a collective introduction of all sites related to gnustep

[Zhang Weiwu]

During I am trying to look for information about setting up my own 
gnustep based desktop, I found I have to look information and download 
software pieces from here and there. With new input from Stefan 
Bidigaray here is the updated my notes about the information / projects
I come across.

GNUStep Library http://gnustep.made-it.com/

  Looks like a document collection website for gnustep and its
  applications (e.g. GNUMail. The site did not describe which project
  it belongs to, suggesting it is a standalone project. Many documents
  on this library is the main source referred from. Not sure who are
  maintaining and who to contact if user wants to contribute or
  correct / ask documents.


GNUStep http://www.gnustep.org/

  Should be the "main" site that hosts gnustep the project and its
  projects. This seems to be the only site that is active, with new
  packages released and development going on. It also hosts some
  documents that overlaps in purpose but different in content than
  GNUStep Library. This creats confusion for users which document to
  read. The installation guide, for example, is similiar to the build
  guide on GNUStep Library, but much terser.


GNUStep.it http://www.gnustep.it/

  This site hosts some projects: GWorkspace and SystemPreferences.
  Although it is the first google result for "system preferences
  gnustep", it offer an unmaintained version of SystemPreferences.app
  where gnustep.org has the maintained one. It also have several
  documents that wasn't in the GNUStep Library. The site did not cite
  what project it belongs to or who maintains it. GNUStep.org cite
  this website as "Italian developer site", which is confusing because
  it differres from GNUStep.org not on langauge but on the software
  hosted.

Étoilé  http://etoileos.com/dev/start/

  A desktop environment project based on gnustep, in development. It
  has a few very charming ideas and ambitous goal. In fact it looks as
  if it is 'the' desktop environment based on gnustep because I didn't
  find any others harf as famous as this one. For your information
  GNUStep is considered by the project themself a "development
  environment" project while leave the task to make desktop
  environment to others.

backbone http://www.nongnu.org/backbone/apps.html

  A project hosted on savannah with the intention creating a "Really
  Good Desktop". That suggests this project is an integration project
  or distribution project, or framework development project, but in
  fact the project produce 3 applications: Preferences.app (which
  confuse with SystemPreferences.app that is maintained by
  GNUStep.org, I'd propose rename SystemPreferences with
  "Administration.app" to save newbies' time getting confused),
  Terminal.app, plus TextEdit.app, a simple text editor with rich text
  format support (but unmainted). This project seems unmainted
  since 2004. All the tools no longer compile with latest gnustep.
  The Étoilé project looks much more like a "desktop" project than
  backbone. 

Collaboration world http://www.collaboration-world.com/

  A site that doesn't have introduction nor information who maintains
  it and which project it belongs to. It hosts several projects like
  GNUMail.

GNUstep HelpCenter http://www.roard.com/docs/

  The name gives an impression this is where documents or support goes
  to. In fact it is a "meta website" with links to some documents on
  other sites and no support (support seems to be on this
  gnustep-discussion mailing list). HelpCenter gives impression the
  documents are user-centric, which turns out to be development centric.

GNUStep Icons Project http://freshmeat.net/projects/gnustep-icons/

  The project says it maintains icons of GNUStep project, which is
  clearly defined, except it seems to be unmaintained since 2002 or 2003

GNUStep Application project http://www.nongnu.org/gap/

  Hosts several gnustep projects. Not sure its relationship with
  gnustep project. I guess from the name it completes gnustep project,
  by offerring applications. GNUStep is a "development environment"
  thus it's goal should be offering software for building
  applications, while this site offers applications itself.