- Inkscape Announcements - Inkscape Mailman

[Inkscape] Seeking help re:Conservancy Supporter fundraiser
by Bryce Harrington 12 Jan '16

12 Jan '16

We apologize that we're interrupting the usual content on this mailing list with a fundraising message, but the non-profit home of Inkscape, Software Freedom Conservancy, is in urgent need of your immediate support: https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/ Inkscape receives a variety of important services (see https://sfconservancy.org/members/services/ ) from Conservancy. Inkscape has relied on Conservancy since 2006, and we hope you can help them out. They also support an array of other important Open Source projects, including Git, Samba, Wine, and dozens of others - see http://sfconservancy.org/members/current/ for the entire list. While Inkscape and these other projects each contribute 10% of their gross revenue to Conservancy's general fund, this doesn't add up to enough to even employee one full time person, let alone the already overworked staff of three that Conservancy has. Conservancy's fundraiser is asking people who support our principles to donate donate $120/year ($10/month), to support the organization. Conservancy seeks about 2,500 Supporters to continue its current work, and 750 Supporters to continue a "bare minimum" of services to its projects. Already as of the time I write this, 721 people have signed up, so your donation might be the one that ensures the basic community services continue forward or it could start paving the way towards establishing a solid commons for protecting our license freedoms. Whenever I make donations, I like to know how it is tangibly helping achieve progress on things that I care about. Here are some specific things that Conservancy has done for Inkscape over the past few years: * Handling all of our Google Summer of Code payments and travel, tending to the financial transactions with Google to receive and then disperse the money. We're planning on GSoC involvement again this year, and will be depending on Conservancy to handle all the financial bits in order to help make it all proceed smoothly. * Coordinating travel reimbursements for Inkscape contributors to attend conferences. They were instrumental in directly helping us plan, organize, and arrange the 2015 Inkscape Hackfest, and will be helping us organize another hackfest in 2016. * Receiving and tracking all donations. We've received tens of thousands of dollars in donations from you (thank you!) and without Conservancy, our attentions would be consumed by financials instead of remaining focused on the software development. The Conservancy provides access to their ledger system, giving Inkscape great transparency over our finances, while unburdening us from the responsibilities of handling all the individual donations and transactions. * Collaborate with us in crafting the legal policies to establish a Funded Project system for Inkscape. This new system will enable donors to choose specific development tasks to pursue with their money, giving the Inkscape community a powerful way to directly influence the future of the project. * Recovering lost money in Inkscape's paypal account. * Handling book royalties from publishers of Inkscape manuals. * Handling thank-you gifts to developers. In 2015 we distributed programming manuals to Inkscape's top contributors, which proved to be a very cost effective educational effort! * Keeping the non-profit status for us so that Inkscape doesn't have to form its own org and file its own paperwork. In 2015 Conservancy helped us revise our legal charter, the Fiscal Sponsor Agreement (FSA), that defines how Inkscape operates under non-profit rules, board elections, and so forth. Beyond these basic services, Inkscape also benefitted from Conservancy's wider category of license protection services. These services are currently at risk and will only continue if the 2500 membership mark is attained by the community. * Protecting the Inkscape trademark and logo. They helped us finally get the Inkscape name and logo officially trademarked in the U.S. This benefits users by preventing various knock-off scams that purport to sell Inkscape or market scammy services or products using our name. * Enforcing the GPL for Inkscape. Unfortunately we've had a few instances of companies attempting to rebrand Inkscape and sell it as their own proprietary product. We don't have a problem with companies re-distributing Inkscape, so long as it is done according to the GPL license. When nefarious entities seek to subvert that, Conservancy provides the legal muscle necessary to stop it. As you can see, Inkscape relies on the important work of Conservancy. Please donate to Conservancy - if you do so before January 31, the donation will be counted double thanks to a generous matching donation provided by Private Internet Access. (Conservancy is a 501(c)(3) charity incorporated in New York, and donations are typically deductible on U.S. taxes.) Please visit: https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/ And please also support Inkscape's SVG Standards work here: https://inkscape.org/en/support-us/svg_working_group/ Bryce

1 0

[Inkscape] Inkscape Version 0.91 is Released!
by Bryce Harrington 31 Jan '15

31 Jan '15

The Inkscape community proudly announces the release of Inkscape 0.91. https://inkscape.org/en/download/ Inkscape is a drawing and painting tool similar to Illustrator, CorelDraw, and Xara X, but with features, new tools, and interface style of its own. It emphasizes the W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format, but reads and writes a wealth of other formats including PDF, so it is an easy complement to your other graphics and desktop tools. Best of all, Inkscape is created *by* the community *for* the community: Inkscape is 100% Open Source and freely available to everyone in the world. This release marks the culmination of a multi-year effort to switch to a new internal graphics rendering engine, Cairo. This brings performance enhancements and more accurate rendering of drawings. Thanks go especially to Google for sponsoring much of this work. A new Trace Pixel Art feature enables creation of vector art from bitmaps, sprites, and icons. A new Symbols Library provides reusable graphics elements - you can even read in Visio symbol libraries. New Snapping options and improved Snap preferences make it easier to quickly place items in the alignments you need. The tools for arranging objects offer several new ways to position the elements of a drawing. Tons of other little improvements have been made across all the other tools as well. Several new file formats are supported, including FXG, SIF and HTML5 export; and VSD and CDR import. EMF/WMF are now readable and writable for all platforms. And XCF, PDF, EPS, and PS+LaTeX support are improved. Inkscape has a rich Extension ecosystem, which is well known for bringing clever, cool, and innovative new ideas. Over a dozen new extensions are added in this release, including an Isometric Grid Generator, a Bitmap Cropper, a Text Extractor and a Text Merger, an HSL Adjuster, a Font Replacer, a Voronoï Diagram Creator, and more. The above barely scratches the surface of all the new stuff included in this release. For the full story, including examples and screenshots, please see our detailed Release Notes: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Release_notes/0.91 The Inkscape developers plan to meet for a 3-day Hackfest in Toronto at the end of April 2015. You can help us to improve Inkscape by donating to help cover travel, room and board so our international volunteer developers can attend the hackfest in person: https://inkscape.org/en/donate/hackfest/ Bryce

1 0

[Inkscape] Inkscape Version 0.91 is Released!
by Bryce Harrington 31 Jan '15

31 Jan '15

The Inkscape community proudly announces the release of Inkscape 0.91. https://inkscape.org/en/download/ Inkscape is a drawing and painting tool similar to Illustrator, CorelDraw, and Xara X, but with features, new tools, and interface style of its own. It emphasizes the W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format, but reads and writes a wealth of other formats including PDF, so it is an easy complement to your other graphics and desktop tools. Best of all, Inkscape is created *by* the community *for* the community: Inkscape is 100% Open Source and freely available to everyone in the world. This release marks the culmination of a multi-year effort to switch to a new internal graphics rendering engine, Cairo. This brings performance enhancements and more accurate rendering of drawings. Thanks go especially to Google for sponsoring much of this work. A new Trace Pixel Art feature enables creation of vector art from bitmaps, sprites, and icons. A new Symbols Library provides reusable graphics elements - you can even read in Visio symbol libraries. New Snapping options and improved Snap preferences make it easier to quickly place items in the alignments you need. The tools for arranging objects offer several new ways to position the elements of a drawing. Tons of other little improvements have been made across all the other tools as well. Several new file formats are supported, including FXG, SIF and HTML5 export; and VSD and CDR import. EMF/WMF are now readable and writable for all platforms. And XCF, PDF, EPS, and PS+LaTeX support are improved. Inkscape has a rich Extension ecosystem, which is well known for bringing clever, cool, and innovative new ideas. Over a dozen new extensions are added in this release, including an Isometric Grid Generator, a Bitmap Cropper, a Text Extractor and a Text Merger, an HSL Adjuster, a Font Replacer, a Voronoï Diagram Creator, and more. The above barely scratches the surface of all the new stuff included in this release. For the full story, including examples and screenshots, please see our detailed Release Notes: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Release_notes/0.91 The Inkscape developers plan to meet for a 3-day Hackfest in Toronto at the end of April 2015. You can help us to improve Inkscape by donating to help cover travel, room and board so our international volunteer developers can attend the hackfest in person: https://inkscape.org/en/donate/hackfest/ Bryce

1 0

Re: [Inkscape] [Inkscape-devel] inkscape-0.91pre4 source tarball
by Bryce Harrington 23 Jan '15

23 Jan '15

On Wed, Jan 21, 2015 at 05:32:25AM -0700, Brynn wrote: > Regarding > > > One of the major remaining tasks we have is to write up release > > announcements. The drafts are being developed here: > > > > http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php?title=AnnouncePlanning091 > > Assuming the draft shown there is the current working draft, I would suggest > "Everyday people" might come across in a negative way. At least, it makes > me feel a little offended. I think there could be a better way to indicate > that people use Inkscape for all kinds of reasons or purposes, beyond > professional ones. Good point. Perhaps more emphasis on the types of *drawings* would be better than the people. > And I think more emphasis could be given to non-professional uses, because > in reality....or at least in my experience, Inkscape is used more by > non-professionals than by professionals. > > I didn't change that wiki draft, because I haven't been in contact with that > group, and don't want to offend anyone; and also, because I have no positive > concept of marketing, and won't be able to write my thoughts properly (to > sound like marketing). > > Easy suggested changes: "Other people", "People", "Non-professionals" (to > replace "Everyday people"). As Tav alluded to, we've generally drafted two separate announcements - a formal one that we intend to work more like a news release and be disseminated far and wide on a large variety of news sites. And a second informal one to be sent to blogs and more community oriented places, more conversational in tone. For the latter, informal press release, I definitely agree we should focus to more everyday type users. The formal one may have longer legs if we more emphasize the professional uses of the program - that is to say, more news sites may pick it up and distribute it to more people if it sounds like a professional scale tool. But again, we may be better off focusing on the professionalism of the *drawing* more than the professionalism/non-professionalism of the person doing the drawing. > More involved suggestions: Here are some of the non-professional uses that > I've come across, in my participation in forums: > > - someone making a new icon for their business > - someone making a layout for their business card, or letterhead, or etc. > - someone drawing a banner for their Facebook, or a website, or even for a > brick and mortar business > - people making drawings for use with digital home/craft cutter machines, or > vinyl cutting or laser etching, or wood routing (CNC), or even using > Inkscape drawing for a digital metal cutting machine > - someone making illustrations for a book they wrote, or pamphlet or flyer > for their business > - someone making a holiday card or party invitation or poster > - someone making decals for their motorcycle > - someone making decals for their model cars, trucks, etc. > - people making designs to be printed on fabric (t-shirts, sweatshirts, > hats, etc.) > - people trying to develop their artistic and design skills > - having fun Right, so half of those I would call "professional uses" even if the artist isn't doing it professionally. This is a good brainstorming list. We could pick out 3 to 5 items to make mention of in the release, perhaps even include examples of those they can see if they click-thru the links to our website? > So those are not just "everyday people". They are business owners, or > leaders of organizations, or teachers, or parents. (and actually, teachers > ARE professionals, even though not professional artists) > > Maybe instead of the sentence starting with "Everyday people", it could be > something like: Many non-professionals use Inkscape for things like: " and > then list a few of those things? Or, "Inkscape is used for professional-quality drawing, like: ..." > Just a couple of thoughts :-) Keep 'em coming brynn! Bryce > Thanks for listening, > brynn > > > -------------------------------------------------- > From: "Bryce Harrington" <bryce@...22...> > Sent: Monday, January 19, 2015 1:42 AM > To: <inkscape-announce(a)lists.sourceforge.net> > Cc: <inkscape-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net> > Subject: [Inkscape-devel] inkscape-0.91pre4 source tarball > > > Download it at: > > > > https://inkscape.org/en/download/ > > > > Tagged on the release branch as: > > > > INKSCAPE_0_91_PRE4 > > > > This likely is the last pre-release before our official release. There > > are a few more remaining changes that Josh and I are aware of, but > > nothing to cause undue delay. Hopefully the release will be finalized > > within the coming week. > > > > Please make sure any bugs you find are properly recorded in the bug > > tracker[1]. If you find particularly serious issues, please also make > > sure the issue (and any work-arounds) are detailed in our Release > > Notes[2], and hopefully we can tackle them in future point releases. > > > > Packagers, if you haven't already I recommend using this release as an > > opportunity to try out the new package upload system on the main > > website. Make sure to set your uploads as Mirrored, so we can start > > utilizing the new mirroring service. Please see Martin's tutorial > > posted on Dec 31st, and contact him directly if you need permissions or > > help uploading. > > > > One of the major remaining tasks we have is to write up release > > announcements. The drafts are being developed here: > > > > http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php?title=AnnouncePlanning091 > > > > It needs formal and informal announcements written. To see what we need > > to make it look like, see: > > > > http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php?title=AnnouncePlanning046 > > > > In particular we'll need to identify a few volunteers to send the > > notices out. I can take care of a portion of the notifications but > > there's quite more to do than I'll have time for, and so would > > appreciate any help. > > > > Bryce > > > > 1: https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/ > > 2: > > http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Release_notes/0.91#Known_issues > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > New Year. New Location. New Benefits. New Data Center in Ashburn, VA. > > GigeNET is offering a free month of service with a new server in Ashburn. > > Choose from 2 high performing configs, both with 100TB of bandwidth. > > Higher redundancy.Lower latency.Increased capacity.Completely compliant. > > http://p.sf.net/sfu/gigenet > > _______________________________________________ > > Inkscape-devel mailing list > > Inkscape-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net > > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-devel > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > New Year. New Location. New Benefits. New Data Center in Ashburn, VA. > GigeNET is offering a free month of service with a new server in Ashburn. > Choose from 2 high performing configs, both with 100TB of bandwidth. > Higher redundancy.Lower latency.Increased capacity.Completely compliant. > http://p.sf.net/sfu/gigenet > _______________________________________________ > Inkscape-devel mailing list > Inkscape-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-devel

1 0

[Inkscape] inkscape-0.91pre4 source tarball
by Bryce Harrington 19 Jan '15

19 Jan '15

Download it at: https://inkscape.org/en/download/ Tagged on the release branch as: INKSCAPE_0_91_PRE4 This likely is the last pre-release before our official release. There are a few more remaining changes that Josh and I are aware of, but nothing to cause undue delay. Hopefully the release will be finalized within the coming week. Please make sure any bugs you find are properly recorded in the bug tracker[1]. If you find particularly serious issues, please also make sure the issue (and any work-arounds) are detailed in our Release Notes[2], and hopefully we can tackle them in future point releases. Packagers, if you haven't already I recommend using this release as an opportunity to try out the new package upload system on the main website. Make sure to set your uploads as Mirrored, so we can start utilizing the new mirroring service. Please see Martin's tutorial posted on Dec 31st, and contact him directly if you need permissions or help uploading. One of the major remaining tasks we have is to write up release announcements. The drafts are being developed here: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php?title=AnnouncePlanning091 It needs formal and informal announcements written. To see what we need to make it look like, see: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php?title=AnnouncePlanning046 In particular we'll need to identify a few volunteers to send the notices out. I can take care of a portion of the notifications but there's quite more to do than I'll have time for, and so would appreciate any help. Bryce 1: https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/ 2: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Release_notes/0.91#Known_issues

1 0

[Inkscape] Inkscape sponsorship for LGM attendees
by Bryce Harrington 02 Mar '14

02 Mar '14

Interested in meeting up with fellow Inkscapers? Thanks to generous donations to the project, we are able to provide funds to reimburse five developers up to $500 each for attendance at the Libre Graphics Meeting in Leipzig in April. Anyone in the AUTHORS file as of Feb 19th, 2014 is eligible to apply. To register, please email Tavmjong Bah, our coordinator for the event, by March 6th to get on the list. He'll let you know what position you are in the list. Then, register for the conference, enjoy your time, and save your receipts. Afterwards email copies of the receipts to Tav, who will forward them along to SFC for reimbursement. A maximum of $500 US each will be reimbursed to five attendees for travel, hotel room, and food. Note that the LGM meeting may also give partial reimbursements, so if your total costs exceed $500 they may be able to help. In addition, the board is sponsoring Tavmjong Bah to attend both LGM as a speaker and as our event coordinator, and the co-located SVG Working Group Meeting. Tav will be representing Inkscape's interests at the SVG meeting, and will be working with them on features including mesh gradients, hatched fills, and auto-flowed text. Thank you to everyone who has contributed to Inkscape in the past. Your funding has made these sponsorships possible. We've found these face-to-face meetings invaluable both for sharing ideas and as general inspiration for advancement of the project. Bryce

1 0

[Inkscape] Inkscape joins the Open Invention Network
by Bryce Harrington 27 Feb '14

27 Feb '14

Inkscape has been invited to join as a member of the Open Invention Network. On Tuesday, the Inkscape Board voted in favor. In so doing we pledge to never use patents aggressively against the Linux System. We would never do this of course so the step is merely symbolic, but an important symbol. We are joining almost 750 projects and companies from the software industry (see http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/licensees.php) in a pledge that covers over 2,100 Open Source packages. This helps to reduce risk on the core Linux System and other middleware technologies. Valer Mischenko of OIN sums it up: "This is the largest community to address software patent challenges in the world. The idea is: when everybody pledges freedom, there will be no wars." For more information, please read on, or go to openinventionnetwork.com Bryce ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [Inkscape-board] [REFERENDUM] Should Inkscape Join the Open Invention Network? Resolved: The Inkscape Project agrees to join as a member of the Open Invention Network. In so doing we pledge to never use patents aggressively against the Linux System. Votes: Five votes in favor, none against. Motion passes. Josh Andler a Johan Engelen a Bryce Harrington a Jon Cruz a Tavmjong Bah a (Votes not received from Ted Gould and Mental Guy) http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_name=20140225080118.GB2… On Sun, Feb 23, 2014 at 11:38:07PM -0800, Bryce Harrington wrote: > Proposal: > > [ ] a. Join the Open Invention Network (OIN). Pledge that the > Inkscape organization would never use patents aggressively > against the Linux System. > [ ] b. Remain independent from the Open Invention Network. > > > Background: > > Hi Bryce, > > My name is Valer and I am writing to you on behalf of the Open Invention > Network (OIN). Our mission is to support projects developing or using > Linux-related and open source technology by deterring patent aggression. > > We do this through a community that pledges not to assert patents > against each other over the Linux System technology. This pledge covers > over 2,100 Open Source packages. It is structured to reduce risk on core > operating system and middleware technologies. Almost 750 projects and > companies from all areas of technology creation, deployment and use have > joined our community so far (see not very up to date list: > http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/licensees.php) > > We want to invite Inkscape to our community. > > You may be interested in our community credentials and to get some more > context about our work. Here is an endorsement from Eben Moglen, > Chairman of the Software Freedom Law Center: > http://emoglen.law.columbia.edu/now/organizations/OIN > > Here is an endorsement from Jim Zemlin, Executive Director of the Linux > Foundation: > http://www.linux-foundation.org/weblogs/jzemlin/2009/09/09/protecting-linux… > > Our community is free to join. The only thing we want is a pledge that > Inkscape would never use patents aggressively against the Linux > System. Of course it never will, and that's a symbolic gesture, but it > remains very important for our work. When we also bind big companies > with this pledge we are sure they will not attack ç in this context for > example. But their participation in OIN is also very important in > various other aspects. > > And these companies are numerous. For example Valve Software and Dropbox > are on of the latest bigger companies joined in. UnitedStack from China > joined just a weeks hours before. Pretty much everyone else is in there > too, from Red Hat to GNOME, Fujitsu to CentOS, Google to KDE to > OpenStack Foundation. This is the largest community to address software > patent challenges in the world. The idea is: when everybody pledges > freedom, there will be no wars. > > We are passionate supporters of the Linux System and open innovation. I > hope we can work together by welcoming Inkscape to our non-aggression > community. Every single voice helps us face current market challenges > while investing in a more collaborative future. > > Attached is a very short overview of OIN + FAQs, but I am happy to > answer any questions and to explain in more detail why the pledge of > Linux System and open source patent non-aggression is so important for > open innovation. > > May you decide positively there is a possibility to sign online: > http://licenses.openinventionnetwork.com > > Please consult to Johan, Tavmjong, Ted and Josh and let me know what you > guys think. > > Regards, > Valer Mischenko, > Open Invention Network > > www.openinventionnetwork.com

1 0

[Inkscape] Announcing lib2geom 0.2.0 (http://2geom.org)
by Joshua L. Blocher 27 Oct '08

27 Oct '08

2geom is a library for performing geometric calculations on paths and curves. It was started as a replacement for the various incomplete, incompatible and incorrect path data structures in Inkscape. After a busy year with johan, verbalshadow and mgsloan working on the inkscape port to 2geom; jfbarraud and marco developing some sophisticated new geometric operations; acspike writing a python binding; cilix, pjrm and goriccardo checking details and mental doing everything in between, we are releasing a new release for distributions and in particular, inkscape and scribus to target. The latest version is available from: https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=167845 We discuss technical issues on a mailing list, but the real discussion happens on the jabber channel (though in bursts - you need to hang around for a while; most discussion happens around evening UTC to evening west coast US time). lib2geom@...37... <mailto:lib2geom@...37...> Of course we have the usual sourceforge bug tracking and feature request tracker. It is hard to list all the features that made this release special, so I'll let you read the release notes if you are that sort of person. For the rest of us, download it, build it, and start playing with the toys! njh

1 0

[Inkscape] Inkscape 0.46 Released!
by Bryce Harrington 25 Mar '08

25 Mar '08

The Inkscape community today is announcing the release of the newest version of its open source vector graphics editor. Inkscape 0.46 is a major update that introduces native PDF support. The implementation of PDF support in Inkscape provides an easy, open source solution to editing PDF documents. Tons of new features and performance improvements are included in this release. Dialogs now have the ability to be docked to the editing window. Gradients can be edited completely on-canvas. The new Paint Bucket Tool fills bounded areas with color. A new 3D Box tool helps create perspective-correct drawings. A new Tweak tool provides an intuitive method for editing paths and painting objects. The new Live Path Effects feature can create "brushes" and various organic effects on paths. Improvements to color management include support for color spaces other than sRGB. Most SVG filters are now implemented, and a new powerful UI is provided for editing filter stacks. == Downloading Inkscape 0.46 == Inkscape 0.46 is already included by default in Ubuntu Hardy so just install it normally. Ubuntu Gutsy users can install by adding the following to System : Admin : Software Sources : Third-Party Software: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/inkscape.testers/ubuntu gutsy main deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/inkscape.testers/ubuntu gutsy main Macintosh OS X users can download a Leopard Universal package from our SourceForge site: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=93438 Packages for Fedora, Debian, Windows, and other platforms should be coming soon. == For more information == Complete Release Notes for 0.46: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/ReleaseNotes046 Community Contributed Screenshots: http://inkscape.org/screenshots/ Bryce

1 0

[Inkscape] Interview with Ted Gould: SVG, Inkscape, and Web Standards
by Joshua Zeidner 18 Feb '08

18 Feb '08

"I was lucky enough to be able to have an in-depth discussion with Ted Gould regarding the future of Inkscape and SVG. We spoke a bit about Inkscape's history, its future, and the role SVG will play in the web in coming years." http://joshuazeidner.blogspot.com/2008/02/ted-gould-svg-inkscape-and-web.ht… -jmz

1 0