[GEM Development] Shane Land GEMini Release 3 now online!

[Shane M. Coughlan]

Shane Land is proud to annouce availability of GEMini Release 3, the best 
little GPL file manager out there!  You can download it right away from 
http://gem.shaneland.co.uk

GEMini is a tiny GUI file manager for FreeDOS with drag and drop, and a text 
file viewer.  It has been tested on FreeDOS Beta 9, Windows98SE, Windows2000 
and WindowsXP.  Naturally, it works best on FreeDOS :)

GEMini Release 3 is an important turning point for software in Shane Land. 
We're moving closer to OpenGEM Release 4 (the fourth major release of our 
full GUI distribution), and we're focusing on three things:

  - Reliability
  - Scalability
  - Usability

Reliability
GEMini Release 3 is based on stable commerical code (DR GEM 3.13) and well 
tested opensource code (FreeGEM Desktop 3.2.1 and FreeGEM Output). It has 
been developed since 2003, and is based on OpenGEM, which has been developed 
since 2001.  GEMini is intended to provide a solid file manager for all 
users.

Scalability
GEMini Release 3 partially impliments the update and install system that 
will be used in OpenGEM Release 4 (which is due out later this year).  This 
means that it will be easy to update and upgrade GEMini to suit your 
purposes.  If you need more applications, you can simply download and 
install them (applications will made available on the OpenGEM website 
http://gem.shaneland.co.uk as the release date of OpenGEM 4 gets closer). 
You can keep GEMini as a tiny file manager, or you can scale it up into a 
fully featured GUI with a complete office suite if you so wish.  And, if 
you're too impatient to wait for Shane Land to release additional 
applications, you can simply install them yourself from the OpenGEM SDK or 
websites like www.deltasoft.com and www.seasip.info.

Usability
GEMini is designed to install quickly and easily, and to simply work.  It's 
really focused on the end-user, and providing a simple way to deal with 
files.  It's designed to keep out of your way, and to let you just work.

If you want to develop something for GEMini or OpenGEM, or if you're just 
curious about the code, you need the OpenGEM SDK.

OpenGEM SDK Release 1 is now available for immediate download from 
http://gem.shaneland.co.uk.

OpenGEM SDK is a collection of tools, source code and binary for the
creation of OpenGEM/GEM/FreeGEM applications.  It includes:
- GEM bindings for Pacific C, DGJPP and Turbo Pascal
- Pacific C compiler
- DR GEM 3.13 complete binaries source code
- FreeGEM AES binaries and source code
- FreeGEM desktops binaries and source code
- Multiple GEM binaries of core units (DR GEM 1.2, 2.0, 3.0 etc)
- GEM binaries for all applications released under GPL
- Many source code sections for GEM applications
- All the GEM driver binaries and source code
- Many tools for making and altering GEM code and settings
- Documentation to help you get started

In short, OpenGEM SDK Release 1 is the one-stop-shop to get started with
creating applications for GEM, or for altering the GEM GUI enviroment.  It's
the most complete collection of tools, code and applications yet released
for the platform.

Finally, a little note about OpenGEM Release 4, the forthing complete GUI 
release.

I think OpenGEM Release 4 will be a surprise.

It will have a quick way to install updates and new applications.  You
simply place files into a folder, and OpenGEM will see them when it starts.
It'll ask you if you want to install, and if you select yes, then it's done.
No more hassle.

There will be two OpenGEM Release 4 distributions:

OpenGEM Core
- this will be the core applications of OpenGEM, and will be just a little
bigger than the current GEMini.

OpenGEM Complete
- this will be the core applications of OpenGEM plus things like fonts and
different printer drivers.

There will be an update for GEMini Release 3 to OpenGEM Core, and an update
for OpenGEM Release 3 to OpenGEM Complete.

I will also be releasing the GEM applications as seperate OpenGEM install
files so that you can download and install the ones you want, without having
to download all of them at once.

To download GEMini Release 3 or OpenGEM Release 3, or the OpenGEM SDK, 
please visit http://gem.shaneland.co.uk

Regards

Shane
gem at shaneland.co.uk
gem.shaneland.co.uk