While this is not part of the core Haiku development, we still feel it is important for our platform and our Haiku fans to report this news. We are excited to tell you that Haiku developer Michael Lotz is porting the open source Flash player Gnash to Haiku. This port is based on the latest Gnash 0.7.2 release, and uses the AGG rendering backend (which Haiku uses for its graphics system), and a native GUI.
With this article, I want to introduce you to some interesting facts about the new Icon format that Haiku is using. At first sight, they are just scalable vector icons, and Haiku is not the only operating system to have them. But the interesting bits are in the implementation details which should make Haiku stand out from the rest.
The first unique feature is that Haiku uses a special vector storage format, that has been specifically designed to store icons; we call it the Haiku Vector Icon Format, or HVIF for short.
Stippi's Icon Set The community has spoken, and as project leader Michael Phipps recently announced at WalterCon 2006, we have a winner for the Best Rated Icon Set Award: the honor goes to Stephan Assmus, for his Stippi icon set. Stippi came in first place with the highest average rating, closely followed in second place by the Honey, Zumi and Mc Clintock icon sets.
With the results of the open rating in hand, there is now work left towards creating the final icon guidelines.
BodySince I live in South Florida I had to take the opportunity to attend WalterCon 2006 since it was only three hours away in Orlando. My involvement in Haiku has not been tremendous at this point, but it and BeOS have always had a special place in my heart. I hoped attending the conference would bring back some of my passion for developing on Haiku. I'm glad to report this was the case.
WalterCon 2006 was held this past weekend in Orlando, Florida, and for those who have been waiting to know what it was all about, the wait is over. Jem Matzan of The Jem Report was at WalterCon, and he has written an interesting article on the conference that gives an overview of the event, and also makes some insightful observations as someone new to the project and the platform.
Work on the networking stack is making slow but steady progress. UDP and IPv4 protocols are mostly done, TCP can send out data, but receiving is not yet implemented.
Current work is concentrating on getting TCP ready, and to implement a network server. This server is responsible for configuring the stack when it's started, and to take over inetd services and similar things that can or even should live in userland.
Under the sponsorship of Google, BFS Team lead engineer Bruno Albuquerque is scheduled to give a Haiku-related lecture at the upcoming Encontro Mineiro de Software Livre 2006 (Minas Gerais Open Source Forum 2006) to be held on October 10, 11 and 12 at the Ouro Preto City Convention Center. Titled "Haiku OS -- Challenges of Creating an Operating System", the lecture will introduce Haiku with a focus on the technical challenges and the motivations behind the creation of the project.
September 23 was the last day of the rating period for the Haiku Icon Contest. We want to thank the authors of the great artistic work submitted to the contest, as well as those who took the time to rate the icons. Interest in the contest was very high, as reflected by the more than two thousand unique visitors that made their voice heard during the three week rating period.
Time is up for the Haiku Icon Contest submissions, and it is now everybody's chance to make their voice heard. Head over to the rating page, and tell us what you think about the fourteen gorgeous icon sets that were submitted to the contest. In the rating page you can view the icon sets side by side for comparison purposes, as well as preview each icon set on a virtual desktop.
We owe a long due recognition to a Haiku contributor who came up with some great ideas, implemented them, and turned them into much needed funding for our project. We are referring to Karl vom Dorff, creator of HaikuBounties.org, a website where contributors can make monetary donations for specific areas of development, and developers can take coding challenges in exchange for the donated bounties. Karl started HaikuBounties.org early this year, and through the course of just a few months, he was able to raise close to $2000!
