Re: [INFO] NEXTSPACE

[David Chisnall]

Hi,

This looks very nice, but a few comments:

- Apple still owns the NeXT trademark, so be careful about using NEXT in the 
name.  

- NeXT used the NX prefix (NS = NeXT + Sun, NX = NeXT), so using it as your 
prefix is confusing.

- Please don’t put big RPMs in the repo!  It adds overhead to anyone who clones 
it, and GitHub has a perfectly adequate Downloads facility for hosting these.

- It would be easier to package (and to collaborate) if these were separate 
GitHub repos.

David

> On 25 Nov 2017, at 22:35, Sergii Stoian <stoyan255@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> More than 15 years ago I joined the GNUstep development because I like NeXT's 
> OS design, look and feel. At that time my dream was to return NeXTSTEP 
> desktop to Linux. After 15+ years my dream still alive. I understand that 
> GNUstep project goals somewhat changed over these years. And this is good 
> until project is interesting to broad kind (goals, tastes) of people involved 
> in it's development.
> 
> Finally I've decided to inform dear community about my project of last 2+ 
> years.
> I've named is NEXTSPACE. It is SPACE for NeXT applications.
> You can find code and brief description of project here 
> https://github.com/trunkmaster/nextspace.
> It is not finished yet. However I use it as my desktop environment on daily 
> basis.
> You can find RPMs in Packages directory:
> * libdispatch and libobjc2
> * nextspace-core - system specific files: skeleton for user home firectory, 
> shell profile, udev, polkit, etc.
> * nextspace-gnustep - GNUstep libraries with my patches.
> The next step is to build Frameworks, then Appplications. You can create new 
> user with all needed files inside it's home dir. You can start Login with 
> command 'systemctl start loginwindow' or login to newly created user from 
> your login application (it should start ~/.xinitrc in user home dir). That's 
> it.
> 
> Some noticeable achievements I've got:
> * I integrated Workspace and WindowMaker into Workspace Manager. That's it - 
> one application. It was made possible by using libdispatch and libobjc2. For 
> example, when non-GNUstep application starts Workspace's Processess panel 
> shows it with info grabbed from WindowMaker. Another example: when you start 
> application by double-clicking in File Viewer and appicon already exists in 
> Dock icon fly from FileViewer's to docked appicon.
> * In general Workspace is ready to be NSWorkspace povider.
> * GNUstep and WindowMaker unified look and feel (menus and titlebars, fonts, 
> miniwindows).
> * Media management: Workpace automatically mounts removable media inserted 
> (UDisks integration).
> * Terminal: a lot of improvements. It's better to see it.
> * -NXAutoLaunch option implemented. Now applications started with this option 
> doesn't show menu at all. No focus flickering. Smooth as it should be.
> * Preferences: everything you need to set up must be here. Not only GNUstep 
> NSGlobalDomain options (localization, fonts) but system specific options also 
> (display, keyboard, mouse, sound, networking).
> * A lot of other things I can't recall now but I write it down someday. ;)
> 
> There are some facts I don't like and want to change:
> * NEXTSPACE is based on quite outdated release of GNUstep (base 1.24.8, gui 
> and back 0.24.1);
> * It is based on ART backend. I want to use Cairo backend but ART has usefull 
> features (.nfont packages provide ability to set hinting and antialiasing 
> options on per font basis).
> * DE needs documentation. I plan to discuss NSHelpPanel implementation with 
> you guys. First of all we need to define format for help files.
> * It is developed and tested on CentOS 7. I have no plans in near future to 
> port it somewhere else. I need to finish what I've started first.
> 
> PS: My apologies to community for being off the track so long. Now you know 
> why.
> My current strategy is the following:
> 1. Finish NEXTSPACE to be feature rich, stable and fast. I guess this step 
> will be done until next summer.
> 2. Return to development of ProjectCenter. First of all PC badly needs good 
> editor, then GORM interoperation and next debugger.
> I hope my work will be useful not only for me but for GNUstep project also.
> 
> -- 
> Sergii Stoian, ProjectCenter maintainer
> _______________________________________________
> Discuss-gnustep mailing list
> Discuss-gnustep@gnu.org
> https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss-gnustep