Xara releases Xtreme open source code at Libre Graphics meeting

Xara recently announced that it planned to make its flagship product Xara Xtreme available as open-source under GPL license. At the Libre Graphics meeting in Lyon on 18th March, Xara announced that, after the last few months of readying the source code, it has now made the first release of the majority of the Xara LX source code for public download.

All source code compiles under GCC and has been made 32-bit and 64-bit compatible.
The framework, based on WXWidgets, replacing the Windows MFC framework is largely done and works very well.
It loads and renders Xar files and demonstrates the speed and quality of the Xara rendering.
Working tools and functions include:
- Select an object, scale, and drag it on the page. Delete, group, ungroup, duplicate objects. Undo and redo work.
- Zoom and pan tools work with a really slick Windows update
- Xara is making its subversion server public so that anyone can now download the source code and compile.

Commenting on Xara's goals, Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Ubuntu Linux and the second space tourist, says: "The announcement by the Xara team positions them well for the growing wave of momentum behind free and open source software. In each market sector, there is emerging a dominant open source application to challenge the existing dominant proprietary application. I wish the Xara team every success in their efforts to ensure that Xara becomes the leading open source graphics application, and to craft a strong community and business around that work."

Xara is inviting contributors to help progress the Linux port. "Xara has done all the ground-work and we hope that we can find contributors who can spare some time to help bring, what we believe, will be the most advanced graphics tool, to the Linux platform," says CEO Charles Moir. "We hope and intend this product to be a flagship Linux application, bringing graphics capabilities that more than compete with the best available on Windows and the Mac to the Linux platform. We hope development progress will accelerate now that we've made code available under GPL."

Demo movie

If you want to see what Xara Xtreme can do, there are demo movies available in various formats here

Demo download

You can find more details here

Source code download

Editors

For further details please contact: Nova Fisher, Communications Director, nova@xara.com nova@xara.com

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About Xara Group Ltd

Xara has been developing cutting edge software in the UK since 1981. Xara has developed a wide range of products covering the whole realm of publishing and graphics software. Xara Xtreme is the world's fastest, and many believe the world's best drawing and illustration software.

Xara has a particularly strong technology and innovation history. It pioneered many of the graphics technologies and techniques used by the industry today. Many of its User Interface techniques have been adopted by the industry. From the very beginning Xara has been involved in the online world. Doing most of its business via the Internet, Xara has gained millions of customers worldwide. Xara Online provides leading edge online Web Service based solutions.

About MAGIX AG

MAGIX is an internationally operating provider of software, online services and digital content for using multimedia products and services in personal communication. MAGIX offers private and professional users technologically advanced and user-friendly software, online services and digital content for designing, editing, sharing and archiving digital photos, videos and music. In 2005, based on sales of products through retail distribution of photo, music and video software, MAGIX held a leading market position in Germany and various other European countries, and was one of the three leading market players in the USA.