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SkyOS GUI Contest
SillyClown writes "Just saw this on OSNews.com. SkyOS (an alternative OS) is having a contest to replace their user interface. There are 30 or so designs, and the polls are open for voting. Check it out, help shape the future of SkyOS!"
for those of you who have no idea what SkyOS is(and I'm sure there are many), check out this page.
What I find the most interesting about it is that OpenGL and SDL are both ported, along with many of other GPL'd projects like MySQL.
The IT section color scheme sucks.
if you want Linux, you know where to find it.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
I'll be honest. I'm impressed with the amount of work already put in there. I wonder if ELF/COFF support means such binaries can be run if all those calls are supported in SkyOS.
Now I just hate to see yet another OS that attempts to replace BeOS out there... so SkyOS will have to have an extremely simple programming interface, hopefully all in ANSI C 99, and not too much graphical overhead (as in KDE and GNOME), and most importantly, a COMPLETE support of OpenGL 1.4 and soon OpenGL 2.0.
I've always wondered if it was possible to create a BeOS lookalike OS that can use the drivers source code from the linux kernel (or X11) to be able to fully use all those network adapters and graphic cards.That will give that OS a huge lead in development of drivers which is usually the stumbling block against many new OSes.
If SkyOS REALLY has a tiny footprint, complete hardware-backed OpenGL support and drivers for as many hardware as is supported in say OpenBSD and has apps like QT, SDL, mozilla, perl, MPlayer, xmms, svgalib etc, I think this OS has a real chance. I just think the BeOS niche is open for any OS for the taking, which can shed the enormous overhead involved in running for example Linux + X11 + graphics binary drivers + Mesa + qt + gtk+ + KDE. At least some developers appreciate the relative simplicity BeOS had and will develop for such an OS if free.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
in all reality most of these desktops look much like windows / mac / or some linux desktop currently in use like blackbox or E or something. Eye candy is kinda nice cause it sortof adds an actual desk to the 'desktop'. I guess I would probably add a file drawer and inbox / outbox on the side of the desk. Also it seems like you could go on with a more 'desktop' desk like look and feel. Kinda different, but more user firendly I'd think. If done right then you would add a 'media player' that looks like a radio on the desktop and make the whole desktop look like a virtual desk. Anyway it is not something that I have seen many people do. Yes it would be costly as it would be opengl and all 3d and lots of graphics, but what else do you do with all those cpu cycles ;-).
Only 'flamers' flame!
Does slashdot hate my posts?
Be Careful. The SkyOS leaders apparently don't understand the GPL or how it works.
Let's just say that there will be some evidence that comes to light soon that reasonably proves they're using GPL Linux Kernel code in their kernel without providing their kernel under GPL.
Don't believe me? Research a bit, if you know what you're doing it will become obvious very soon...
It's clear from their description that SkyOS is getting a considerable amount of help from the free software community--the list of features includes support for POSIX so GNU software can be used including the GNU compiler collection, GNU binutils, and GNU shell tools. But is SkyOS free software too? I looked around the website and could not find any clear indication SkyOS is free software.
I found Google cache of a license page clearly indicating this is proprietary software, but that page isn't being published on SkyOS' webserver anymore, so I'm not sure if it still applies. In light of this and because I could not find links for SkyOS' source code, I'm inclined to not recommend SkyOS (or any other non-free software).
Digital Citizen
That in and of itself is not a bad thing. Windows 95 was actually pretty nice in a lot of ways. DLL Hell and its instability made it a pain. Fix those issues, and Linux might never have taken off like it did...
Since Windows XP (and Longhorn) have moved away from the classic Win95 interface, why chuck it? Unless you just want a unique interface to establish SkyOs's identity. But hell, keep what works. The familiarity would attract a lot of users.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
From the parent poster's quote of the older SkyOs so-called End User License Agreement ("EULA"):
The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL) does not allow anyone distributing the covered software to withhold the complete corresponding source code of the program or to point somewhere else and essentially say "get it from them, not us". Perhaps Andrew Youll should spend some time reading the GNU GPL FAQ, if the license's text isn't sufficiently clear. Distributing binaries alone is insufficient for compliance with the GNU GPL. It doesn't matter if SkyOs comes with only a port of the applications or changes the software's feature set.
Youll's EULA demonstrates Youll is trying to place more restrictive terms on GPL-covered software than the GPL allows. His EULA suggests he is quite unclear on what the GNU GPL's terms are and how to work within them. But overall, it's sad that someone who draws value from the GNU project's contribution to their own work is being dealt with in such a manner. Leveraging one's rights is never "harass[ment]". The GNU GPL does not aim to make SkyOs free software (although SkyOs would do their users a favor by making the entire operating system free). Proprietors have successfully used and distributed GCC as their main compiler for years.
Digital Citizen
It's indeed a shame that SkyOS is closed source. This is the kind of project that would have hundreds of developers within weeks of it being GPL'd. I doubt that just one individual, working part time for six years (since 1997), could support USB and write a complete kernel and GUI without using the source code of others. The EULA posted in another comment seems to be an indirect admission that the kernel even includes Linux source code. We need someone to do a binary analysis of SkyOS to determine if any Linux kernel code has been borrowed illegally.
Since the CD is only $10, I would've bought it too, if I could read the kernel code and modify it under the GPL. I doubt it would be possible to get a wrapper for binary only drivers working without running the entire kernel, as these frequently use non-recommended access points into the kernel (modifying the system call table or something like that), but open source drivers could easily be ported, and a basic compatibility layer created to make it easier for nVidia and ATI to port their drivers.
Honestly, I don't think that an operating system has any business being closed source. It just makes much more sense for the core of a system to be open. I'm not opposed to using commercial applications on a free OS, but I want to be able to see and modify the core of my system (and yes, I do read and modify; I write my own drivers too). Operating systems are just better when they're open.
I will not use SkyOS until the possibility of GPL code copying is cleared up. Another benefit of OSS: infringements are easily identified and repaired once the complaining party reveals proof of the infringing code.
A solution to the problem with music today
KHTML strikes again! SkyKruzer, the SkyOS browser, is yet another port of the KHTML code. The KDE developers have done an amazingly great job with KHTML. That makes four browsers using the same rendering engine (Konqueror, Safari, and ABrowse from AtheOS are the others). All because the code was so easy to understand and port. Having this hugely complex, yet easy to understand and portable body of code out there is doing wonders for alternative OSes, since a nearly perfect browser is essential for an OS these days. Thank you KHTML team!
The freedom of a developer to charge for code is as much a freedom as the consumer's freedom to not buy code or the open source developer's freedom to give away their code. Bill Gates has every right to charge for XP(much as we might wish otherwise:), just as I have every right not to buy it. But if you take the decision to charge for code then you have to have a piece of code that is worth charging money for, or perhaps in some cases something that people are prepared to pay money for.
If they intend to make money from a closed source OS then I suspect they will be sorely disappointed. This OS looks quite nice but since it offers nothing that cant be found anywhere else where can it go? If I want to pay for an OS I'll go for one with application support, even if the one without only costs ten euros, and since there are free offerings out there that offer all this and more why should I want to pay in the first place?
Which leaves them with a few ten euro CD replication fees. Not much for that much work, is it? Surely an open source model would result in a distribution with far more value, with useful applications like OpenOffice.org which they could shift a load more of and quite legitimately get away with charging a bit more than 10 euros for CD copies.
However I could be missing a point and being unfair on the developer. Perhaps they do not view it as a revenue stream, instead using it to gain some other advantage. Since I write open software as much for the CV candy as the philanthropy (hey, you have to eat!) I can see why someone might do that.
Oxford Dictionaries Online
that page doesn't do much to explain what it is.
there are screenshots of skyos running photoshop and quicktime,
and in addition, there are icons for MS Internet Explorer, Adobe Acrobat, ICQ, and WinAMP.
i'd really like to think that the sole developer did this all on his own.
but it seems more likely that he hacked the hell out of win95 with help from cygwin,
violating the gpl and ms eula
(or perhaps linux and wine, violating just the gpl).
please prove me wrong!
hopefully the only violation here is the failure to release the ported code
to all those open source projects used, and that can be rectified.
there is no way all of those projects work seamlessly without any modification
...unless this is a win32 kernel.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
just rename it to SkyNet and set it free to take over the world!
1. SkyOS does not run Windows apps. Any Windows apps you have seen running in the GUI CONTEST are for imaginative design purposes only. Think of them as placeholders for generic software.
2. In regards to the EULA; the EULA was written by Robert (coder for SkyOS), whose main language is not English. He included the EULA in hopes that he could simply give some extra information about the OS, as well as to take a step towards legality (which we will of course encounter in the future). Youlle simply added some last minute touch ups to try to help out.
SkyOS is not open source. Robert has worked on the OS for 6 years. He wants to keep the code for himself to work on, and if you can't respect that, then go use Linux. The inclusion about the GPL aspects in the EULA was simply his attempt to make it known that just because some GPL'd apps were included in the SkyOS package, it did not make SkyOS open source. Any GPL'd code he modified he will gladly send to anyone that wants it (though I don't think he modified much). There is also unmodified software included, which was simply ported to the OS (the media player....a few other things I can't think of). Those you can simply download from their respective websites (which is the message he was trying to convey).
Robert holds the GPL in high regards and was never trying to augment it in any way. He simply wanted to make it known that the OS did not use GPL'd code, and that the simple inclusion of GPL'd software did not make the OS open source.
*PHEW*
3. The contest was open to everyone. 35 designers sent in designs, and I posted all of them. They are now being voted on. The top three will make it to round two. A winner will be decided from that list. After that, the GUI Team will be taking the design and polishing it up and getting it ready for Robert to code in. In addition to this, there will be new wallpapers, a new software installation interface, new icons, and a new OS installation interface. This will all be included for version 5.0 of SkyOS, which will be the next release.
If you have any questions, don't hesitate to visit the GUI Design Contest forum, located at:
http://www.nathanpalmer.com/skyos/phpBB2/index.php
Hope that helps!
Hexydes