[CREATE] First beta release of the 64 Studio distribution

[Daniel James]

Hi Alan,

> I'm glad to see my favourite Abiword
> included by default for a change.

Yes, I like Abiword too. It reminds me of MS Word 5.1 on the Mac I used
to use about nine years ago - does one job well, and doesn't try to
interfere with your work. We couldn't include OpenOffice.org because
there was no native amd64 version last time we looked.

> I'd encourage you to grab the patches Ubuntu used to neuter the GIMP
> installer which annoys users the first time they run the program.

Thanks for the tip. We've got bigger annoyances than that though :-)

> I'm not a fan of Microsoft C# but the gimp-sharp project is looking good
> so far

We've avoided C# apps so far, as I'm not convinced that Microsoft won't
try to claim patents on some related technology in the future.

> there is a lot you could do to produce a better custom version of the gimp

So far, the GIMP does the job for everything except CMYK images, for
example to use in Scribus for pre-press work. We may package Cinepaint
Glasgow when that comes out, for CMYK and other format support that the
GIMP lacks.

> The gimp animation package (GAP) might be worth including with your
> version of the GIMP.

I've never used that - I'll have to give it a try. I do think we need a
vector animation tool though.

> I'm holding out hopes for Pitivi, the fact that Fluendo are backing it and
> using it themselves bodes well

Yes, we've also been keeping an eye on Pitivi, but as we understand it,
it isn't ready for actual editing yet.

> Jakasha always struck me as a rather ugly beast, especially how their went
> about reinventing the desktop/workspaces inside their own application

They've just added a bunch of new developers and are planning some major
releases later in the year, starting with a new player.

> If you
> could bring together the other applications under a simliar set of themes
> you could really unify the look of 64studio and make it look like a real
> multimedia workstation.

So far, we're using a Qt theme that looks a bit like GTK to go some way
towards this. There are too many toolkits in use to get perfect
integration yet, but there is the Portland project:

http://portland.freedesktop.org/wiki/

> One last big idea I had was that distributions might also include windows
> versions of certain software, to help users with compatibility on
> other machines or to give to their friends who are not yet ready to switch
> to Linux but are willing to use open standard and free software.

The OpenCD project is already doing that:

http://www.theopencd.org/

> Best of luck with 64studio

Thanks!

Daniel