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GNUstep Project Gets New Chief Maintainer
stivi writes "OSNews is reporting that Gregory Casamento has accepted the position of GNUstep Maintainer. Adam Fedor, former GNUstep leader writes: 'After over 15 years of being the Chief Maintainer for GNUstep, I've found I have too many other responsibilities to devote as much time to GNUstep as is necessary. I still plan on contributing to GNUstep in the future in a lower capacity.' Gregory has been a prolific developer for GNUstep for the past seven years and is currently the maintainer for Gorm (the graphical interface designer) and the GUI library. I think he will make a great choice to lead GNUstep in the future. New plans for change have been set up already. Thank you Adam for the past, congratulations Gregory to the future."
seriously, who really cares or uses this?
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Hopefully we see GNUStep get some definitive direction to show the world that it's still alive. Most people think it's a legacy development tool kit which at one time was meant to replicate OpenStep, but is now dead, though that is not the case, but they need to let the world know they are alive. Also, they either need place nicer with the rest of the Linux/Unix desktops(Gnome or KDE) or either acknowledge that they are indeed their own little enviroment(the site still tries to pass it off as development libraries and tools)
You care enough to post.
The previous news item in this category was exactly 4 years ago. He could start by sending out more 'press releases'.
And... I think this dude is a complete moron. He types (on the page and in his blog) all this "business" speak gibberish which, in the end, means nothing. He says that he thinks KDE and Gnome are "amateurish" but doesn't bother to explain his reasoning behind the assertion. To me, this implies that he doesn't actually have a reason behind the assertion and that the whole silly blog is propaganda. I find his "business speak" patronising, transparent and meaningless. It may work for Microsoft, but propaganda does not work for the audience he is (supposed) to be targetting.
the 13 people who make up the entire userbase is totally excited about this.
was (and is), that few people realised how great the original NeXTStep environment - which GNUStep attempts to clone - was.
:-)
I was already around as a CS major at the time NeXTStep basically failed in the marketplace due to a) asinine marketing/pricing on the part of NeXT Inc. and b) the fact that everytime we showed the NeXTStep environment to fellow CS students and CS faculty, you would mostly get blank stares, and a few polite remarks. But no more.
Few "got it" how easy this was to use - concepts like the seperation of the user interface specification from the core logic of a program simply did not register with people weaned on TurboVision ("one line per code for each UI element"), and Apple has (probably rightfully so) more or less given up on educating people on how great the current successor to NeXTStep (Cocoa) is.
Nowadays, people code for OS X because OS X is seen as a hip system with a small but viable installed base, and the fact that the dev tools are extremely nice is just an added bonus.
So if GNUStep is just an Open Source version of something that is obsolete, why care at all?
Well, because the likes of KDE could have had it so much easier if they had used something like GNUStep (the structure of which is pretty revolutionary), instead of toolkits like QT, which were developed to be just a "better Win32" API.
Make no mistake, QT/KDE et al. turned out to *be* a better Win32/Foundation class environment, but I guess that most folks who were ever proficient in developing for the NeXT environment will agree, that a widely used and enhanced GNUStep would have been even more productive than that.
And still could be someday - after all, Linux desktops are such a melting pot of different toolkits and environments, that perhaps some "killer GNUStep apps" (graphics apps, like an Illustrator clone would be a good start) could get people to notice GNUStep again.
One can always dream...
Just my $0.2E-32
A.
Hmmm... Maybe he will work on some Linux distro? Perhaps a RedHat-based one?
what is useful about GNUstep? I read throw the Wikipedia article on it, and I got the impression that it is yet another GUI toolkit. So I am curious as to what makes it more useful in which situations: ie. where does it shine?
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
Their annoying usage of a top level conf dir ~/GNUStep (or whatever it is). No other app I've seen does such garbage, dot-dirs all ftw.
Well, having programmed in both, I'd take Objective-C over C++ any day. If you know C and an OO programming language, you can pick up Objective-C in a weekend. The same cannot be said of C++!
That said, I'm looking forward to automatic memory management being added to Objective-C.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
please keep your stupid shareware crap away from my systems.
sincerely,
anonymous coward
In 1985, Steve Jobs left Apple to found a new computer company. His company attracted many very talented individuals. They created the NeXT computer, a very advanced, very beautiful computer running a Unix-like operating system eventually called NeXTStep, which eventually became OSX.
I use NeXTStep as proof that Microsoft has set the computer industry back 12 years. NeXTStep used display postscript on both the video display, and for printing. It was fully-preemptive, with a clean, POSIX-compliant system interface. The application framework was extremely advanced, and extremely easy to code for. Using Objective-C as the programming language of choice, NeXTStep had some very advanced programs for the time, such as Lotus Improv, the spreadsheet MS-Excel wishes to become when it grows up.
As it is, MS-Windows still lags behind NeXTStep by a good amount, especially in terms of ease-of-development, ease-of-use, and aesthetics.
Tim Berners-Lee created the World Wide Web on a NeXT.
Anyway, when it became apparent that NeXT was not going to survive, they released a bunch of specifications that together made up the technical documentation for OpenStep, based on NeXTStep. The idea was that OS vendors could implement OpenStep APIs, and application vendors could target a single API for multiple OSs.
GnuStep is an implementation of the OpenStep API, and other programs to recreate the NeXT environment on any Unix-like operating system. Applications written for GnuStep can be recompiled to target OS X with little-to-no work.
Basically, when people say Linux needs an easy-to-use, easy-to-develop-for application environment and desktop, they are talking about GnuStep, whether they know it or not. It's not as flashy as GNOME or KDE, but it's much cleaner, easier to develop for, easier to use, and much more consistent. Where both GNOME and KDE try to be similar to MS-Windows, GnuStep tries to be like NeXTStep, the best application development and user desktop ever created.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
NeXT was bought out for $400 million. How can I make my business a "failure" like that?
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
it could go a long way to attracting Mac developers to Linux if they can accomplish ports of many Cocoa apps with simple recompiles.
And this is useful... why? What Cocoa apps would actually be of interest to Linux users and wouldn't be so tied into the Macintosh desktop that it would still be a lot of work to port?
A lot of the "big apps" are developed using various compatibility or wrapper libraries anyway (e.g., Skype, NeoOffice, Microsoft Office, AOL IM, Acrobat, Firefox, Thunderbird, Java, etc.)
was (and is), that few people realised how great the original NeXTStep environment - which GNUStep attempts to clone - was. [...] GNUStep (the structure of which is pretty revolutionary)
Neither GNUStep nor NeXTStep were "revolutionary"; almost all of the fundamental concepts and designs in those systems came from Smalltalk. They may have been better than C and Motif at the time, but they were still a poor imitation of Smalltalk.
Linux desktops are such a melting pot of different toolkits and environments,
I'm running Gnome right now, and there is not a single non-Gnome app running on my desktop or on my launchbar. I think KDE users have the same experience with KDE. The notion that Linux desktops are an inconsistent mix of different toolkits and interface styles is a myth.
And still could be someday - after all, that perhaps some "killer GNUStep apps" (graphics apps, like an Illustrator clone would be a good start) could get people to notice GNUStep again.
There are several Illustrator clones for Gnome and KDE; what makes you think that GNUStep can deliver something that is better in any way?
Nowadays, people code for OS X because OS X is seen as a hip system with a small but viable installed base, and the fact that the dev tools are extremely nice is just an added bonus.
It sounds to me like you haven't tried modern development tools. I have done some apps in XCode and Objective-C, and I very much prefer Glade+Python, Eclipse, and Monodevelop. As far as I'm concerned, Apple is way behind on development tools, and even their upcoming update isn't going to fix that.
"GnuStep tries to be like NeXTStep, the best application development and user desktop ever created."
I'd say one of the best. Open Genera and the Amiga were pretty powerful for their time.
Well, to be more accurate, they cared about NeXT enough to base OSX off of it. GNUstep is the most API-compatible option that can run on alternative platforms. Of course, its not because of the API that it is so interesting as a desktop platform, and developers and users have come to appreciate it in OSX.
.nfonts). Also GNUstep could probably accomodate more of the freedesktop specification than they currently do, however I do recognize that freedesktop specifications pretty much have the MS way of doing things in mind and therefore some things aren't appropriate for GNUstep. Also, GNUstep doesn't have a perfect window manager to use with it. WindowMaker is very good, but doesn't render menus/dock in a way that is guaranteed to be visually consistant with GNUstep. WindowMaker is probably the best effort to focus on moving forward, but there is work to be done.
The two main open desktop projects (GNOME and KDE) heavily mimick the user interface paradigm established by MS. GNUstep is a good complement with the NeXT (also OSX) user interface paradigm (separate menu, management of windows individually and by application, applications registering services for more complex/powerful gui actions than what is done by drag/drop, copy/paste, etc).
GNUstep/NeXT/OSX services are the only appropriate equivalent of command line pipes in GUI land, which makes it a highly logical fit for those who understand the beauty and power of pipes in *nix. For example, in Gnome/KDE if an application wants spell check, they need to implement it themselves or at least take in a library and hook things around it. In GNUstep, any text application I can highlight something, click services/spell check if I have a spell check app installed, and it will happen. People complained for a long time about browsers not having spellcheck, but with services implemented and used browsers would have had it for free. It's kinda like piping the output from some command into aspell. All kinds of interesting things have been done with services, and someone implementing something new and different ends up enhancing all the desktop software that is appropriate for it without extra effort.
I have used GNUstep many a time to see how they are going, and if the environment were more complete (i.e. a GNUstep web browser, and IM client, office software) I would use it as my desktop full time. I remember before gcc had objc++ and before gnustep & gorm had nib support, that those two barriers going away was expected to allow all kinds of wonderful porting from OSX (i.e. the OSX Firefox code, one of their IM clients, whatever else). I haven't seen any word on efforts since those developments. I would love to contribute, but my plate is too full.
The downside is that in GNUstep more so than KDE/Gnome, non-native applications are really jarring, without separate menu and not interfacing with services. WindowMaker does a good job grouping windows by application for application hiding, but it isn't enough. Also GNUstep is capable of doing a lot, but fonts, for example, are a pain in the ass (at last check with the decent backend with anti-aliasing you had to package fonts in
If you work it, GNUstep is a lot further along than most people realize, but the fact you have to work hard to get a complete environment discourages new users. And even when all is said and done, things are a bit rough around the edges in spots...
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
But is it merely trying to get Mac apps to compile and run, or actually duplicate the whole user interface paradigm? Honestly speaking, the ability to simply run Mac apps isn't exciting, for the most part we already have good equivalents. It is appealing to use those projects under GNUstep because they were designed with that sort of user interface in mind unlike GTK/QT apps, but the applications in and of themselves have no features not implemented in the counterparts.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
So if you want to port to GNUstep don't use Carbon / QuickTime / CoreBlah stuff in your application. Also keep in mind that GNUstep has a certain lag when it comes to the latest features of Cocoa since the GNUsteppers always have to keep up with Apple (and since Apple NDAs new features GNUstep learns about those at earliest when Apple releases a new Version of OS X). Thats the reason they announce only: "Applications written for GnuStep can be recompiled to target OS X with little-to-no work."
Sexiness. It isn't at the moment.
It needs users to go "wow I want that" and for developers to go "wow I want to do that". Take a lesson from Apple and Microsoft here, make it look and sound good.
Deleted
I've been casually flollowing the etoile development, and I've even gone so far as to (mostly successfully) build GNUStep and Etoile on my OS X-running Powerbook. It's clear that GNUStep has made some strides in recent times. Etoile seems to be proving that there are some with a vision of what a GNUStep *platform* could be. All in all, pretty exciting stuff.
./configure, make, make install... I'd like to see someone pick a reference platform and target it for continuous integration that closely tracks Etoile and GNUStep development. My personal favorite would be some kind of BSD, however, I'm a pragmatist and realize that Ubuntu is probably the logical choice for such a task given its ubiquity and its history of eventually making 1st class citizens of derivatives (kubuntu, edubuntu, xubuntu, etc).
The catch is, that integrating this stuff is a bit more work than your average
Fact is, I think that we'd start seeing more apps show up for GNUStep if we had a supported reference platform. You know, give developers some place where they could port their apps over from Mac OS X in peace without having to worry about spending "hacking day" compiling software rather than writing it.
. Penguins Surely Ca
GNUstep have been around OVER FIFTEEN YEARS. Since then both KDE and then GNOME have come out with desktops that ship default on most Linux distros and have been doing so for the longest time. The GNUsteppers still can't get a single setup to work.
They're such a mess, and most of their code was written by Paul Kunz anyway - not by them. This Casamento blowhard still hasn't got Interface Builder working. Heck, they've only had over FIFTEEN YEARS! LOL And Kunz has since ported HippoDraw to C++ where he evidently likes it better. And considering the unproductive bombastic types at GNUstep, who wouldn't?
Hanging out with GNUsteppers is bad for your spirit, bad for your health, and very bad for your reputation.
When I moved to C++ about 20 years ago, I had a very good book called something like "From C to C++" which outlined the basic bottlenecks/problems etc in C one at a time and then showed how C++ could be used to overcome them.
I remember starting work on Monday fired up with my shiney new C++ knowledge and was really able to push the project I was working on to a new level. It took about a week to convert the project to compile with C++ (sans classes) and then another week to make a big step forward by encapsulating some of the code into classes.
--I thought I was wrong once, but I was mistaken.
"When you partially drag the window off the right, then left-side scrollbars are more useful. When you partially drag it off the left, then right-side scrollbars are more useful. Result: this is not a deciding factor."
It is if you're the majority, whom is right-handed.