Paul Manias of the Athene project sent word to us that Rocklyte Systems is seeking beta testers. Candidates must be running a Linux system with at least a 2.4 series kernel and have 5 or more years of technical computing experience. Testing is to be focused on the new graphics system that replaces X11. Please introduce yourself to pmanias@rocklyte.com to apply.
Athene Seeking Beta Testers
About The Author
Adam Scheinberg
Vice President, Information Technology at Massey Services, Inc • President, Board Member, The Mockingbird Foundation • All Things Web, Umphrey’s McGee • Web Developer • Father • Foodie • Music Snob • OS enthusiast
Follow me on Twitter @sethadam1
href://www.rocklyte.com
sorry, wrong link…
Sorry, fixed…
proper HTML is a Good Thing (TM)
They talk on their website about using SciTechs SNAP graphics system enabling Athene to replace X11. SciTech says that it supports fully accelerated graphics on 180 different graphics cards. Does this mean that it also does 3D acceleration ?
SciTech also has a GLDirect prodcut which allows for the use of OpenGL applications using DirectX libraries from Microsoft…will their linux version also support OpenGL, seeing that existing linux graphics stuff is based on OpenGL….?
If they ported over the QT and GTK2/GTK+ libraries, we might be able to use this software to run linux apps without X11…an interesting thought….
quote
We do not distrubute all of the source code, but the components which we deem to be helpful to third-party developers and which do not risk the dilution of our intellectual property are available to you at no charge. Approximately 70% of the source code is currently available to the public.
/quote
Third-party developer, that means you. To replace X with a closed source product ? Well, good luck.
replace X ? don’t think so…
replace X with non-GNU/non-GPL stuff ? thanks, but NO, thanks !!!
X is *much* more than a graphics system. Were that the case, directfb would already have replaced it.
For example KDE makes use of XAtoms and ICE for IPC because they don’t want to reinvent too many wheels. Presumably Gnome uses those services as well.
X also provides high level clipboard and drag-n-drop services, and more.
I don’t think X will be replaced by just a graphics system.
Mac OS X isnt doing too bad… Don’t forget, business will drive the adoption of technologies, not single users who like to hack away on stuff.
PicoGui did a new release today, it shows a lot of promise. It can operate on top of X as well, it doesn’t bother with display driver stuff
http://rocklyte.com/athene/faq.html#G4
http://rocklyte.com/athene/faq.html#D4
In future, read in the FAQ right before you ask anything.
I don’t see anything on the website or in the FAQ about running apps from another computer on your desktop. If it doesn’t support this most basic functionality of X, then it is definately a step down.
If “from version 1.2.2, Athene is no longer capable of supporting X11 applications”, how can you “force Athene to run within foreign window managers, for example KDE or GNOME”???
The only way this makes sense is if KDE or Gnome is recompiled for Athene, since they are dependant on X.
ouch, man oh man, what did I say….;)
I was interested in more specifics about the underlying system. I was fully aware of the whole GPL issue-and of how propietary this whole thing is, but that does not preclude my interest in the specs. Also the issue abouting porting over GTK+/GTK2 and QT is interesting because it my someday be possible to run my favorite linux GUI apps in another OS environment, perhaps even atop winbloze(just a thought, not that I should dare desire such)
bsdrocks:
I did read the FAQ and it contains no details whatsoever, in fact the entire website is basically empty as regards the nittty-gritty details…If you read my post, you wuld see that the questions I asked were not answered in the FAQ.-I was hping someone in these forums might be able to answer these questions.
I did read the FAQ and it contains no details whatsoever, in fact the entire website is basically empty as regards the nittty-gritty details…If you read my post, you wuld see that the questions I asked were not answered in the FAQ.-I was hping someone in these forums might be able to answer these questions.
Two questions are answered in the FAQ, but not the third one. 😉
SciTech has released much of the src to its SciTech SNAP Technology under a dual-license structure (Proprietary and GPL). To date this includes the SNAP SDK and will soon include the complete SciTech SNAP DDK. Documentation to the SDK is also currently available on the website.
Absent from these releases are the driver src as they were developed under strict NDA’s with the various HW manufacturers. Once the SciTech SNAP DDK is released developers will be able to write complete SNAP drivers – provided they have the appropriate chip level information.
Can someone clarify the usage of the term OS here? I was under the impression that an Operating System doesn’t actually need another Operating system running. Yet Athena implies that it needs Linux or Windows to run.
From the comments, it looks like people think XFree86 is GPL. You guys should look a little more closely…
bsdrocks,
Two questions are answered in the FAQ, but not the third one. 😉
no, not in the detail I was looking for….
Is there a difference between the quality of the fonts in the commercial version of X11 (website x.org) and the free one (website xfree86.org)? Or is the exactly the same?
Where the announcement reads “… replacing X11” some of you have taken that out of context. What it means is “… replacing Athene’s use of X11”, i.e. the introduction of SNAP now means that X no longer figures in the commercial direction of the project.
As to what is and isn’t in the FAQ, the FAQ responds only to frequently asked questions. In other words if no-one asks the question, obviously it won’t be appearing in the FAQ (doh!) %-)
My view to your query is as follows.
I don’t really know much about OSes but I’ll try to answer your question.
The short answer is, I see Athene on Linux like Windows 95 on DOS.
Normally, a user environment to be called an OS, it must communicate directly with the hardware and do things on its own and not rely on the subsystem it’s using. As far as I know however, any graphical user environment relies on a subsystem most likely a command line. For example, X11 relies on the Linux/Unix subsystem which is an OS, Windows 95 relies on the DOS subsystem which is an OS. If they make Athene powerful enough to have nothing to do with the underlying subsystem so they make Athene take total control of the computer and do things on its own, perhaps it can be called an OS. At this stage, I don’t see it as an OS.
Even if the windowing system runs for instance Windows, Mac and OS/2 apps (take X11 for example, it can run Windows programs), it doesn’t make it an OS. It is a windowing environment that provides GUI.
If Athene uses Unix/Linux functions to connect to the net instead of its own ones that work on Athene, I wouldnt call it an OS. Id they use the Unix/Linux little apps to set up a network, I wouldn’t call it an OS. However, when it comes to 3D accelerated graphics, I see it differently because it does itself and would have nothing to do with the subsystem.
If I have made a mistake in my post above and if anyone disagrees with me, don’t flame me but correct me please.
This system is closed source, reading their reasons I can fallow their logic but I also found it less than sound.
They state that they do not want to wind up competing directly with someone that picks up their product on a GPL and decides to go into competition with them.
When and if this OS becomes a hit what is to stop an open source movement from covering them anyway. An open source effort can well do in a year or two what took them five years to do closed and without outside assistance. This brings up the second problem in their logic, working closed source created another problem for them – cost it already has cost them many times as much to get to this point than an open source project would have. The extra costs will not end here, I will give an open source project my time but a close source project must give me something of real value for my time (not just a piece of iffy software). Next comes promotion – again I go out of my way to test and use open
source (I like to look under the hood) but commercial software has to sell itself to me on its own. Until I am sold on the software I will not recommend or offer it to anyone else. Linux is pushed by hundreds of companies now not just one. Now true the rewards can be larger ie.. be the next Microsoft the risks are much greater ie.. be clobbered by MS if your software is good. Which brings up the final error in their logic — close source makes a perfect target for Bill Gates. When MS notices you they know that buying or taking you out will remove your software from the market.
I wish them luck but don’t hold out much hope for this particular OS itself.
Oh shut the hell up already! X11 is an ancient beast that needs to be replaced as soon as possible. So what if Athene is only 70% opensource? That 30% is propietary drivers. SAME THING ON X11! Do you see the source for nVidia’s drivers? No. But you probably use it. Do you see the source for ATIs drivers? I dont think so. Not for the latest chipsets anyway.
Give it a freaking chance before you stomp it into the ground and spit on it – there is no way it can be worse than X11.
Yes, X11 is old, but it wont be replaced for the obvious reason that not very many developers wants it to be replaced. If it aint broke….
Sure you can argue that it is indeed broken and quite a bunch of patchwork, and i do feel sorry for the poor people who have to actually write code using it, but luckily almost everyone can simply use libraries that abstract those problems away, (Qt, GTK, etc) and i can’t see why the state of the code would matter to anyone but the people working on it.
The good thing about keeping it is that it is compatible with virtually all unix systems with an X11 implementation, and that it has a lot of useful features, of which exporting the display is the most known one.
And so what if it is 70% open source. It still lacks the last 30% for it to be useful. You still can’t port and possibly not even really expand a product of which you only have 70% of the source code.
But use it if you wish, but if you can’t understand why a lot of people will not use it or why they dont care if X is replaced or not, then i think you are a fool.
From: http://www.rocklyte.com/news.html
The speed increase over the X11 based version of Athene is typically 5 – 20%, although in some critical areas the new architecture has provided as much as a 300% increase in speed over X11.
300% sounds good to me
Hug0, I’m pretty sure when they say a 5-20% increase and a 300% increase they are talking about their own windowing performance. I don’t believe they are referring to things happen faster compared to X. Initially Athene ran on top of X, when they separated it from X _Athene’s_ performance increased.
15-20% Totally ditching 30 years of maturity, features, and support, and all you get is 20%? I’ll stay with X11 (and my HW-OpenGL NVIDIA drivers) thank you
In PC performance terms AMD and or Intel would through a party and run adds for even single digit performance increase when compared to the competition. In the Mobile PC market an increase of 15-20% in battery life is often a good enough reason to spend thousands on a new portable. Heck, I see people slam the PPC/Mac all the time for failing to get with in 10% of the performance of a x86 based PC on some benchmarks. So in my book I will have to side with masses and say that 15-20% sounds like a good enough reason to take notice.
some of X’s performance problems are in the protocol level, not at driver level.
Win95 is both on top of DOS and underneath DOS – it needs DOS for compatibility reasons – among other things and it also fools DOS to use 32 bit drivers
In Solaris term – it is an OE, Operating Environment
While Adam got the title mixed up (Athene previously used X11, they just ditched it), personally, if we were about to change X11 for something else, it may as well be good. By good, I mean it would last well for another 30 years. I wouldn’t ditch X11 for a product that fixes a problem that is so minor.
However, I would highly consider migrating out of X11 if it offers something that would mean something in the future. For example, vector, instead of raster objects. Being completely modular. Not limited to desktops. Do not tie itself to a platform. Gives a proper API whom have a high chance of surviving long with giving new features without needing to break binary compatibility.
Stuff like that. Stuff that matters. :-).
I would have signed up for this beta testing thing if I had time for it… I rather give the opportunity to someone else that woudl test it even more than installing, loading it up, saying “Uhmm, nice”, and then exit after an hour or so, start X and KDE.