SkyOS now has more GTK+ applications to enrich its application base: Gaim and Sylpheed-Claws being the latest ports. The project also made available a beta for their upcoming Software Store. Elsewhere, the SkyOS Monthly newsletter has been released with articles about SkyFS/BeFS and the chances of SkyOS succeeding as a business.
SkyOS Gets Deeper into GTK+; SkyNews Monthly July Available
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
this os has such a great future ahead of it!
The best part of this post was not even mentioned in the osnews writeup. In the linked SkyOS Monthly your very own Eugenia Loli-Queru gave a great interview about her perceptions of SkyOS.
In the newsletter it mentions using cygwin and an SDK under windows to develop apps for SKYOS. Is it possible to write, compile and run SKYOS apps under SKYOS, or do you need to run another OS as well to do that?
Whatever your thoughts are on SkyOS, you can’t deny the fact that this OS is progressing incredibly fast.
What sort of office productivity apps (i.e.: MS Office) are available? I see on the website that AbiWord has been ported, the interface of which is great; however, I’ve found its support of Office file formats *sorely* lacking.
It’s looking pretty good so far, though, all things considered…
I would rather see the apps coming out as native SkyGI apps rather than GTK+ ported ones, which breaks the overall UI of the system. A basic email client integrated along side the new SkyFS/BeFS would do more to show off what SkyOS can do.
If I had more free time I’d like to do a SkyGI front-end in C#/dotGNU (recently ported). If anyone else has the time and energy and wants to get involved, I recommend talking to Robert about it 🙂
I sadly don’t see SkyOS going anywhere, it is merely a hobby OS that costs money, I do not see it really going anywhere. Marketshare is important and I don’t see it filling any hole available. btw, I did read the SkyOS Monthly. I tried it out and was not impressed in the least bit, it didn’t seem to offer me anything I hadn’t seen before. I also don’t like its proprietary nature. Don’t take this as me completely bashing SkyOS, I am in favor of it trying, and I like to see people doing things like this, I just am skeptical of its capabilities in the real world.
The article seems pretty negative regarding the future of SkyOS as a viable business, but I am a little bit more optimistic. It is true that Be tried and failed with a more innovative system, but times change – the feeling of dissatisfaction with Microsoft is stronger now, and the awareness of the fact there might be alternatives out there has improved, mainly thanks to the success of Linux. The market of those who will run another OS simply because it isn’t Microsoft is still relatively tiny, yet it might be big enough to support a small, lean enterprise with low overheads and no illusions of grandeur. I certainly intend to buy a copy of SkyOS when it is a little more useable – you guessed it, just because it isn’t Microsoft. BTW, I do not think of myself as a fanatic. Since I do not agree with the ways that company treats both competitors and its own customers, I see nothing wrong with voting with my wallet – isn’t that what free market is supposed to be about?
We will eventually be moving these applications off of GTK and over to native ports. However, this takes a large amount of time and effort, and we have a number of things to accomplish before this.
As soon as there’s a native IDE for C#/.NET in SkyOS I intend to churn out applications after learning some things about SkyFS and SkyGI. And I agree with Andrew that alternative OS’es has a bright future. I’ve got the feeling that it will become more common with alternative OS’es in the coming years, and SkyOS is one of the choices that makes sense. Longhorn will become a big brute of an OS, demanding lots from your hardware, and Linux is STILL not a preferred choice to most.
I made a post in the syllable-topic (post #72) about various aspects of Alternative OS’es and why SkyOS, Syllable and the others have a fair chance of getting a userbase.
If its easier to port software from GTK, and faster, why would someone build an app with SkyAPI? (dont know if thats the name, pardon me if im wrong).
From the moment the toolkit is ported (in this case GTK+), it is vastly faster/easier to simply port apps that only depend on GTK+, than rewritting them from scratch. It took years to these Gaim devs developing Gaim, do you think that a single SkyOS developer would do it faster? No. It’s faster to port it.
Its not a dumb question. The answer should be yes but I doubt it. That would mean that they are shipping there own GCC due to the fact that they are using PE as the file format…..unless they have support for loading Win32 apps and can run Cygwin under SkyOS. SkyOS is going to have a hard time winning me over until you can really go dogfood with it. I can at least build ReactOS on ReactOS and have been able to for over a year.
Also, for those of you who just want the screenshot, here is a direct link to the picture.
http://www.skyos.org/images/gaim.png
GCC/Binutils were broken in the last betas, but they are working for beta8 again. Additionally, you will be able to develop in C# (no GUI bindings yet).
And yes, GCC running on SkyOS generates .PE executables.
I’m looking forward to see some new OS’s around, I would like SkyOS to fly but there is only a few people working on it… yet I wish them the best, hope they do some innovative work in the OS scene because I’m really tired of these 2 “giants” that try to manipulate everyone either with business strategies or zealotry.
Yet I think it will still take some time to new OS’s fly, I guess that’s because making a OS is one of the hardest things in the world, I think a single person can build a car from scratch faster than a group of 1000 person can build a OS.
So, in my view, innovating OS’s will only show up when programming itself innovates, kinda like it has the jump from Assembly to C, a jump from C to something else that enables creating of applications and OS’s way faster and with much less code, debugging, and low level stuff.
Another thing I was forgoting in the future OS’s, no one knows how it will be, yet I’m sure it will follow the future of the computer, so the future of the OS’s can’t ignore the future of the computer, so and once again the innovating OS’s will also show up only when computer itself innovates, not in the sense of adding more speed to the processor or more RAM, but innovate to some thing diffrent. Of course the innovation in the OS’s field could be the driven force in the evolution of the computers but I think the reverse is more like it.
Finally with computer innovation I’m not meaning direct brain connections or something like it, that scares me and I would never use it…. Isn’t this out of topic??
Well I guess i got a bit carried away… well report abuse then! o.O
” I think a single person can build a car from scratch faster than a group of 1000 person can build a OS.”
That’s not quite right. Just because MS makes a gargantuan OS with hundreds of megs of extras doesn’t mean that a different OS has to take a million hours to create. Sure, it’s not easy by any means, but the belief that OS’es are purely made by enormous teams of programmers, designers etc. isn’t a fact, just the way MS is doing it.
Sorry I was not aware that it had worked in the past. So I assume you have your own patches to gcc then? Is there a website where patches might be posted?
Interesting articles… Just one thing though: I think the most important thing is not the quality (ie.: innovations,…) of the OS, but rather the quality and *innovation* of its applications.
Leo.
From the newsletter:
“There actually is a market out there that consists of people who hate Microsoft and want an alternative, but Linux is too difficult and Macs are too expensive. It’s a very specific market, but it’s a foot in the door.”
“To expand beyond the cheap and ignorant anti-Microsoft troll market will take some marketing magic.”
(Italics mine.)
This is not a troll or flame but just a tip: if you want to expand you might not want your ‘marketing magic’ to consist of alienating the tiny niche market you may have by calling them ‘cheap and ignorant trolls’ and destroying your niche before you can even expand beyond it. I sincerely hope that newsletter is produced by over-enthusiastic fans and is not endorsed by the company itself, but it looks to be an official thing.
Sincerely,
An apparently cheap and knowledgeable anti-Microsoft troll.
I am a strong SkyOS supporter however I don’t like the fact that they are starting to mess with GTK. It’s just that, it’s so inconsistent with the UI. I hope they do something similar like the QT-GTK rendering engine, GTK apps being rendered as QT. I don’t like just another theme that makes GTK app look like SkyOS widgets, I’d rather see GTK apps being rendered as SkyOS widgets. It would be more consistent then just using a SkyOS theme/style.
A GTK theme that matches WindUI is in the making.
Wonna add, something similar is done with Windows. When you use GIMP2 for example, the GIMP for its widgets can inherit the current style being used on Windows. So GIMP2 looks like a Windows program.
Yeah, I was a little hesitant about including that line. I mostly just wanted to express that it was a rather volatile user market with many oportunities for flamewars. I’ll probably reword it when I get a chance.
I sincerely hope that newsletter is produced by over-enthusiastic fans and is not endorsed by the company itself, but it looks to be an official thing.
It’s not an official thing. I’ts written by the community.
And, I don’t think DirectEdition (the author of that piece) did anything wrong. There is a group of “cheap and ignorant anti-Microsoft trolls”. Like it or not, they exist, and they are abundant.
But, then again, my definiton of a cheap troll is pretty wide. People using “$” when speaking about Microsoft are already cheap and ignorant trolls to me.
Thanks Thom for your response. That’s a good news but lets say the user changes the SkyOS theme, will the GTK theme automatically update itself to match the new SkyOS theme? You see where I am going? It should be more then just a theme, it should call up SkyOS’s rendering engine and update itself just like in Windows or the QT-GTK example.
Okay, just to have it said:
SkyNews Monthly, the eXpert Zone, SkyPool, etc are in no way affiliated with the SkyOS Team and are individual projects by users and enthusiasts of SkyOS.
I should put up a larger disclaimer on the site.
“SkyNews Monthly, the eXpert Zone, SkyPool, etc are in no way affiliated with the SkyOS Team and are individual projects by users and enthusiasts of SkyOS.”
yeah they are individual projects, well eXpert Zone is more of a gathering of veteran skyOS followers / users.
Yes, this is exactely what the GTK/SkyOS theme will do. As you may or may not know, SkyGI is very themeable. The GTK theme will use the same theme interface which “native” SkyGI control are using. As soon as you switch to a different theme, GTK apps will be informed about this like all other apps, and they will immediatley redraw/reshape themeself using the new theme.
It is true that Be tried and failed with a more innovative system, but times change – the feeling of dissatisfaction with Microsoft is stronger now
Is it really? I feel that people in general are more satisfied with Microsoft right now than what they were back in the 90’s. And the simple reason for that is WinNT. The DOS and Win/9x line were simply terrible and people hated them with a passion. But few people were aware of any alternatives.
WinXP is not perfect, but good enough to keep most people from complaining about it.
I’m not sure where GTK is really promoted. It’s used as a temporary solution in SkyOS is otherwise shunned.
GTK was used instead of QT at least on SkyOS because it would make porting GIMP, Abiword, and Gaim easier.
any intense to make skyos more video editing friendly than linux?
I would like to see an easy to handle graphik sound driver setup, under linux it had cost me more than 3 days top configure my soudncards, and they never did run well, especially 2 soundsources at once.
If someone could port Virtualdubmod, xvid, eac dvd2avi and all this stuff with firefox on top many people will be happy
Setting your soundcard up is a simple one-click operation.
As for video editing, I’m not sure. The best bet I see for now is porting Blender and using their compositing engine.
…I wish there WAS, don’t get me wrong, but when you have 100 flavors of Linux or BSD floating around out there (free) that run on almost every kind of hardware and are getting easier and easier to install and configure almost daily, I don’t see ANY other operating system being able to get a real foothold.
Linux GUIs improve in usability and attractiveness every passing year, more and more productivity applications appear and the existing ones are being steadily perfected… I don’t know. I was never a linux/bsd/unix-like fan, but I have to admit it is becoming very impressive and even with a slick new OS like SkyOS coming along rapidly, it just might be too late.
Mike
I have to say, the SkyOS GUI is really nice! Tis very Mac OS X like which is good. If only there was a Linux DE that was as slick as the SkyOS one. I’m a Mac guy and I’d never switch back to x86 but SkyOS looks pretty sweet. Well done!
Yes, this is exactely what the GTK/SkyOS theme will do. As you may or may not know, SkyGI is very themeable. The GTK theme will use the same theme interface which “native” SkyGI control are using. As soon as you switch to a different theme, GTK apps will be informed about this like all other apps, and they will immediatley redraw/reshape themeself using the new theme.
That’s excellent! Thanks for that reply Robert.
“And, I don’t think DirectEdition (the author of that piece) did anything wrong. There is a group of “cheap and ignorant anti-Microsoft trolls”. Like it or not, they exist, and they are abundant.”
It’s a bit late for this but I just wanted to clarify that they absolutely do exist and I think that was an excellent analysis of SkyOS’s early toehold in the market – just that it might not be the best salesmanship to be quite so blunt about it.
And thanks, James Smyth, for the clarification about who was what. I’ve followed SkyOS with some casual interest but I’m not familiar with details of the business and community.
“What made BFS so remarkable was that it was revolutionary type of filesystem called a ‘databasing filesystem’. I’m not confident that they were the first databasing filesystem (there’s a part of me saying OS/390, but I’m not really sure…) But it was certainly the first databasing filesystem with any popularity.”
You’re wrong! Such “databasing filesystem” was in OS/2 – HPFS filesystem supported “extended file attributes”. They was supported in FAT filesystems too (when running under OS/2, of course) by storing these attributes in database file (“ea data.sf”).
Believe me, there’s plenty of people that’s NOT the least interested in running Linux for all sorts of reasons. I am one of them. I’ve installed and experimented with various packages and distros and the conclusion is that I don’t like it. It’s a personal preference.
While Linux is still based on technology from the 70’ies and upgraded through an enormous patchwork, the SkyOS core is completely written from scratch, not based on old *nix-heuristics. In my eyes, that’s a plus. What I’m trying to say is that Linux still feels like a unix shell with a GUI on top, a patch work. Therefore I think there’s plenty of space for an OS like SkyOS to gain in popularity once it has taken off.
* ps. not trying to flame linux, just expressing my personal preference. *
What I’m trying to say is that Linux still feels like a unix shell with a GUI on top, a patch work. Therefore I think there’s plenty of space for an OS like SkyOS to gain in popularity once it has taken off.
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you are unnecessarily flaming other OS. if you like skyos and can use it fine. linux is based on unix standards for compatibility. thats the reason for its success. somehow creating everything from scratch doesnt make it automatically good and you have to work towards compatibility with other stuff anyway. look at how much of usable apps in skyos have linux origins. almost every operating system can and makes use of such code. skyos might be a good os on its own right technically but dont fool yourself into thinking that it will succeed just because of that. remember the dead beos?
I say again that my intention was not to flame linux or it’s users in any way, I stated my personal feelings without any malign thought in my mind, but I can see that someone would find it offensive. Still, I’m not wrong in saying Linux is a shell with a GUI (or several) on top. And I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, it’s just not for me. And yes, SkyOS is currently using ported Apps and parts from other OS’es like linux, BeOS etc. but that’s mainly because the current development environment is limited. Those things will change as things come together.
And yes, I remember BeOS, which is still living through Haiku etc. and it’s filesystem that is partly used by SkyOS.
When SkyOS v5 goes live we’re going to see more and more native applications turn up which is always a good thing.
remember the dead beos?
First of all, BeOS is far from dead (hell, it’s the only OS I use). Take a closer look at bebits and bezip and yellowtab and Haiku before making such a bold statement
Outdated? Yes. Dead? Far from it.
Secondly, the applications we use for SkyOS aren’t “From Linux”. That’s a 100% nonsense statement. Apps like AbiWord and GAIM aren’t created soley for Linux, they are available for Windows, QNX, xBSD and so on.
Outdated? Yes. Dead? Far from it.
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i know. i meant dead as it development of it which has sold to palm os. open source work alikes arent the same as the original effort
Secondly, the applications we use for SkyOS aren’t “From Linux”. That’s a 100% nonsense statement.
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of course they have been ported. they were developed originally for linux and only linux. all of these development have linux origins.
it isnt nonsense at all. ask any of the gtk+,gaim or abiword developers what their primary target platform is.
If you’re gonna quote me, please use my complete quote:
Secondly, the applications we use for SkyOS aren’t “From Linux”. That’s a 100% nonsense statement. Apps like AbiWord and GAIM aren’t created soley for Linux, they are available for Windows, QNX, xBSD and so on.
These apps are created for the sake of creating an app; the only reason they seem to be created “for Linux” is because Linux is at this point the most popular. But if QNX were to gain more momentum….
>These apps are created for the sake of creating an app; the only
>reason they seem to be created “for Linux” is because Linux is at this
>point the most popular. But if QNX were to gain more momentum….
You are wrong.
Abiword an GAIM where created FOR / UNDER Gnu/Linux (Gnome) and where ported to other OS’s because of their Nature. Just like the guys from SkyOS took them to make SkyOS more usable without having to worry about licenses that have to paid. That is the advantage you have with Free Software you are free to use it. Problem with SKyOS is that it is not FREE and therefore i find it very strange they port FREE software without making their own OS freely available. Smells fishy. Anyway if SkyOS will not become FREE it will not stand a chance on the desktop. What does it offer that Windows does not offer? What does Windows offer wich SkyOS not offer? right a whole lot.
ps. i compare to Windows because that is the crowd SKyOS is targeting at and because of is commercial nature.
re: development:
technically yes most are from linux but not all OpenTTD is from Win32.
re: thom:
SkyOS is aiming for users who are fed up of windows but dont want to drive into the ever increasin number of *nix distro’s appearing, i myself use SuSE, WinXP, and a whole range of alternative Oses, but when i first started looking for an Os other than Windows, i saw linux and stayed clear for a while, reason? it just looked too complicated at first.
technically yes most are from linux but not all OpenTTD is from Win32.
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i never said it was all. i said many of them have linux origins so dont bash linux just because you can use these programs in windows or skyos
These apps are created for the sake of creating an app; the only reason they seem to be created “for Linux” is because Linux is at this point the most popular. But if QNX were to gain more momentum….
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regardless they are created for linux now. gtk+ is maintained by redhat. gcc has linux developers sponsporing. so is gaim and abiword. same goes for khtml. who cares about theorotical possibility of qnx being popular. its a embedded OS and doesnt compare to skyos by any means
have i ever bashed linux? i myself am a linux user, only been using it for about 1yr mind.
SkyOS has some intriguing potential from the many write-ups that have been available.
However, I’ve continuously noted that the downloads are unavailable, and they are ‘out of stock’ for the purchase.
This has been so since I first visited the SkyOS site a few months ago.
It would be very helpful to be able to download/obtain it and give it a test drive.
“ps. i compare to Windows because that is the crowd SKyOS is targeting at and because of is commercial nature.”
I bet you’ve never paid a license for applications that use the shareware format. Or any software at all for that matter. What makes an OS a different beast? Just because Linus decided to make Linux Open Source doesn’t mean EVERYTHING must be Open Source to be approved of.
Some people just can’t afford to spend thousands of hours programming something and then give it away for free. Hardware costs money, and I bet most manufacturer won’t send free hardware to creators of small alternative OS’es, they have to buy the stuff. In this case SkyOS costs $30 which afaik is spent on new hardware etc.
And seriously, what they do with the money isn’t important, what IS important is that my money is spent for something I will use. And $30 for something like SkyOS is ok in my eyes.
Sorry, didn’t mean to go on a rant, but I’m kinda tired of the whole OSS-ideology bashing something like SkyOS.