There are lots of interesting desktop environments for X, other than the big two three GNOME, KDE, and Xfce. One of those is Etoile, a highly modular and leightweight environment based on GNUstep. Etoile is entirely project and document based, which means that you focus on your documents, and not on applications. Earlier this month – and we missed it, my apologies – the project released version 0.4.0.
They’re very clear about the intended audience of this 0.4.0 release. “As a developer-focussed release, this predominantly consists of frameworks,” they warn, “A few demonstration applications are also included. More will be added during the 0.4.x release series, leading to a user-focussed 0.5 release next year.” Th frameworks are numerous, and best described by the team members themselves in the release announcement.
The release can be downloaded from their download page. More information about the various components that make up Etoile is also available.
I’m glad somebody is using gnustep and extending it into a desktop environment
looks nice, too.
I assume it is not yet fully usable, but I wonder if this document-centric approach is a good idea? Cool initiative though, I’ll check it out sometime.
It does indeed look beautiful. I might well have a play with it, especially since there’s a live CD available.
But I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for a decent selection of native applications. Let alone applications that’ll do everything I require in a desktop OS.
Mixing in non-native applications from other desktop environments would render it virtually worthless.
Another interesting project that I fear will never turn into something that I can actually use.
it is a lot of fun to program for (using objective C), so native apps might be forthcoming – i know i plan on writing a bunch
http://osnews.com/story/20550/Etoile_0_4_Released
it looks just like this story
. unless i am missing something
I wanted to try out a Live CD but going to http://download.gna.org/etoile/ does not list a 0.4 Live CD. There is only 0.2 at the time of this writing unless I looked for the wrong label? There are references to 0.4 but none is an ISO and the file size is too small.
P.S. This story was already posted a few days ago.
Neither me succeded to get 0.4.0 iso… Well, since I’m not developer, I’ll wait to odd (intended for mere users) 0.5.0 release:)
I think it is “beautiful” in that it is flat and minimalistic. I like that.
However, the whole effect is ruined by Linux’s blurry, horribly-kerned font rendering.
When is somebody going to fix that?
are you reffering to the FreeType rendering in Linux? if so what is your primary concern? I have had no issues with it since redhar linux 8 came out sporting Gnome and teh Blue Curve theme
Opentype 1.5 was just added to FreeType CVS; and I won’t be surprised that when FreeType 2.3.8 is released such will be fully polished thus bringing FreeType fully current with the Opentype 1.5 specification.
I will say that GNUstep and Etoile haven’t been current with FreeType’s font system [though it looks like they’ve made great strides in Etoile], but I have to ask you show an example of what you mean by blurry, horribly-kerneled font rendering.
What version of FreeType do you have running on your system?
What Window Managers do you currently have running and which versions of the Toolkits do you have running for GNOME, KDE, Xfce, etc., do you have installed?
I’m looking forward to the Opentype 1.5 spec support for FreeType 2.3.8 and beyond. Then when XeTeX and other projects to make use of Unicode in TeX are fully mature it will make publishing even more of a dream with LaTeX/TeX/XeTeX using such solid tools as LyX 1.6.x, Kile 2.1.x, TeXMaker 1.8.x and more.
Edited 2008-12-01 23:14 UTC
Étoilé does differ from OpenStep in a number of ways, just judging from the screenshots. Menu bar on top, dock centred. Gee, I wonder where they thought of that.
My one fantasy wish is that future major releases of OS X will allow me to do either a dwrite or preference set to give me back my vertical floating, tear off windows.
This look very, very promising.
While KDE and Gnome folks battle wether blueish or brownish is the better theme (*duck*), this distro comes along with a completely new way to tackle the “problem” of making computers useable for humans. Better yet, the use of the GNUstep/OpenStep foundations obviously makes it a lot more efficient, without missing essential functionality.
The only thing I’m currently missing is some sort of integration with the major players. As most people will need Firefox, OpenOffice and such a like in the forseeable future, there should be some integration – either of Etoile in Gnome or KDE distros or of Gnome/KDE apps in Etoile.
I know you’re joking but brown is only an Ubuntu choice, not a Gnome choice.
I agree integration needs to be handled better. I hate it when I use a gnome app within etoile and as soon as I click on the gnome app poof my menubar disappears. It’d be awesome if they could hook into the gnome mac menu hack to make the gnome app stuff appear in the etoile menubar.