It works with POP3 also of course (config not included here sorry!), so you can choose from either method.

I hope this guide is useful!