Update and news from Charles Moir

**Skadge** · 15 February 2007, 03:13 PM

Some interesting news on the dev-list :

I was asking some update on the status, and I got within 5 min this answer from Charles:

The project is not stopped. We continue to check in any submitted patches and improvements as always and do daily builds etc. Our internal developers are tied up with other priorities right now, but of course we welcome and will support all and any external developers willing to contribute to the project.

I hope to have a more detailed statement about the future of the project soon.

Charles

Then, concerning the closed source CDraw:

But why is this the big question?

The source code of all the product is available with the exception of
CDraw rendering core. This doesn't stop the product working. We make the
binary of this available for free to be distributed with Xara Xtreme.
(And increasing numbers of distros are distributing completely closed
source products such as Flash Player and Adobe Reader, and most Linux
users have these installed even where they are not distributed as part
of the OS). The lack of CDraw source code certainly doesn't stop Xtreme
being progressed and developed by any interested developers if they were
interested in helping us progress the product.

So isn't it a bit of red-herring to be focussed on this small part only?

We've held back on CDraw partly because it's simply not necessary to
have the source code of this to develop, improve, fix bugs, add new
features or all the other things that I'd imagine most users would be
looking for. It's obvious this part is complete, and works perfectly
well (as you can tell using the product), so why the fixation on CDraw?

The original plan and hope was, if you recall, that *together* the
community and Xara would help create a world (and Microsoft and Adobe)
beating product. Well Xara have put a huge amount of time, money and
effort into the product so far, and we've got great result, but there's
not much 'together' in this so far.

So we still hope and look forward to the time where the community can
help us develop the product and achieve that original goal to create the
best graphics product that has ever existed on the Linux (and other)
platforms. We're still working very hard to make that happen.

Charles

Nice to know that people are still alive, working on the project. I think the Xara team wasn't enough thanked for what they've accomplished. Their application is great ! So: thank you !

**con** · 15 February 2007, 04:11 PM

So theyre waiting for outside devs...damn, if I had the skills I'd start hacking right away...Guess I could do some translating...is there a page where I could find out what languages Xara is already translated to?

Thanks for posting Skadge

**fjgaude** · 15 February 2007, 04:18 PM

Personally, Charles Moir's feelings about CDRAW as a binary is valid. Consider what has happened with Novell joining forces with Microsoft, and Ubuntu joining with Linspire: we see a blend of proprietary and open source.

What does it gain us to be pure, pure OSS? The world needs more folks working together to achieve a goal. Everyone has to make a living one way or the other. The folks at Xara Ltd. that did most of the coding to get Linux version to where it is deserve our thanks, even though they were working on salary during the time.

There is nothing like Xara on Linux. I've worked with Inkscape off and on and even with its latest update, Gaussian blur, and it is almost an embarrassment to go from using Xara to Inkscape, because of the loss of speed, quickness, and increase in key strokes and complexity.

So let's give Xara team a big thanks for what they have done so far, and ask others who have the ability to help, to please help, in creating a most worthy design software.

frank

**eobet** · 15 February 2007, 06:34 PM

And again, not a word about the OS X version...

**Soquili** · 15 February 2007, 06:53 PM

I think people are missing the point about Open Source Software. Linux and/or OS X developers other than Xara Group Ltd (now owned by Magix) employees should not be expected to produce all the work.

Developers from the Linux and OS X communities are required for any Open Source program to prosper. Waiting for Xara to dedicate develpers and money is not what Open Source is about.

The fact that Xara Group Ltd was bought by another company is a very good indicator they do not and have not had assets that allow them to devote a lot of time and money they cannot afford.

Charles nor anyone else can say work on OS X or the Linux version can be expected to have a deadline. Reading through the mail lists there have been few OS X developers available or willing to give of their time.

Just my 2 cents (USD) which is worthless for anything today (even a gumball costs 25 cents

).

**StevenWWinters** · 15 February 2007, 09:02 PM

Has Xara ever stated whether source for cdraw will be released? I thought the plan was for it to be, but perhaps that has changed...

**ajdlinux** · 18 February 2007, 03:22 AM

It *is* important to have an open source CDraw because until then Xara is Free Software that depends on non-Free Software. This means, for example, that Xara must be in Debian's non-free repository, rather than 'main'. If CDraw was open sourced there's a much bigger chance that Debian users and users of other 'completely free' distros would install it.

Projects that run on an open source platform (Linux), are open source in themselves (like xara) but depend on a closed library (CDraw) generally aren't all that well received by the community.

If it's such a small deal releasing CDraw as open source then why doesn't Xara just do it? It could get more attention then.

**jedfrechette** · 18 February 2007, 04:27 AM

For an excellent analysis of why Xara's open source strategy isn't working I suggest anyone who is interested read this message by Carl Worth

http://www.xaraxtreme.org/maillists/.../msg00038.html

**remi** · 18 February 2007, 01:49 PM

Charles already mentioned one of the main reason, why CDraw wasn't published up to now: There is no great feedback from "the Community" to develop new features like the completion of the SVG import/export filter. There are only members of "the Community" who asks for CDraw to include this piece of code into other projects like Linux OS or competition projects. There was even a developer who likes to do a port of Xara Xtreme for Linux for the Windows operating system, which is surely not the goal of Xara Ltd. and all the developers who work on this product for their living.

All the great developers of "the Community" wants "CDraw", but there was only one developer who was willing to do some coding for Xara Xtreme for Linux so far (I'm talking about Alex). Perhaps there was one or another two who tries to do a Mac OS X port, but that's all.

Under these circumstances I wouldn't recommend to open the source code of CDraw to all the nice competitors out there, which likes to call themselve "the Community"...

Regards,
Remi

**thewump** · 19 February 2007, 06:13 PM

I think the question here is what can we DO to help? I can't code.. but I can be an evangelist.

http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=336515

If we all make a commitment to do what we can to raise the profile of XaraLX in the Linux community we are a part of that can only do good. Xara comes up in the ubuntuforum about once every few days, and I'll see what I can do about catching those posts and help people understand the product and promote it.

I'll go create a blog posting too.. these are things we can ALL do. The more buzz there is from the user community the more interest there will be in the developer community.

Keith