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[News]

The website for the ReBorCon 2011 that Bas is organising is now available. ReBorCon is a new, international conference for the REBOL family of programming languages, including the current REBOL 2 line, the REBOL 3 in development, and the open source Boron language. The programme includes several topics that are of interest for Syllable.

[News] [Syllable Desktop showing multiple open filer windows]

The third edition of the Syllable Winter Conference will take place in the Netherlands on Saturday the 29th of January, in conference centre "Het Brandpunt" in Baarn. We will demonstrate setting up Syllable Server as a web/FTP/SSH server, making a website on Syllable Desktop, and building it and uploading it to Syllable Server with REBOL 3. This will show REBOL 3 and a new cURL binding for it on Syllable Desktop. Further, we hope to have another goodie for the visitors, to take home.

To give you an impression of the conference, you can see the more than seventy Dutch spoken videos on YouTube of the presentations given during the first Syllable Winter Conference in 2009 (playlist), the second Syllable Winter Conference in 2010 (playlist) and the fourth Syllable Summer Conference in 2010 (playlist).

For information about the conference, contact Bas de Lange on the email address mentioned here.

SylCon Summer 2010 Movies Jan 7 2011, 0:11
[News] [Syllable Server with Rox Desktop]

During the SylCon Summer conference 2010 we filmed the presentations given. It took a while to process them, but thanks to skûtsje shipper Paul Fortuijn (who took the time of processing all the movies) now they are finally available on YouTube. If you want to view the movies in Ogg video format, use this website: TinyOgg.com.

Topics covered include the Syllable Server release 0.4, the new graphical development version of Syllable Server, advancements in REBOL 3, improvements in our CMS and how we will open up our communication channels. The movies are Dutch spoken. If you want to help making translations and sub-titles of these videos please contact Bas de Lange on the email address mentioned here.

Good Syllable Year! Jan 1 2011, 20:30
[News]

We wish everyone a good Syllable year! Last year we promised to create some breakthroughs, and we did. After making the REBOL 3 and Boron programming languages available on both Syllable Desktop and Syllable Server, we started working on their closer integration with the system. We created the first REBOL extension on Syllable, and will soon announce the first binding with a programming library. We made the REBOL 3 collaboration system and the CMS for the Syllable web sites run on Desktop. The CMS became more capable and fifteen times faster, so that it is now much easier for us to maintain the sites. We made a new Syllable Server release, and created a graphical version of it with the ROX desktop, that we are using internally and that has enabled us to move away from non-Syllable Linux distributions (extending our hardware's life span in the process).

Most of these accomplishments are "under the hood". We demonstrated them on the Syllable Conferences and on Software Freedom Day, but they are not easily available yet. So the main goal for this year is to continue with these developments and to make them better available to the public.

Splendid Isolation Dec 9 2010, 23:11
[Applications] [Syllable Desktop building and publishing its own website]

The CMS that builds our websites was used on Syllable Server so far, but now it has been ported to Syllable Desktop. This was done by porting it to REBOL 3. The screenshot shows Desktop building its own website in static batch mode and synchronising it with Amazon S3.

Syllable Desktop showing its own website locally This screenshot shows Webster previewing the built site as local files. Building the websites on Syllable Server is around 35% faster with REBOL 3 than with REBOL 2. A few longstanding problems in our Russian website and documentation were fixed because REBOL 3 now understands Unicode.

Chatty REBOLs All Around Nov 8 2010, 17:54
[Ports] [REBOL 3 RebDev chat on Syllable Desktop 0.6.6]

The latest version of the REBOL 3 open host kit, alpha 110, enables Syllable Desktop for the first time to run the REBOL 3 client/server RebDev collaboration application for chat and development files sharing. It already worked in the Linux version for Syllable Server. The client is not an application that was ported and needs to be installed, but is a small REBOL script that is downloaded in its newest version every time the program is started - much like a web page. It runs unmodified, currently on Syllable Desktop, Syllable Server, Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Amiga OS (PPC), OS X (Intel & PPC) and Windows.

The source code of the REBOL 3 open host environment is now hosted in a public Git version management repository. To compile REBOL 3 on Syllable Desktop, you need to have the following software packs installed:

    - Development files pack for your exact Syllable version
    - Developer's Delight
    - Network Necessities

To compile REBOL 3 and start the RebDev application, enter the following commands:

    build update
    build log
    build get REBOL-Core--current
    build patch REBOL-Core--current
    build REBOL-Core--current
    build install REBOL-Core--current
    r3
    chat
    new-user

REBOL & Boron Conference 2011 Sep 26 2010, 17:20
[News]

Bas is organising a conference for the REBOL family of programming languages, including the current REBOL 2 line, the REBOL 3 in development, and the open source Boron language. The conference will be held on Saturday February 26 in the Netherlands, in the same venue as the Syllable conferences. Many of the demonstrations will be done on Syllable Server and Syllable Desktop.

We will set up a website for the conference later, but we want to get the word out as soon as possible to gauge interest. If we get international visitors, we have the option to scale up the event to multiple days, including the Friday, to make the journey worth their while. So if you are contemplating coming, or even better if you are interested to give a presentation or demonstration or workshop, please contact Bas de Lange.

Update:

The website is now on-line.

[Applications] [Boron programming language]

Kaj has overhauled the Boron demonstration he presented at Software Freedom Day for publication on the web. Boron is the programming language that is the successor to the ORCA language that we use in Syllable. If you want to try it, Boron is already available in Syllable Server 0.4 and the development build of Syllable Desktop.

The presentation starts with an introduction to Boron. It then demonstrates how to build a small dynamic website that serves up the presentation itself. So there is a simple website content management system in there and a simple presentation program, in about fourty lines of Boron programming. Both the program and the presentation are available for download.

The demonstration is running on Syllable Server and the Cheyenne web server, just like the original talk at Software Freedom Day. It could also run on Syllable Desktop by using one of the web servers available for Desktop.

[News]

Ed informs us on our forum that the current September issue of PCLinuxOS Magazine is starting a series of articles about Syllable Desktop. They're written by Darrel Johnston and available on-line. The magazine is free under a Creative Commons license and can be downloaded in PDF format or viewed on the web. The first article introduces Syllable Desktop and shows the installation process with a very nice series of screenshots.

[News] [Software Freedom Day]

Friday September 17, Kaj will present two talks at the Software Freedom Day 2010. This event is kindly hosted by the CWI in Amsterdam, the Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science, known best in open source circles as the birthplace of Python.

The first talk presents our graphical development version of Syllable Server running the ROX Desktop, which we recently introduced at the Syllable Summer Conference, and compares it to Syllable Desktop.

The second presentation introduces the Boron programming language, which is the successor to the ORCA language that we use in Syllable. It will demonstrate building a small website with Boron on the Cheyenne web server, also running on Syllable Server.

[News] [Kaj de Vos showing PenguPop on graphical development version of Syllable Server during WinterSylCon 2010]

Saturday 4th of September 2010 the fourth edition of the Syllable Summer Conference will take place in conference centre "Het Brandpunt" in Baarn. We will present the new Syllable Server 0.4 (more info about edition 0.4), updates in our graphical development version of Syllable Server (which we showed during Syllable Winter Conference 2010, see the videos down below). Attention will also be paid to advancements in REBOL 3, continued improvements in our CMS and how we will also open up our communication channels.

To give you an impression of the conference, you can see the more than twenty Dutch spoken videos on YouTube of the presentations given by Kaj de Vos during the first Syllable Winter Conference in January 2009 (playlist) and the second Syllable Winter Conference in January 2010 (playlist).

If you want to help with making subtitles and translations of these videos please contact Bas de Lange on the here mentioned email address!

Syllable Server 0.4 Released Jun 8 2010, 16:16
[Syllable]

We are pleased to announce that we have released the new Syllable Server 0.4. This release focuses on maturing existing functionality, improving security, ongoing system restructuring, and making the system a suitable base for third-party package managers. Extensive work was done, so the full change log is quite long.

About half the packages in the system were upgraded, including key components such as the Linux kernel, UDev, the LFS init scripts, DirectFB, SDL, BASh, Packager, OpenSSH, REBOL/Core, the Cheyenne web server and CDRTools. Other important packages such as Ruby, Midnight Commander, Links and Transmission were also updated. XZ-Utils was added, providing the same LZMA compression as in 7-Zip, but in a different format that is becoming popular, and is better integrated with POSIX systems. TAr was upgraded and this version has support for XZ-Utils. Compression of the system distribution was changed from 7-Zip to XZ format. The latest development versions of Cheyenne and UniServe are included, which provide a new WebSockets framework for advanced persistent, full-duplex communication with the latest web browsers.

As an example of clearer system structure and improved security, the super user account has been renamed from "root" to "system". Logging in to this account has been disabled: you are now supposed to log in to the account named "administrator" to manage the system. From this account, you can use the sudo command to perform actions with system privileges.

Here is the updated manual, which explains the key abilities of the system step by step. Syllable Server can be downloaded here. Extra software is available here.

[Ports]

After many years of trying by several people, Kaj collected their hints and got the server part of OpenSSH to work. The integration into Syllable Desktop is based on earlier integration into Syllable Server of the system configuration needed for the OpenSSH server. Kristian implemented the socketpair function in Syllable 0.6.6 to support OpenSSH, although this currently still needs to be disabled. Michael Pavone and Adam Kirchhoff supplied and tested several other options that need to be disabled to get the server running and stable.

This work is now available in the current development build. To activate the OpenSSH server, edit the file /resources/indexes/init/sshd and uncomment the last line, according to the instructions there. After that, the server will be started on each system start-up. Unique encryption keys that identify your system were already generated at the first start-up of your Syllable installation.

[News] [Kaj de Vos showing Syllable Desktop]

Saturday 30th of January 2010 already the second edition of the Syllable Winter Conference will take place in conference centre "Het Brandpunt" in Baarn. Like we did during the first Syllable summer conference with presenting Syllable Server and our WebKit based browser Webster, we will now also make some important announcements. During several presentations and demonstrations we will highlight these. We will also follow up on the content management system, with which you can manage websites on Syllable Server. In this context we will go more indepth into the Try REBOL site, with which you can try out the REBOL programming language in your browser. The recently implemented support for WebSockets on Cheyenne, part of the upcoming HTML5 web standards, with which persistent HTTP connections in an efficient manner become possible, and with that the management of rich interactive websites on Syllable Server, will of course extensively be highlighted. Keep an eye on the Syllable Winter Conference page for the latest updates to the programme.

To give you an impression of the conference, you can see here six Dutch spoken videos on YouTube of the presentations given by Kaj de Vos during the first Syllable Winter Conference in January 2009.

Part 1, deep links into the video: Syllable Desktop, memory management, swap, why do we use Linux as a server kernel?, the using of Syllable in a DVD factory.
Part 2, deep links: WebKit, mounting USB disks, terminal Bash shell, installing extra packages, Battle for Wesnoth, native applications, resource packages, VLC media player, Application Binary Interface.
Part 3, deep links: Unix System Resources, resources directory, symbolic links, no hard links, locality of packages.
Part 4, deep links: search paths, separation of system and independent packages, playing a movie with VLC.
Part 5, deep links: VLC, MediaPlayer, FFMPEG, media framework, hardware overlays, media codecs.
Part 6, deep links: the REBOL song, audio mixing.

If you want to help with making subtitles and translations of these videos please get in contact with Bas de Lange on the here mentioned email address!

WebSockets for Cheyenne Jan 2 2010, 22:16
[Ports]

Over the holidays, the Cheyenne web server that we use in Syllable Server got a WebSocket framework. Cheyenne's author Nenad Rakocevic implemented WebSocket support in just a day on top of the UniServe universal network I/O subsystem that underpins Cheyenne. In a few more days, he designed an original WebSocket framework supporting persistent connections in an efficient manner, extending the regular Cheyenne framework for the typical HTTP stateless request/response communication.

WebSocket is a part of the upcoming HTML5 web standards. It allows a web browser and a web server to have a persistent, two-way full-duplex connection using just one TCP connection. It does this by starting a regular HTTP connection and then effectively renegotiating it into its more flexible underlying TCP connection. This gives it good chances to traverse firewalls, effectively giving us back the full power of the Internet. In this way, it is an evolution and replacement of Comet, which is a collection of hacks to use Ajax to simulate persistent HTTP connections. WebSocket improves over Comet by being standardised, much cleaner and more scalable. It does, however, require explicit support by both the server and the client. Currently, only Chrome 4 has WebSocket support. It is planned for Firefox and Safari. The latter means WebKit and that means we will be able to port it to Webster.

We intend to use this framework in our Syllable web infrastructure. The Cheyenne WebSocket framework is available in its SVN version. A WebSocket echo demo program is available here.

Update:

There is now a demo chat application online. Remember that you need a WebSocket browser for it, such as Chrome 4 or a nightly build of WebKit. You can follow Cheyenne discussions here.

[Applications] [Math Project 004]

Lucas Murad tells us: “I have released Mathematic Project, an application intended for making calculations in Syllable Desktop. This very first public release is a proof of concept and this is the starting point of a whole math utility, with the purpose to avoid the need to port external apps and carry Syllable Desktop to universities and labs where mathematic software is increasingly being used. The app is available at: Math Project 004.”

Fruitful New Year! Jan 1 2010, 16:22
[News]

We wish you all a good new year! The new sun is shining strong here, surely the sign of a fertile year to come. Indeed, we will create some breakthroughs this year.

[Syllable]

The current development build of Syllable Desktop has a greatly improved installation menu. The options for IDE and USB CD players were merged, so that the troubleshooting options can now also be tried with a USB CD player. Specific installation options were added for the Acer Aspire One and ASUS EeePC netbooks. The EeePC requires compensation for its shifting of drive positions, which is now performed by the installer. This was tested for us by Hans Rood on the Summer SylCon, and the Aspire One was tested for us by Ruud Kuin. There are now more safe mode options for troubleshooting, such as an option to fully remove the USB 2 driver, which is buggy on some systems.

Experimental installation options were added for installing from and to USB memory sticks. These don't work yet, because Syllable doesn't start from USB devices other than CD players yet, but this is being worked on. Apart from Syllable's own AFS format, there's an option for starting from USB memory formatted with Linux's Ext2FS file system. Installing to USB is still unreliable on Syllable, so the Ext2FS option allows to experiment with creating a USB installation medium from Linux.

[Syllable]

At a request from Carl Sassenrath, inventor of REBOL and the Amiga OS, Kaj has created a website that allows you to try the REBOL programming language without installing it. The site showcases the new REBOL version 3 that is close to going into beta release. It also offers to test the classic REBOL 2 and ORCA, the open source implementation of REBOL, and to make comparisons between them.

The website is running on Syllable Server 0.3, in development towards version 0.4. For this application, the security of the server operating system was enhanced to be able to offer the public to run generic REBOL scripts.

The website was made on top of the REBOL stack included in Syllable Server. It runs on the Cheyenne web server. It is made in a Model/View/Controller architecture with the network application platform we have been working on: a combination of the QuarterMaster web framework and the content management system that is also used to build our Syllable websites. This REBOL demo site marks the transition of this application platform to being capable of building advanced interactive websites.

Hola! Oct 14 2009, 16:51
[News]

At the request of our Spanish web master, Lucas Murad from Argentina, and Leo Ruilova, from Chile, Kristian has opened a section for Spanish speaking Syllable fans on our forum. Do come in and say hello to them!

MEDNAFEN Multi-Emulator Ported Jul 12 2009, 16:36
[Ports] [Sonic on MEDNAFEN]

Rui managed to port MEDNAFEN, an emulator of several classic game computers, including the Atari Lynx, Nintendo Game Boy, NES, Sega Master System and Neo Geo Pocket. Together with the other emulators that already run on Syllable, this brings us many classic games.

SylCon Summer Conference Jun 24 2009, 17:25
[News] [SylCon 2008]

Our yearly summer conference will be held from Saturday July 18 to Saturday July 25 in the Netherlands. We will be sailing again on the Frisian vessel the Stêd Sleat while discussing and demoing the Syllable systems. This year we are offering several arrangements, so you can choose how many days you want to attend. There are discounts for longer stays and for kids, so you can make this into a nice vacation for your family. Contact Bas for arrangements.

Let the Feeding Frenzy Begin Jun 9 2009, 21:50
[News]

The news sections of the websites have been extended with RSS feeds. If you prefer to follow Syllable news through an RSS reader application, you can now do so. Each selection of the news on the different sites has a corresponding feed. Look for the RSS icons. Please don't let your reader fetch the feeds too often. We don't publish news several times per day, so it's no use to check more often than a few times each day. Each news article now also has its own page, so the feeds can point to them. Good reading!

Improved Keyboard Navigation May 29 2009, 1:47
[Syllable]

Anthony has implemented keyboard navigation in DiskManager. This means you will be able to install Syllable without using a mouse, in case the installation CD has problems with that. To do this, Anthony had to make fixes to keyboard handling in LibSyllable Views. This will also improve keyboard use in other applications.

VIP Entrance May 27 2009, 21:57
[Syllable]

Anthony has enlightened us by implementing auto-login. In the next Syllable Desktop development build, you will be able to go into the Users & Groups preferences and set a user account to log in automatically, without going through the password dialog.

[Syllable] []

A sigh of relief goes through the audience as we give you the new Syllable Desktop. Thanks go to those who contributed to it and those who helped shake out the last remaining bugs. Many of those were fixed, including several regressions from earlier releases. The window decorators don't destabilise the system anymore. The installation procedure is greatly enhanced with options to fix hardware support problems. The native web browser is replaced with Webster, based on a newer version of the WebKit engine. Many enhancements were made to standards support, leading, among others, to the ability to run QEmu - so now you can run virtual machines. The documentation was improved and several translations were added. Read more in the full release notes. ISO CD images, (VMware) emulator images, an upgrade pack and documentation are available from the download page. Extra software is available here.

Syllable Nukem Forever Mar 4 2009, 14:45
[Syllable]

There's a release candidate for Syllable Desktop 0.6.6 in our development builds now. If you want to influence the final version, this is your last chance to test it.

About Old News and New News Feb 15 2009, 8:32
[News]

If you think the news articles here are out of line, that's because the web sites got a brand-new news module. Custom made for Syllable, just as the rest of the site. However, the older news items are still in the old style, which is less flexible, so we can't easily update their styling. The new articles are in our custom database and have their content fully decoupled from the styling. They're also easier to write and maintain. It's an important focus of ours to lighten our workload.

A Starlet is Ported Feb 12 2009, 23:38
[Ports]

Kaj has ported XML-Starlet, a suite of XML tools that builds on LibXML2 and LibXSLT. The immediate motivation for the port was the need to process the XML files inside Open Document Format files (as used by OpenOffice and a number of other office applications). In our downloads is an installation package for Syllable Desktop.

Welcome to Micro Mart Readers Jan 18 2009, 23:00
[News]

The current issue of Micro Mart, a weekly computer magazine in the UK, has an article about Syllable and three other alternative operating systems. It was written by Michael Reed.

To the New Beginning Jan 1, 10:17
[Announcement]Happy new year to all! I think we can look forward to it, because there is a lot of opportunity for it to be better than the last one. :-)
New Russian Translator Dec 22, 18:27
[Announcement]We have a new Russian translator. Alexander ("azlk" on the forum) has already done a lot of work on our Russian website, and is also working on the translation of Syllable itself.
Total Freedom Nov 10, 19:23
[Announcement]The Dutch website of Software Freedom Day is now running on Syllable Server and the included Cheyenne web server. This has given the site much more storage space for their multimedia content, virtual hosting under their own domain names and the freedom to use server technologies of choice. The site was already made with the same content management system that Kaj is developing for the Syllable sites.
Welcome to Linux Magazine Readers Nov 1, 19:19
[Announcement]Bas picked up the new Dutch Linux Magazine this morning, that has hit the shops now. This November issue, number 5 of this year, has a four-page article on Syllable, including an interview Kristian did with them.
Syllable Conference Fimbul Winter Edition Oct 25, 20:58
[Announcement]Bas has announced that he will organise the first winter edition of the Syllable Conference. We set up its own page for it, where Bas will keep you posted as the event evolves.
From Russia with Love Oct 25, 20:34
[Announcement]Dmitry ("Rohan" on the forum) has requested an official Russian website, so we set it up. Dmitry will be translating it over time.
The Second Coming of Software Freedom Day Sep 17, 18:58
[Announcement]Kaj will be presenting the brand new Syllable Server 0.3 at the Software Freedom Day event coming Saturday, September 20, in the city of Utrecht in the Netherlands. He will also be present at the Holland Open Software Conference in Amsterdam the two days before. Although there won't be a Syllable presentation there, if you'd like to speak with Kaj you can catch him while walking around, or enquire with Bas at the Software Freedom Day booth at HOSC.
Watch the Watchers Sep 16, 16:33
[Announcement]Thanks to the fact that Syllable Server is a Linux, and after having gone through their waiting list, Syllable is now listed on DistroWatch, the major monitoring site of Linux distributions and a few BSD and Solaris systems.
Three is a Charm Sep 12, 8:33
[Syllable]The third release of Syllable Server has been published. This is an important release, because it is the first one that focused on making the system actually usable as a server. A number of popular servers were added and configured, and also several innovative REBOL software stacks. Out of the imaginary box, Syllable Server is now ready for such things as accepting remote SSH log-ins over the network, running a web server on the Cheyenne REBOL server, running an FTP server and several more. Special attention has been paid to programmability, with support for developing Model-View-Controller web applications in QuarterMaster and networking applications with the REBOL/Services Service Oriented Architecture. The Genode Nitpicker windowing system is also included. Read the rest in the full changelog. An extensive manual was also written, which is easy to follow. As usual, both a BitTorrent download (preferred) and a regular download are available (80 MB 7-Zip archive). Please use the torrent if you can.
Software Freedom Day Sep 6, 22:06
[Announcement]Apart from organising Syllable events, Bas is very active in circles of open source, open standards and open content in general. A truly open guy. :-) He also organises Software Freedom Day in the Netherlands. His free event will take place next weekend on September the 13th. It's well worth attending, with around twenty organisations setting up booths and holding talks. In addition, Bas will be demonstrating Syllable and the upcoming new Syllable Server release.
A DOSE of Technology Sep 6, 21:53
[Announcement]Bas will be representing Syllable at the T-DOSE conference in the Netherlands, the free Technical Dutch Open Source Event, "The place where experts meet". In the weekend of October 25 and 26, in the city of Eindhoven, at the Fontys University of Applied Science, there will be more than twenty speakers and many open source projects will shed light on their workings. Bas will present Syllable in a talk and man a booth.
SylCon Photos Aug 7, 12:23
[Announcement]Here are the photographs from SylCon, courtesy of skoet.nl, our shippers:
http://skoet.nl/vakantie08/page2.htm (from halfway)
http://skoet.nl/vakantie08/page3.htm
http://skoet.nl/vakantie08/page4.htm
http://skoet.nl/vakantie08/page5.htm
We also have some videos, but they will take longer to process. Bas will try to make a new issue of SDN with a SylCon report.
German and Slovenian Translations Aug 5, 23:31
[Announcement]Localised web sites are springing out of the earth. Michael Utz and Matic Gradiser have offered to be the editors of German and Slovenian versions of our web site, respectively, so we created them. As with the other translated sites, Michael and Matic will complete and maintain the translations over time. They would also like to try their hand at creating and maintaining the German and Slovenian translations of Syllable itself.
Forum Moved Aug 5, 15:13
[Announcement]We moved our forum to a new hosting location. If you bookmarked it, please update the link. All data is migrated, so you can simply log in as before.
USB Bug Gets the Boot Aug 5, 14:57
[Syllable]Kristian tracked down and fixed the bug that prevented Syllable from booting off a USB device. We published a new development build that will boot from a USB CD player. This means Syllable can now be installed on machines that don't have an IDE CD player, such as the Asus Eee PC and other small laptops. Also, with some extra settings in the boot loader, it should now be possible to install Syllable to a USB device, such as a memory stick. On SylCon, we found out that the extra SD memory slot in the Eee PC is connected via USB internally. It should now be possible to install Syllable to an extra memory card, so you don't have to touch the default operating system on the main drive.
The new development build also has the new Webster browser included.
Update: further bugs in our USB support turn out to cause lock-ups when trying to install to a USB medium such as a memory stick. This problem will need to be fixed before we can do so.
Introducing Image Viewer Aug 5, 14:22
[Applications][ImageViewer]Jonas Jarvoll released his new Image Viewer application. It's more capable than the AView picture viewer that's included with Syllable. Image Viewer is now listed in our applications downloads.
Meet Webster Jul 24, 16:08
[Applications][Webster]More creative destruction. Another long-time milestone has been reached. It has always been our plan to factor out the web rendering engine of ABrowse into a library with a native Syllable View widget on top, so it can be embedded into more applications than just a web browser. Kristian did just that: building on Arno's WebCore port, he updated that and then stepped up the modularisation by creating the WebView class. He rewrote the browser on top of that and named it Webster. The first alpha version is available in our applications downloads. The latest Syllable 0.6.6 development build is required to run it, as several bugs in the system were fixed for the new browser. The source code is available on our development site.
SylCon Development Builds Jul 24, 16:06
[Syllable]We slept through a storm on the ship. We docked alongside a clipper a bit too hastily; another clipper, the Hollandia, crashed into us. Nothing new, shippers from Holland have always sucked. We saw a Black-headed Gull die; we saw a Great Crested Grebe feed a fish to her young. Nothing else is important, is it? Oh, there's another cycle of destruction and creation. We demonstrated a new development build of Syllable Server that we created just before the conference. While we were sailing in Friesland, Kristian produced a new development build of Syllable Desktop in England. Both are now published here.
Zorro Strikes Again Jul 14, 19:45
[Announcement]Unfortunately, we had to replace our Spanish web site. We extended our content management system to create a fully integrated new one, so it is now an official branch of our main web site. Lucas Murad created the old site and will be editing the new one.
We took the opportunity to also overhaul our Dutch site and pull it into the content management system. Bas de Lange is the editor. The sites currently still show the original English content. The editors will be translating it over time.
Immer Mehr BeGeistert Jul 14, 19:40
[Announcement]As last time, we have been invited again to the BeGeistert BeOS meeting, the 019 edition. It will be held from 10 to 12 October in the same venue in Düsseldorf in Germany. Bas will be there to represent Syllable again.
SylCon is Nigh Jul 11, 1:10
[Announcement]The Syllable Conference 2008 will start in a week. We will be holding presentations and workshops around the upcoming Syllable Desktop 0.6.6 and Syllable Server 0.3. There will be a workshop showing how to set up a complete network with Server and Desktop machines and how, if you know one, you know the other. We will also try to install Syllable on an Asus EeePC.
Syllable Server Development Build Jun 7, 2:11
[Syllable]We released a development build of Syllable Server. This version has a number of updated components, including the kernel, and several fixes. Most importantly, a lot of server functionality was added. Included is a REBOL software stack with a web server and a web programming framework. Support and start scripts are integrated for a number of standard servers, such as CUPS, OpenSSH, BIND, Apache, RSync, SaMBa and VSFTP. However, the configurations of these new modules are not complete yet.
Two To Tango May 3, 22:20
[Ports][VLC]Ruwen Boehm ported the VLC and MPlayer multimedia players to Syllable Desktop. The behaviour of both is still a bit rough, but watching DVDs on Syllable is possible now. Some of the needed parts were ported by Rui Caridade, Andrew Kennan and Kaj de Vos. Newly ported components include FAAD2, FLAC, FontConfig, LibA52, LibCDDB, LibDVDNav, LibDVDRead, LibID3Tag, LibMAD and LibMPEG2. These packages don't have to be installed separately, as the libraries are included in VLC and MPlayer. Packages for both are in our resources downloads. They need to be started from the command line, until someone writes native Syllable graphical control interfaces for them.
Syllable Desktop Running on Asus Eee PC! Apr 14, 22:12
[Syllable][EeePC]Michael Saunders got Syllable Desktop to run on his new Asus Eee PC - a machine for which it is uniquely suited. There is some work to do to support all hardware, but most functionality already works. Michael reports that video, audio, touchpad, USB and battery monitor all work. Widescreen video and network don't and there may be reliability problems with USB storage devices. As installing Syllable from a USB device doesn't work yet, Michael used an inventive method for installation. It can be done by imaging your Eee drive with the dd utility (from Linux), installing Syllable on it through QEmu and then dd'ing the image back to the real drive. Note that the drive number needs to be adjusted in the GrUB boot file. We are looking into distributing Syllable especially for the Eee PC in this form.
Ruling the Waves: SylCon 2008 Apr 10, 17:30
[Announcement]Bas has announced the Syllable Conference 2008. Like last year's successful conference, it will be held in the Netherlands on the Frisian sailing vessel the Stêd Sleat (the former racing ship of the city of Sloten). There is limited space available. Make sure you don't miss the atmosphere, the adventure, the comradery, the Syllable presentations, the talks, the plans and the announcements in this break-through year for Syllable. Read the full announcement at the forum and enlist with Bas de Lange.
Mr Bean Strikes Again Mar 27, 16:05
[Ports]Rohan reports that an otherwise unknown contributor going under the name Bean has rewritten the AFS filesystem driver for GrUB 2. The original driver was for GrUB 1 and was derived from the full AFS driver. This meant that the copyright could not be reassigned to the FSF, so the GrUB project didn't want to integrate the code. The new driver is much smaller and looks like it will be integrated into GrUB, so we will have a new boot loader and maintenance will become much easier. Before that happens, though, we may have to do more porting work on GrUB 2 to integrate it in our build process and installer.
Here is a separate test CD that is capable of booting an existing Syllable installation on disk.
Squeak Ported to Syllable Desktop Mar 21, 17:30
[Ports][Squeak with Seaside]Kelly Wilson has ported Squeak to Syllable. Squeak is a multimedia environment based on the Smalltalk programming language. There are no video and sound drivers yet that interface between Squeak and Syllable, so the Squeak graphical environment is not available yet. However, headless Squeak programs that don't need a graphical user interface run, and the screenshot shows a web site in ABrowse, produced by the Seaside web application framework.
Peep at FOSDEM Mar 7, 20:42
[Announcement]Here is a photo of the Syllable stand at FOSDEM last week, by Jesús Corrius.
Rhope Dataflow Language Feb 23, 21:45
[Applications]Michael Pavone has created a new programming language: Rhope. It's a very interesting language that is based on dataflow and also uses transactional concepts to make parallel programming easy. Rhope is an interpreter that is available for Syllable, OS X and Windows. Mike mentions that it was for a large part developed on Syllable and that its web site runs on Syllable Desktop, on a web server and web framework programmed in Rhope itself. Rhope currently has preliminary support for programming graphical user interfaces on Syllable and Windows.
New Dutch Site Feb 22, 15:00
[Announcement]There's a new Syllable website in Dutch. It is maintained by Bas de Lange and hosted by the region Utrecht/Amersfoort of the Hobby Computer Club. The link is available here in the community panel on the left.
QEmu Ported to Syllable Desktop Jan 28, 3:57
[Ports][Syllable on Syllable]QEmu has been eluding its port to Syllable Desktop, but the Syllable team has gotten this emulator to work now. The port is based on earlier work on QEmu itself and on a number of improvements that are being made to Syllable Desktop. The coming Syllable development builds will have improved support for POSIX threads, timers and async I/O. The newest QEmu version 0.9.1 runs now. There is already a binary package of QEmu 0.9.1 for Syllable Server in our downloads section.[Ubuntu on Syllable]

Other recent ports to Syllable Desktop include LibPurple and Finch, the text mode client of Pidgin (the former GAIM instant messaging application) and the latest version of SaMBa, 3.0.28.
New Premium and Source CDs Jan 17, 0:17
[Syllable]We published a new Premium CD for Syllable Desktop 0.6.5. As always, it's available from the Syllable shop. The complete program source code didn't fit on it any more, so we created a separate CD for that. It holds the source code for Syllable Desktop, Syllable Server and extra packages. Both CDs are also available as a download from now on, so you can choose to receive them sooner and save the shipping costs by burning your own CD.
Ghosts on Photo Jan 13, 22:10
[Announcement]Ralf Schülke published a nice photo series of BeGeistert 018. Here are some of Bas' Syllable presentation:
The audience
The man
The man and the machine
Ghosts on Video Jan 12, 17:17
[Announcement]BeGeistert 018 is in progress, where we were graciously invited. You can see it live on this webcam. Bas is representing Syllable there and just gave a spontaneous presentation.
Good Things Coming to Those Who Wait Jan 8, 2:22
[Syllable]After an extensive development period, we released Syllable Desktop 0.6.5 with goodies all over. Of course there are bug fixes, most notably in USB and the network stack, leading to large reliability and performance improvements. LibUSB and SANE were ported, so there is now USB access from user space and support for scanners. There are new network and video drivers, including a unique S3 DeltaChrome driver that Arno wrote from scratch. Two new window decorators debut from John Aspras. CD burning ability is now integrated in the form of SimpleBurn and CDRTools. A new network preferences applet from Andrew Kennan was integrated, and also Arno's port of OpenBeFS. Many ports were upgraded and the system layout has been heavily reorganised. Files needed for compiling software have been split off in a separate package. This is also the release that harmonises a number of things between Syllable Desktop and Syllable Server.

The full change log is here. Installation CDs, the upgrade, and images for emulators are here. Additional software can be found here.
New Download Section Dec 26, 15:33
[Ports]The link to our Official Releases in the navigation panel on the left here has been replaced by a new download page of our own. After going through several download web sites in the past years, this one is meant to stay. It is fully integrated into the new content management system for the sites. We will extend it over time to add categories, main sections for Syllable Desktop and Syllable Server, and eventually, software contributed by individual developers.

The current page offers some new packages that were created or ported recently. They are mainly libraries, of interest to software developers.
Second Serving Dec 14, 16:42
[Syllable]The second release of Syllable Server is now available. A number of fixes were made, most notably to terminal initialisation and printing. GhostScript is included now. Some of the Syllable-specific initialisation scripts are executed now.

Many packages were updated, including GLibC, CoreUtils, BASh, ORCA and the printing packages.

Several new packages were added. IPTables is included, so Syllable Server can be used to build a firewall. The wireless tools are included for configuring wireless networks. The ALSA userspace library and tools were added to provide full access to the audio system, instead of relying on OSS emulation.

All separate binary software packages for Server 0.1 are still valid on Server 0.2. On Syllable, binary compatibility is maintained as much as possible.

[Installation and usage instructionschange log, torrent (preferred), installation package (75 MB 7-Zip archive).] Please use the torrent if you can.
Show that you Share! Dec 5, 16:50
[Announcement]Bas will be manning a booth to present Syllable at the Show that you Share! conference in the city of Utrecht in the Netherlands on Friday, December 14 [flyer (PDF)]. The conference is about networks, communities and learning, with a focus on educational purposes. We will highlight the opportunity that Syllable offers to learn about system technology without the huge overhead that other systems bring with them (for example in code size) and the low barrier to entry for contributing to Syllable.
FOSDEM 2008 Nov 29, 14:40
[Announcement]Bas is going to represent Syllable again on the FOSDEM 2008 conference in Brussels in the weekend of February 23 and 24. We will have a table to present Syllable. Please come, as it's a great gathering of free software enthusiasts, and if you want to help, please contact us.
New Slovak Site Nov 19, 23:15
[Announcement]Lukas Veselovsky has opened a web site for Syllable in Slovak. Good luck, Lukas!
Newsletter #2 Nov 11, 14:48
[Announcement]Ruud has published the second issue in the new series of our Syllable Development Newsletter. It contains thirteen pages of articles, interviews and the second instalment of Kristian's programming tutorial. The newsletter is accompanied again by a software pack, rounding up seven packages that were released since the first edition.
Development Build November 4 Nov 6, 19:45
[Syllable]Another development build of Syllable Desktop is ready. From now on, the development builds will be available from their own page on the new development site. A link is on the panel on the left. The caveats are the same as for the previous build.
New Development Site Nov 4, 20:15
[Announcement]This web site has been split into subsites oriented towards different audiences. A new site was created for software developers. It can be reached through the new "Subprojects/Navigation" panel on the left and contains all the content that is specific to software development on Syllable. The API references and driver tutorials are now on-line again.
There's Something Fresh in the State of Denmark Oct 23, 23:44
[Announcement]A Danish tribe is emerging from the Syllable hordes of the north. Flemming is leading his people and his turtle to a new Danish site he has split off from Syllable Norden.
Syllable Server Emulator Images Oct 16, 16:20
[Syllable]To enable you to try Syllable Server without installation, two preconfigured virtual machine images are now available. One is for VMware [torrent (preferred), image (82 MB)]. It can also be used with QEmu and VirtualBox. The other is for other emulators such as Bochs, or also QEmu [torrent (preferred), image (81 MB)]. Please note that the latter unpacks to a file of one gigabyte. The start menu of the images provides configurations for several emulators. More detailed instructions are here. Please use the torrents if you can.
An Example to Emulate Oct 16, 0:09
[Syllable]It's the melancholical season in Scandinavia, so in an attack of nostalgia, Flemming installed the last version of AtheOS in an emulator image - exactly six years after its release. For a walk down memory lane, or to peer at Syllable's roots, have a look at this screenshot of AtheOS running on Syllable. To try it yourself, we provide a VMware image that can also be used with QEmu and VirtualBox [torrentimage (11 MB)], and a raw image that can be used with Bochs and QEmu [torrentimage (11 MB)]. Please use the torrents if you can.

For unpacking the files, you need 7-Zip [portable version, Windows version].
New Development Build Oct 10, 23:58
[Syllable]We are resuming the regular development builds of Syllable Desktop. The new build contains important stability fixes for USB, and enhancements to make the porting of software easier. There are fixes for making it easier to find the SDL extension libraries during the compilation of software. Configuration of packages that need PkgConfig during compilation is now supported. If you are building this software in a staging area, you also need to update Builder, which now also has support for PkgConfig.

The FFMPEG codec and cURL are missing from this build due to temporary build failures. If you need them, you can copy them in from the previous development build or from Syllable 0.6.4.

[Torrent, ISO, MD5 checksums.] Please use the torrent if you can.
First Syllicon! Oct 6, 10:00
[Syllable]The first development release of Syllable Server is available! It provides a text mode Linux environment, but also contains a preliminary graphical environment built on the framebuffer device, with DirectFB and SDL on top. The planned graphical environment from Syllable Desktop is not included yet. The installation procedure is short, but is still manual - and resembles the installation procedure for the old AtheOS. Included are tools such as a graphical web browser, a file manager and an editor. One thing Syllable Server is designed for is to function as a light-weight virtualisation platform for running other operating systems (or multiple instances of itself). The QEmu virtualisor/emulator is included, and the KQEmu Accelerator kernel module is integrated into the system. [Screenshot of Syllable Server running on Syllable Desktop, installation and usage instructions, torrent (80 MB), installation package (80 MB).] Please use the torrent if you can.

Dutch IT journalist Brenno de Winter already published an article about the launch of Syllable Server and a podcast interview with Kaj de Vos.
   Digg! Digg this
New Premium CD Oct 3, 0:00
[Syllable]After a long time, we have updated the Premium CD that is available from our Lulu shop. At the time, after we released Syllable 0.6.0a, we cleaned up old library versions from the system, to bring down the size of the distribution. This meant dropping support for old binary programs, so after that, our software collection was rather limited and not sufficient to build a premium CD that would contain significantly more than the basic installation CD. Since then, we have done a lot of work on our package collection, and now we have finally made time to create a Premium CD for Syllable 0.6.4. It is filled to the brim and contains all our official packages and accompanying source code.
MLGame Ported Sep 29, 15:00
[Ports]Our new and already prolific contributor Kelly Wilson has ported MLGame, a game programming framework for the OCaml language that makes use of Syllable's SDL subsystem. Kelly has also updated our OCaml port to the latest version, 3.10, which now has support for PThreads on Syllable for the first time.
New Russian Site Sep 12, 19:00
[Announcement]Resuming our regular news coverage, we are pleased to announce that our contributor Rohan has opened a new Syllable web site in Russian. It will be available from here in our redesigned links section, on the left.
syllable.org Mail Resumed Sep 12, 18:46
[Announcement]Mail addresses of the Syllable members at syllable.org are now operational again.
What's In a Name? Sep 11, 23:58
[Announcement]After having moved our domain name registrations to a new provider, we are now reconfiguring them for the new hosting situation. An effect of this will be that our site names www.syllable.org and syllable.org will not resolve for the coming one or two days. Don't worry, we'll be back.
Slashed to Dots Sep 11, 8:52
[Announcement]The unfolding story of our folding host has even made Slashdot.
Humpty Dumpty Sep 10, 10:24
[Announcement]If you've had a blast from the past lately, it may be because we're piecing this website back together again from anything we can find. Although our provider is one stiff parrot, we are making this into an opportunity to replace our troubled systems of the past with the improvements we had long been planning. We would like to thank those who have offered us hosting help. However, our plans have already been set in motion. The website you are reading now is replicated over the world on a distributed system. It should be well prepared for the extra visitors we are expecting when we release Syllable Server. The content management system is our own, which we are writing in REBOL as we speak.

"Elluk naadeel hep sun foordeel."

Johan Cruyff, after a disastrous soccer match


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