GNOME 2.0 Desktop Alpha: "Rolig Liten Hattgubbe"

[Jeff Waugh <jdub perkypants org>]

GNOME 2.0 Desktop Alpha: "Rolig Liten Hattgubbe"
================================================

The first public testing release of the GNOME 2.0 Desktop, "Rolig Liten
Hattgubbe", is ready for your testing pleasure! It is available for
immediate download here:

  ftp://ftp.gnome.org/pub/GNOME/pre-gnome2/releases/gnome-2.0-desktop-alpha/

Due for general consumption in March, the GNOME 2.0 Desktop is a greatly
improved user environment for existing GNOME applications. Enhancements
include anti-aliased text and first class internationalisation support, new
accessibility features for disabled users, and many improvements throughout
GNOME's highly regarded user interface.


Build Requirements
------------------

- The tarballs included in the release. :)

- Some very basic packages not distributed with this release, such as image
  libraries, freetype and mozilla. These should all be included with or
  available for your distribution.

- autoconf 2.52, automake 1.4-p4, libtool 1.4.2, pkgconfig 0.8.0

- If you are installing GNOME 2.0 alongside 1.4, you *need* recent GNOME 1.4
  library / developer platform packages.

A (dia format) dependency graph for the developer platform and desktop
release is available on the dot.plan website:

  http://developer.gnome.org/dotplan/notes/depends.dia


Testers
-------

If you have incredible talents at breaking GNOME, perhaps even to rival
Telsa's infamous path of destruction (and excellent bug reporting of said
path), this alpha release is made for you!

When reporting bugs, use http://bugzilla.gnome.org/ or bug-buddy. Make sure
you choose the correct version number, as reports against versions included
with the alpha will be given higher priority than reports against
unspecified releases.

Note that by default, the software is built with debugging turned on, and
most programs spit plenty of output to your terminal as they run. This means
that whilst programs may run somewhat slower, the information supplied with
bug reports will be far more helpful to the maintainers. Before submitting a
bug report, try running the software from your terminal to see if it
provides extra information.

We'll answer this one before it becomes a FAQ: If you want to test
anti-aliasing, you need to set the GDK_USE_XFT environment variable, eg:

  export GDK_USE_XFT=1


Bug Squad
---------

Whether you're testing GNOME 2.0 or not, you can still help out with the bug
busting efforts by triaging and tracking bugs in bugzilla. Join the bugsquad
mailing list, and hang out on #bugs (on irc.gnome.org) to get involved.

  http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-bugsquad/

For help with bugzilla accounts, email bugmaster gnome org 


Distributors
------------

This release is not intended for inclusion in distributions. However, binary
packages for bleeding edge testers on your platform are very welcome. Please
email the release team <gnome2-release-team gnome org> if you have built
packages for your platform.


Hackers
-------

When reporting bugs is simply not enough, and you'd prefer to make your own
(or, indeed, fix the ones you find), this release is also made for you! The
best places to send your patches are to the module maintainers, bugzilla or
the relevant mailing list.

Most modules include a TODO list file, and you can find a lengthy release
wide todo list on the dot.plan site (this will migrate over to bugzilla
soon). The modules most in need of attention are nautilus, gnome-media, and
sawfish.

  http://developer.gnome.org/dotplan/todos/


Happy testing!

- The GNOME 2.0 Release Team

-- 
 "First: This is not a race." - Jody Goldberg on the Free Software desktop