No news are bad news

**remi** · 06 February 2007, 01:18 AM

The future of "Xara Xtreme for Linux" is uncertain in my eyes. Xara Xtreme for Linux is the fastest vector graphics editor avialable for Linux, but it's a OpenSource project without OpenSource developers. The reasons for this are already discussed in this forum and I see no hope for the next half year. Answers about questions like "is this project dead" aren't available at the moment.

In the meantime the OpenSource Community celebrates the new version of Inkscape (V0.45) with new functions like Gaussian blur for vector objects, faster display speed and interactivity and better bitmap tracing functions.

To be fair: I wouldn't know how to handle this muddled situation. But I hope, there is a future for Xara Xtreme under Linux.

Regards,
Remi

**PFX** · 06 February 2007, 07:57 AM

Same pessimism. It seem that Xara will not participating in LGM2007.
So there is a lot incertainty... and no given clarification...

PFX.

**remi** · 06 February 2007, 05:52 PM

Yes, it seems Xara Xtreme for Linux isn't part of the second "Libre Graphics Meeting" in Montreal (4, 5 and 6 of May 2007 in Montreal, Canada) - a conference about OpenSource graphics software and a meeting point of OpenSource developers and users.

"At the opening of the Libre Graphics Meeting 2006 in Lyon, France, Xara released most of the source code of Xara Xtreme for Linux in an updated website with details on how to access the sources."
(source: Wikipedia article about Xara Xtreme)

Remi

**con** · 06 February 2007, 07:06 PM

Think the reason ppl are not active in the development of Xaralx is that the code base is big and most devs of the caliber that xara requires are busy with other big projects like KDE and stuff like that....should also be mentioned that even KDE which has been open source since the beginning, has problems getting devs involved, basically cause its written in C++ (==not the easiest language to program in) and the code base is big, which turns it into a big no-no for beginning/intermediate devs who dont have the skills but otherwise would be willing to learn.

I dont think Inkscape poses a big threat to Xara as it is not as polished and hasnt got alot/any of the features that make Xara the great tool it is.

Just my 2 cents....

**stuseven** · 06 February 2007, 07:36 PM

+ I wouldnt give up on XaraLX yet... it is still too soon after
the code was made available... I am sure when programmers
can begin to learn how it is written, improvement of XaraLX
will continue, though perhaps those who started this effort
may have moved to other work.
Still, XaraLX as it is, is a wonderful drawing program which
does what very few other programs can.
I think the major reason for this kind of slow-down... and
we see it repeatedly in opensource... is, after producing a
working program, developers simply dont have a reason to
make it "perfect"... its good enough to use, and that is good
enough. If it were a matter of giving a few hours to help fix
some problem, that would be different... when youre talking
full time, it just isnt practical to expect a group of programmers
to do this, every day for months or years, just to produce a
free program for people to grab up. Really, it comes to this...
if people really wanted a better XaraLX, then they would work
for it... its not enough just to complain about problems, and
ask for new features, if this certainly is part of the growing
process. So, maybe the answer is... XaraLX already is very
good, and hopefully, it will get better too.

**jedfrechette** · 07 February 2007, 01:01 AM

I'm sure things have been a little hectic around Xara central recently so I'm willing to cut them a little slack but I must say my optimisim continues to decrease the longer this question goes unanswered. Judging by the number of comments asking about the open source version in the original MAGIX thread I would say a fair number of others are interested as well. So what do you say Xara, what does the future hold for the open source version of Xtreme?

A) MAGIX's acquisition of Xara does not affect our plans to continue development of an open source cross-platform version of Xtreme.
B) Due to MAGIX's acquistion of Xara and/or other factors we have decided to stop development of the open source version of Xtreme.
C) We are unsure or are unable to say what effect MAGIX's acquisiton of Xara will have on future development of the open source version.

It certainly would be a shame if this was the end of the open source version. There is definitely room for more than one open source vector drawing program and a little friendly competition never hurt anyone.

I am continually impressed with Inkscape and for many tasks its tools are superior to Xtremes. Unfortunately, even with some of the recent performance improvements it can be painfully slow with complicated figures. Hopefully, some of the refactoring that is in the works will help to address this. As for me, until there is some evidence that development of a cross-platform version of Xtreme will continue all of my new figures will be in Inkscape, despite its performance issues.