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Raimeter for Linux or Cross Platform

Report bugs with the Rainmeter application and suggest features.

Do you Want Rainmeter to be Cross Platform Enabled?

Yes
13
72%
No
5
28%
 
Total votes: 18
Rishi_Raj_Jain
Posts: 1
Joined: June 10th, 2017, 2:07 am

Raimeter for Linux or Cross Platform

Post by Rishi_Raj_Jain »

Greetings folks,

This is an Official Call for Coders! Based on (mentioned in Special Thanks) it was suggested that I place a "Call For Coders" here at the Rainmeter Group in hopes that maybe, just maybe, someone with interest or influence will be able to develop Rainmeter in either a cross-platform or platform dependent version for Linux and/or Mac OS X. Over the years this has been deeply discussed and looked into, and it is not a new request. Many attempts to utilize programs like WINE have failed to produce Rainmeter in a desirable presentation.

So why has this not been done?
1.) Rainmeter, in its current form, is directly tied into Windows, utilizing Windows libraries and other software as a backbone.
2.) We rely on the skills of those that volunteer their time to develop Rainmeter. Remember; Rainmeter is community driven by volunteers only!
3.) There is no easy way to "port" Rainmeter to other operating systems. A complete rewrite is more or less required.
4.) No one, and I mean NO ONE, from either the Linux or Mac communities, or any other programmer, has come forward with any interest to build Rainmeter for Linux, Mac or as a cross-platform software!

Make no mistake folks; We have spent the better part of 9 years asking, promoting, and approaching programmers to tackle this project. I even went so far as to approach the programmers of Conky. Ultimately I have received no response or interest from the areas of the various communities that have the skill set to make Rainmeter available on any other platform.

What is so hard about doing this?
Quite a few things actually. One of the greatest hurdles in conquering this task is to make it compatible with current skins (ie. the skin's.ini file). Any build would have to accomplish this, or at the very least, make current skins easily ported to accommodate the new language, maybe even something as simple as changing the .ini to something else.
Again, another reason is that there is no apparent easy way to port the current language and capabilities to another language.
There is also the time to develop and catch up to what Rainmeter is currently capable of, and matching development, or even developing a Cross Platform version that can exceed what Rainmeter currently does, use fewer system resources, and can become a candidate to take over for the current build.

How do we make this happen?
There will never be a Rainmeter for other platforms unless these communities hear your calls. There is strength in numbers, and those numbers need to come forth and place a call on every available channel and blog, and forum for these communities every chance they get. Keep commenting and keep bumping those comment threads.

I am a Linux, Windows multi-booter and I want to see this happen too! It is up to all of us, and the generosity of a programmer team, that will make it happen!

Special Thanks to : http://rainmeter.deviantart.com/journal/Rainmeter-for-Linux-or-Cross-Platform-CFC-224164077

Regards,
Rishi
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jsmorley
Developer
Posts: 22628
Joined: April 19th, 2009, 11:02 pm
Location: Fort Hunt, Virginia, USA

Re: Raimeter for Linux or Cross Platform

Post by jsmorley »

There is one other factor:

Market share on the desktop:

OS versions that Rainmeter runs on
Windows 7 : 49.46%
Windows 10 : 26.78%

OS versions that Rainmeter doesn't run on
Mac OS X 10.12 : 3.59%
Linux : 1.99%

https://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0

I think maybe next year is "The year of the Linux desktop". ;-)
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CyberTheWorm
Posts: 860
Joined: August 22nd, 2016, 11:32 pm
Location: Surrey, B.C., Canada

Re: Raimeter for Linux or Cross Platform

Post by CyberTheWorm »

There is already this for Linux http://gkrellm.srcbox.net/
The only source of knowledge is experience. Albert Einstein
Deviant Art Page
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FreeRaider
Posts: 826
Joined: November 20th, 2012, 11:58 pm

Re: Raimeter for Linux or Cross Platform

Post by FreeRaider »

I use conky ( https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/conky ) on my linux desktop.

I used rainmeter on linux using wine (https://www.winehq.org/ ).
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tjhrulz
Developer
Posts: 267
Joined: October 13th, 2016, 1:28 am
Location: Earth

Re: Raimeter for Linux or Cross Platform

Post by tjhrulz »

Also if I'm not mistaken wouldn't all the plugins that exist also have to be recompiled for Linux? IMO that's a bigger hurdle than rewriting rainmeter.