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GNUstep 0.6.5 freeze
teferi writes " The GNUstep project, a GPL'ed implementation of the OpenStep environment, has gone into a code freeze for the 0.6.5 release. The base library is 94% done, and the various parts, including the DPS/DGS graphics backend are coming along well. "
is the gnustep project just window maker or is it more? Can anyone enlighten me on what else the gnustep project has done.
It has been statistically shown that helmets increase the risk of head injury.
but where are the applications?
There's like maybe two that have been released. Having the library is great, but if there's no real use for it, no one will care.
I don't know if there are very many open-source NeXTSTEP apps out there either.
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What is the relationship between NEXTSTEP and the new MacOS X? If the OpenSTEP project is successful in making a NEXTSTEP-compatable system, would it be trivial to compile the new MacOS stuff to run under it?
-- Erich
Slashdot reader since 1997
I mean GNUStep, not OpenSTEP. OpenSTEP == NEXTSTEP. I knew that. Sorry.
-- Erich
Slashdot reader since 1997
Plus, OpenStep has a better look & feel than KDE or GNOME*
(Yeah, I know, OpenStep is a spec, not an implementation. It still looks nice).
Interestingly enough, the OpenStep spec was from Sun & NeXT, and if you look hard enough, you can find an unfinished OpenStep implementation for Solaris. Unfortunately, Sun let it die in favor of Java (smooth move, dickwads), and the binaries are for SPARC only.
I'm glad to see GNUStep is progressing though. I tried it back in the 0.5.0 era, but it was, well, in the development stage :-)
Incidentally, what would the difference(s) be between OpenStep's Display Postscript and OSX's Display PDF (Quartz) tech? Anyone know the relative pros/cons, how either one stacks up against the other, etc.?
Methinks the xdps component may see a surge of interest, with all these tantalizing reports of what OSX can do with dynamic scaling and alpha-channelling....
iSKUNK!
This is the desktop that should have been THE GNU Desktop all along. Just one look at the screenshots and you can tell this is by professionals.
waiting to run. The problem is that GNUStep hasn't reached a point where GUI OpenStep apps can just be compiled. There are too many inconsistencies and too much not done yet in the AppKit Foundation. But once it's done, in theory any openstep app should be able to be run on linux. They also run on MacOSX, and Windows. OpenStep is the cross platform app development environment that Java wishes it was. A JVM is stupid, it slows things down to much especially considering what a hog swing is, and you have to use swing to do decent interfaces. OpenStep got it right. The basic philosophy of OpenStep is write once, compile anywhere as opposed to Java's compile once, run anywhere...
I remember lusting after NeXT boxes when I was like 12 after we got our 1st 386, they looked so sweet, and the UI was so *smart*. Consistancy is something that almost everyone agrees is a problem with X, but plans to make is nice always seem to fall over. CDE is/was hell (imo), gnome and kde are diverging and converging at the same time, and I'm getting confused. SAVE ME GNUSTEP :)
-Yarn - Rio Karma: Excellent
Please, tell us what you really think. I devote time to GNUstep because it allows me to quickly write cool software that we need and distribute it on commodity hardware that runs an operating system that supports the cards and features we need. I make money doing this. How does this make me an idiot?
It is possible to work with GPLed software for the wrong, and wasteful reasons. But just choosing GNUstep over the competition doesn't make one an idiot.
This project will clearly never finish.
Probably so. Like most free software it will continue to live and improve each day. However they have met several important goals, and they stuff the code as it stands is useful TODAY.
GNUstep is in the same hopeless position as projects such as GNU Classpath, forever trying to catch up to an evolving standard.
At the time GNUstep started, OpenStep was supposed to become a certified standard. Since then Apple bought NeXT (who saw it coming?) and is trying to take their existing code base and justify the purchase. Whether they actually ship it is another question.
The libraries are LPGL, not GPL. There is nothing in the GPL that prevents commercial projects from using the source. There is nothing that requires them to distribute the source unless they distribute binaries. For MCCA users, there is no conflict
To purchase it is not like spending money but rather it is an investment in the future in a blow against the empire
Yes, like its fellow GNU brothers--GCC, Emacs, Gnome, Bash, SmallEiffel and so on--GNUstep probably never will be finished. Wink ;^) -- it will continually keep getting better.
My knowledge of the *step interface is based on WindowMaker. I read somewhere that much of the design of the *step interface was based on large computers with large monitors. That was why they have root menus instead of a global menu. Is this true?
CNN Entertainment has full coverage. Thank you.
Am I the only one who finds the comment about non-acceptance a bit ironic in light of the previous slashdot story concerning Linux's achilles heel and the comments generated?
GNUStep/OpenStep/NeXTStep represent a viable solution to the comments generated *but* is shot down because it isn't mainstream (read not Windows/Mac). Ahh the price we will pay for our "conformist" ways.
how do you know the page owner is even doing the posting? besides, some of us think this is funny!
(crying) Mama, he mentioned a web page I don't like! Make him stop!
What a bunch of crap. Everyone extolls the holy virtues of nextstep, but no one really can give real world reasons why it is so great.
As someone who used and programmed nextstep apps, I can say the hype is unbelievable. I guess Jobs is good at that though.
The MPAA is at it again! Yet another injunction has been filed against 2600 on 26, Jan. 2000. This time to stop LINKING to sites with DeCSS.
People seem to be kind of confused about what GNUstep is and implies, I'll try to clarify:
GNUstep is: an implementation of the OpenStep API. The OpenStep API makes it quite easy to develop programs for it, as the developer doesn't have to worry about the little things, and spend their time innovating and writing great code . It's cross-platform (between Windows w/ the YellowBox, anything running GNUstep, Mac OS X/Cocoa). It's a dream to develop with, and the Objective-C language, to me, is much nicer to use than C++ (although I think there's wrappers for Java, and perhaps C/C++).
GNUstep will: Allow for easy ports to platforms running GNUstep from source written under OpenStep, Rhapsody, or Mac OS X (using Cocoa/YellowBox). This encourages cross-platform development, and hopefully will help bring many apps to Mac OS X/Cocoa, as well as Linux/FreeBSD/etc.
GNUstep is not: a window manager or a desktop environment. Desktop environments can (and quite easily) built with GNUstep. In fact, someone is working on a NeXT-like file manager right now, which is working and developed under OpenStep, and easily recompiled on a FreeBSD box using GNUstep.
For more information, see the GNUstep website or the unofficial GNUstep website, both of which have plenty of information on the OpenStep spec, and where GNUstep is going.
In short-- definately check it out!
Aaron
Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
waaaaaahhhhhh look what a crybaby fag i am, i don't like that web page WWWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
My colleagues and I wrote some OPENSTEP tools that are Interface Builder and Project Builder workalikes.
They are running right now on Intel and NeXT machines running OPENSTEP. As soon as GNUstep can host the code base, these tools will be released.
Linux is about ready to get the best application development environment on any platform--and it'll all be open source.
Interface Builder is a GUI-building tool that works something like VisualAge in that it allows you to (a) visually build connections between GUI controls and methods and instance variables in objects and (b) create new instances of non-UI objects.
Finished UIs in Interface Builder do not contain code. Instead the connections and controls are archived into "NIBs." This allows you to create and maintain UIs without having to write a single line of code. If you've ever written a Java Swing application, you know what a pain in the ass it is to write GUIs by hand.
However, the tool does generate stubs for the custom, non-UI-related objects you create. This allows you to visually create a new object, connect up its stub methods to your controls visually, then "fill in the blank" to generate the core logic of your object's methods.
Project Builder is similar to a Smalltalk code browser, with a Miller column view of your class hierarchy and an integrated editor window that displays source code and documentation depending on the currently browsed object. If you've used JBuilder, Visual Cafe, or VisualAge, you already know how this kind of thing works.
I just love wm
marc
The real mnf999 always posts as anonymous coward
The philosophy of unix is "write once, compile on all conforming platforms" (ie, other unices, as long as you don't use any platform-specific code). What openstep/gnustep buys you is "write once, compile anywhere, including all the silly proprietary have-their-thumbs-where-the-sun-doesn't-shine platforms (ie, Windows et al). The latter is a godsend for programmers everywhere.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
I've used a proper OpenStep derived OS (Apple's Rhapsody betas) and I've used the current front runner linux UIs, Gnome and KDE. OpenStep is a lot nicer. Why is OpenStep nicer? Because it's integrated. Because it has things like color wells you can drag out of onto things, document proxy icons in the window manager you can drag to the filer, app bundles that contain an app and all it's global config in a single unit, system services that dynamically detect what you have selected and offer relevant options to tweak it.
Gnome and KDE can be snazzified with themes and config and whatnot, but in the end it's mostly just chrome. They are struggling to retrofit the same degree of dynamism and integration that OpenStep had from the get-go.
PDF is "good" specifically because it's weaker. Postscript is a fully fledged interpreted stack based language, and the only way to get the output is to run the program. PDF is more like HTML - a page description language which looks very similar to PS and shares its imaging model, but without the Turing-completeness. Basically this means less processor churn at the expense of flexibility and nifty hacks (eg: defining PS subroutines for your graphical elements and just calling them later).
OpenStep used to use a full PS interpreter to drive the GUI. Apple's new system just allocates a chunk of screen real estate, and the program links against the "Quartz" libraries that use PDF to draw into it. One annoying consequence is you can no longer in MacOS X use "NSHosting" - basically, sending the PS stream from a remote machine to display locally, similar to how X works.
Note that there is an Objective C binding for GTK...
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
>At the time GNUstep started, OpenStep was >supposed to become a certified standard.
>Since then Apple bought NeXT (who saw it coming?) >and is trying to take their existing
>code base and justify the purchase. Whether they >actually ship it is another question
Does this mean that openstep and objective-C was going through the process of standardization(standards committee) and all that when Apple bought Next and is now trying to milk openstep's proprietory old code for all its worth? thus killing the standards process?
IF the GNUstep guys are trying to reverse engineer Openstep... wouldn't they be in the same boat as the WINE ppl and never quite be able to get there? I dont know much about the state of openstep and its documentation but if it were standardized and had all the specs available then i guess it would be possible.
was thinking of learning objective-c (objective-c==openstep?) but if i gotta buy some devkit from apple to get the full functionality and only be able to run stuff on OSX then i guess i wouldn't be bothered...
--
# I have no brain
The OpenStep spec was publicly made available, and at one point NeXT indicated that a GNU implementation that met the spec could be certied as OpenStep compliant. This was around the time of Sun/NeXT, pre java. When Sun went Java, NeXT eventually abandonded the standards process.
IF the GNUstep guys are trying to reverse engineer Openstep... wouldn't they be in the same boat as the WINE ppl
It's not reverse enginnering. There is an API, and they are writing the implementation to match that API.
More importantly, I think 2000 will be the year that we see more programs available for GNUstep then were ever avaailable for NeXTSTEP/OpenStep. GNUstep will eventually hold the crown for Objective-C implementations. It's only a matter of time.
You misunderstand. I/we (I'm not the poster you responded to) have nothing against the website itself. It's his/her prerogative to create it. And it's fine if some people find it funny. What sucks, is the fact that he's spammed Slashdot over and over and over and over and over... again. In the last week, I personally have seen him spam /. with this link at least 100 times. No, I am not exaggerating. 100 times, easily. And I only read at most 1/4 of the articles, and even then only about 1/3 to 1/2 the posts under those articles (unless it's something I'm really interested in).
This person has put up a web-page. That is fine. However, he is also spamming it (under false pretenses, too... he disguises the link as being relevant to the discussion). That is not fine. It is spam, plain and simple. And we are responding to him as we would to any spammer, to any person that abuses their internet accounts. By reporting them to their ISP and hoping that their detrimental activities are stopped.
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think you just crossed it.
--
- Sean
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think I just crossed it.
- Sean
There are about 200 apps for NeXTSTEP that will show up on Linux as soon as GnuSTEP is able to support them.
GnuSTEP isn't done yet, but when it is, hold on to your hat.
For a sample of the apps you'll see, check out next-ftp.peak.org, and www.stepwise.com/softrak/
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
I know this may be a bit off topic, but I just thought I would chime in and say that I have done a fair amount of work using VNC (http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc/)
for thin client computing. While I really like KDE and to a lesser degree GNOME on my local desktop, I have found that they seem to be quite slow over anything slower than the highest speed network. WindowMaker, on the other hand seems snappy even under a 56K connection. The only WM I have found to be any faster is twm (which I use to export individual applications to a web browser when I don't need any window manager.) Can anyone tell me why WindowMaker is so fast over a low bandwidth connection. Is it just the simple color scheme, or is there something more to it.
was thinking of learning objective-c (objective-c==openstep?) but if i gotta buy some devkit from apple to get the full functionality and only be able to run stuff on OSX then i guess i wouldn't be bothered...
.o binary was compliant with the GPL), RMS contacted them to tell them it was in violation and they re-released it under the GPL.
Objective C != OpenStep.
Objective C is a programming language that adds OO style programming to C but with a philosophy closer to Smalltalk than to C++ (i.e. Java also has a Smalltalk-like philosophy but with C++ syntax), thus Objective C has got great merits on its own.
OpenStep use Objective C, so it integrates well with OpenStep, but you can use it without OpenStep.
By the way, Next made the Objective C front end for GCC, and first tried to release it in binary only (they thought that releasing the
I have also heard that Apple has got a compiler in which you can mix Objective C and C++, must be pretty cool.
I haven't used it personally so it is things I have heard about it in various tutorials/explanations/... When I get the time I definitively must check it (I'm checking Guile right now).
Anyway, for more informations see this.
"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." Bill Gates,
Actually, one of the nicest of TeX implementations was done for NeXTstep, TeXView.app (provided as an example in /NextDeveloper/Demos in NeXTstep) along with InstantTeX (originally by Dmitri Linde, later expanded upon by various individuals).
.pdf implementation is that it takes away ones ability to effortlessly extend (for example) a drawing application with (arbitrary) PostScript code and have said code render on-screen.
.pdfs for the unwashed masses. LyX, www.lyx.org looks very promishing for this sort of thing as well---though I hope someone 'stepifies the app---I want my vertical menus! support for services! etc.
Alan Hoenig, author of _TeX Unbound_ speaks highly of NeXTstep and the power of Display PostScript in his book and in articles in TugBoat (newsletter of the TeX User's Group, www.tug.org)
The problem with the
Hopefully, InstantTeX or some successor to it and TeXView will be available for GNUstep and will then make it trivial to provide
William
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.