Suggestions for improving a message

Today speaking with fellow KDE devels we realized some of them had the region set to the default C region, that basically means something like USA region but not completely, so not something you want when living not in USA.

Currently the name for that text entry for that is "Default", that may lead to problems as you might think the "Default" region is the correct, but it most probably is not. Some people suggested to switch to "Not Set" which is not completely accurate as it is set to C region, but will probably help "non-purist" users to set the correct Region. Other options go through "Default (Not Set)" or "Not Set (C Region)", etc.

So i'm asking the wider audience here, what would you think it would be the better wording?

To see it live go to systemsettings->Regional & Language, choose "Country/Region & Language" option on the left bar and "Country or Region: YourCurrentRegion (change...)" is what we are talking about.

Poppler 0.6.4 released

Poppler 0.6.4 is available from http://poppler.freedesktop.org/poppler-0.6.4.tar.gz

Changes since 0.6.3:
 Qt4 frontend:
  * Fix crash on links that point to a non existant page
  * Make Document::renderHints return the correct render hints
  * Fix infinite loop when parsing LineAnnotation

 core:
  * Fix crash in the Splash renderer when T3 fonts are badly defined
  * Draw underlined Links correctly

 utils:
  * Fix two use after free bugs in HtmlOutputDev.cc

 build system:
  * Fix build on mingw32

 tests:
  * Distribute the glade file of pdf-inspector

ktank project seeking for developers

KTank project, formed by DrIDK and Ikit, two new french KDE developers that can be often found on #kdegames, aims to create a nice Tank vs Tank game for KDE.
They already have some nice 2D openGL engine


But of course as any other project out there they need more [wo]manpower, specially they are looking for someone that can create nice sounds and songs (rockets have to sound BIG) and also someone with some GGZ knowledge for the multiplayer side, so if you want to be involved in a cool KDE game write to istdasklar free fr or drop by the IRC kdegames channel.

KDE 4.0.0 dinner in Barcelona

If you are from Barcelona and want to come to the dinner we organize for Saturday 12 night with KDE programmers, translators and supporters, drop me a mail at aacid@kde.org before Friday night, everyone is welcome!

libspectre 0.2.0 now available

A new libspectre release is now available from http://libspectre.freedesktop.org/releases/libspectre-0.2.0.tar.gz

That means more work for when KDE 4.1 branch opens, damn!

Changes since libspectre 0.1.0
==================================

API additions:

- Rendering unstructured documents: it's a bit confusing calling
get_page for a document with no pages. The following functions has
been added for rendering unstructured documents:

* spectre_document_render
* spectre_document_render_full
* spectre_document_get_page_size

- Tile rendering: spectre_page_render_slice has been added to allow
rendering rectangles of the page. (Bug #13754)

API changes:

- spectre_render_context_set_page_size determines the size of the
output image, but it doesn't affect the scale factor anymore.

- spectre_render_context_[set|get]_scale now require the scale factor for
both the X and Y dimensions.

Translate!

Hello, this is Albert speaking from my new KDE 4 i18n/l10n coordinator position.

If you have always wanted to help KDE and you have knowledge of a language different than english you can do it! Join today your local Translation team and you will improve your english but also your native language skills :-)

Translations for KDE4.0 are closing in about 12 days but there will be a 4.0.1 so don't worry of being late!

And congrats to Portuguese team that has a 100% translation!

libspectre 0.1.0 now available

First libspectre release is now available from:
http://libspectre.freedesktop.org/releases/libspectre-0.1.0.tar.gz

What is libspectre
==================
libspectre is a small library for rendering Postscript documents. It provides a convenient easy to use API for handling and rendering Postscript documents.

Dependencies
============
libspectre depends on libgs which is available at http://www.ghostscript.com

More information about libspectre
=================================
Web site: http://libspectre.freedesktop.org

The programming manual: http://libspectre.freedesktop.org/manual

Bug reports and feedback: https://bugs.freedesktop.org/ Product: libspectre

And yes, in the TRUE cross-desktop spirit this library is programmed by gnome and KDE people :-)

Valgrind 3.3.0

The cool valgrind crew has released a new version, from the NEWS file:

*********
3.3.0 is a feature release with many significant improvements and the
usual collection of bug fixes. This release supports X86/Linux,
AMD64/Linux, PPC32/Linux and PPC64/Linux. Support for recent distros
(using gcc 4.3, glibc 2.6 and 2.7) has been added.

The main excitement in 3.3.0 is new and improved tools. Helgrind
works again, Massif has been completely overhauled and much improved,
Cachegrind now does branch-misprediction profiling, and a new category
of experimental tools has been created, containing two new tools:
Omega and DRD.
*********

Omega is cool it actually tells you when a leak just happened instead of having to wait to the end of program execution to know you have a leak :D

And i already blogged on how useful helgrind can be to detect problems in thread programs, but i'll say it again, helgrind rocks too!

Terry Pratchett has rare Alzheimer

Today is a bad day :-(

Eek!

Poppler 0.6.3 and Poppler-data 0.2.0 released

Poppler 0.6.3 is available from http://poppler.freedesktop.org/poppler-0.6.3.tar.gz

Changes since 0.6.2:
 poppler core:
  * Fix crash in extra debug code

 glib frontend:
  * Make sure passwords are passed correctly to poppler core

 Qt frontend:
  * Fix crash on documents that specify an empty date

 build system:
  * Disable gtk tests if the user disabled glib frontend

Poppler-data 0.2.0 is available from http://poppler.freedesktop.org/poppler-data-0.2.0.tar.gz and contains lots of new cmaps and nameToUnicode and unicodeMap files so if you are a non strictly latin1 user be sure to grab it.

KDE-EDU Paris meeting summary

So here's my KDE-EDU Paris meeting summary:
* 14 nice people, some people already knew like annma and carsten and new faces like jpwhiting and SaroEngels
* Fixed issues everywhere ktuberling, kalzium, kgeography, blinken, kate, catalan translation, ... Ok, not all are KDE-EDU related but we are KDE developers after all too, right? ;-)
* Fixed an ugly bug together with Jure 'JLP' Repinc about kickoff search not finding items when their GenericName was not defined, it results in ktrader syntax you have to check that properties exist before using them or you get a tree evaluation error, so it is not (GenericName contains Foo) or (Name contains Foo) but ((GenericName exists) and (GenericName contains Foo)) or (Name contains Foo)
* Together with apol we helped a bit Vladimir making Step compilable standalone and as part of playground-edu and BTW if you have not tried Step, do it NOW! It totally ROCKS.
* Helped SaroEngels with an okular problem on CanNotSayTheNamePlatform, it seems KMimeType::findByPath always returns text/plain on the CanNotSayTheNamePlatform so it's actually not a problem in okular.

Preliminary KDE-EDU screenshots^WPhotos

KDE-EDU meeting has started on Mandriva offices at Paris, some quick photos for the impatient.

okular, libgs and crashes on Debian and derivatives

If you are trying postscript rendering on okular, be advised you need to have a recent version, the more recent the best. (around 8.60 or so should good enough)

Unless you use Debian or any of its derivatives that reuse their patches (like Ubuntu) because they are using a patch (06_libpaper_support.dpatch) that makes libgs crash when you reuse the gs instance.

Fortunately for the patch creator there is not any program i know that reused the gs instance, until now. Okular is reusing it and now we crash because of someone patching library code and not being prudent.

So next time you touch library code be prudent! And if you are not the main developer of it be more than prudent!

Translations, Merchandising and a plug

This saturday we hold the KDE 4 Catalan translation marathon, if you want to join KDE Catalan translation team it's the moment! Come and help us making the translation ready!

I have some merchandising left from Akademy-es, 5 baseball caps, 3 t-shirts (1 S, 2 XXL) and "lots" of stickers, if you are from Spain contact me. Of course all money goes to the e.V.

And now the shameless plug!

A friend has started a new Software Company in Barcelona, called AteneaTech, they specialize on Web Accessibility and Usability and with SaaS and any kind of custom development you need. So if you need such a service from anyone, think on them and i'll win a dinner for each new customer that mentions me ;-)

helgrind is back!

Today i was having a hard time debugging some code of mine that used threads and i thought of helgrind, as of valgrind 3.2.3 trying to use it gives you

Helgrind is currently not working, because:
(a) it is not yet ready to handle the Vex IR and the use with 64-bit
platforms introduced in Valgrind 3.0.0
(b) we need to get thread operation tracking working again after
the changes added in Valgrind 2.4.0
If you want to use Helgrind, you'll have to use Valgrind 2.2.0, which is
the most recent Valgrind release that contains a working Helgrind.

Sorry for the inconvenience. Let us know if this is a problem for you.

So i downloaded valgrind 2.2.0, but it complained about me having a too new glibc, so i downloaded valgrind from svn and YES! it's there :-) It made me realize i needed to add QDeepCopy to some QStrings and it is working now :-) Yet again valgrind to the rescue!

Poppler 0.6.2 released

Available from http://poppler.freedesktop.org/poppler-0.6.2.tar.gz

Changes since 0.6.1:
poppler core:
* Fix CVE-2007-4352, CVE-2007-5392 and CVE-2007-5393
* Fix a crash on documents with wrong CCITTFaxStream
* Fix a crash in the Cairo renderer with invalid embedded fonts
* Fix a crash with invalid TrueType fonts
* Check if font is inside the clip area before rendering
it to a temporary bitmap in the Splash renderer. Fixes crashes on
incorrect documents
* Do not use exit(1) on DCTStream errors
* Detect form fields at any depth level
* Do not generate appearance stream for radio buttons that are not active
* mingw fixes

build system:
* Require fontconfig >= 2.0
* builddir != srcdir fixes

Qt4 frontend:
* Improved documentation

misc:
* Fix FSF address

Testing, patches and bug reports welcome.

Spanish computer shops to sell Free Software

I read from a Mercè Molist article (spanish) that the "Spanish Association of Small and Medium Sized Computer and New Technologies Companys" will inform their clients about free software, computers more compatible with it and how to claim back Windows fee if you bought a Windows preloaded computer. A really nice move, let's see what's its future.

Paris here we go

Just bought my tickets for KDE-edu meeting in Paris. In 40 days i'll join the edu KDE crew to ensure KDE keeps being the best educational desktop out there :-)
BTW, from yesterday to today the plane ticket price was like 15€ more expensive, so if you are planning to come, reserve FAST!

Iberia is weird

So i go to Iberia.es to book some flights. I try to get Barcelona->Paris (just one way) for 30th November. Price is 632 €. OUCH. Then i try Barcelona<->Paris (roundtrip) coming back home the 2th of December and it costs 136€. Errr, what?

Anyone with insight in how flight companies work can explain that nonsense? Or is it just that French hate us and they let us go to do some tourism and come back but not just go? :-D

Update: The french hating us is a JOKE. I've been twice to Paris and it has been great.

Zaragoza here we go

Just bought my tickets for aKademy-es 2007. In 30 days i'll join all the Spain KDE crew and do some talks, party and coding, all in the correct proportion. Now i just need to think what to talk about... And BTW you are ALL invited to join us and enjoy the event, it's free!