After some weeks working to provide a good platform to every eyeOS developer, we are ready to announce the roadmap for the next eyeOS version: eyeOS 1.6.0.

eyeOS 1.6 will introduce both system and applications improvements, and will be the first eyeOS release ever to include also an optional add-on for Windows, Linux and Mac OSX.

Synchronization with local files and folders (see blueprint)

eyeOS 1.6 does incorporate a new system (based on the xml-rpc protocol) which will allow external desktop applications to communicate with every eyeOS in the world through the port 80. With this new addition, the same day of eyeOS 1.6 release we will release eyeSync 1.0, a tool to automatically synchronize local files and folders with your eyeOS system.

By just selecting which folders do you want to keep synchronized, eyeOS will maintain it updated with your virtual eyeOS computer, asking you to resolve conflicts with files modified in both ways and keeping the folders always updated with your eyeOS without requiring any action from the user (the system does detect changes in the folders and sends them to eyeOS every time we save changes on a file or copy/remove files locally).

With eyeSync (that will ask you for the eyeOS server you’re working on, your username and password, and the path you want to sync with local folders), eyeOS will include a brand new functionality for the whole system: an online backup of all your data, which can be accessed (and many times also read and updated) from everywhere in the world with an Internet connection, through eyeOS.

eyeOS Mobile Access (see blueprint)

With the new eyeOS Mobile Access (accessible from every mobile phone with a WAP/Mobile HTML browser) you will be able to access your eyeOS files, download them to your mobile phone and upload new ones.

The new Mobile Access will provide a new cool feature for mobile phones: Office files viewing, through the existent eyeConverter to read Office and OpenOffice documents. This means that you will be able to see documents, spreadsheets and presentations from your mobile phone, without installing any new software into it.

Desktop Widgets (see blueprint)

The new eyeOS 1.6 desktop will include three default widgets activated: miniCalendar, miniMessages and miniHome, that will inform you what do you have planned for today (and optionally navigate to other dates with the included calendar), see new and last received messages in eyeMessages and see how much space do you have occupied in your account.

The new widgets will be controlled with a new Widgets Box app which will allow you to see which widgets are installed in the system, add new ones to your desktop and remove existent ones.

Improvements in Calendar and Contacts (see blueprint)

As we did with eyeOS 1.5 and Office, eyeOS 1.6 will include hot improvements for eyeCalendar and eyeContacts, making easier to share information between users using this applications, providing more usability and options.

With the improvements and the XML-RPC system, we can expect for next versions sync tools between the most used desktop apps for calendar and contacts (Microsoft Outlook, Novell Evolution, Mozilla Thunderbird…) and eyeOS PIM tools (eyeCalendar and eyeContacts).

Integrated add-ons from eyeOS-Apps website

eyeOS 1.6 will integrate some cool add-ons (from themes to apps and games) from the eyeOS-Apps community.

For example, the new version will come with the Light Desktop theme, the eyeTetravex game -being the second official game in eyeOS-, eyeXMLViewer and some more.

Improvements in eyeSheets

The Save function in eyeSheets was removed in the eyeOS 1.5 release. Hard work has been done from then, creating a new library which is being used in many projects now, with the collaboration of an eyeOS community member (Juan Lao Tebar). This library (php-ods in Sourceforge) will be used to provide the save functionality in eyeSheets.

Improvements suggested by the community

After the release of eyeOS 1.5, Alexandre Mejat (an eyeOS community member) started a topic in the forums called Suggestions for eyeOS 1.6. While lots of the ideas that appeared there do need some hard work on the system, we have read all the ideas and some of them will be included in eyeOS 1.6.

This ideas include improvements in the themes system (allowing the customization for the four borders in the windows or allowing themes to auto-run applications in the user’s desktop when activated or deactivated, for example).

Note that this kind of topics should be now posted in the new Development Community, specially in the Blueprints pages for registering projects and ideas around eyeOS, which will make much easier to find developers for each idea and get it implemented in the next eyeOS versions.

Optimizing the downloaded data

A new effort on minimizing the amount of data which is sent to the user’s browser on the eyeOS login is being done. eyeOS 1.6 will come with optimized JS libraries and CSS files.

The goal will be to save a 30% of the sent data.

Summary and dates

The new eyeOS 1.6 release will come during April. You can expect the eyeOS 1.6 Beta on an online server to test it (specially the new mobile and sync platforms) by April 15th.

We have noticed the Developers Community it’s starting to rise. We would like every eyeOS developer or user interested in the eyeOS development to join the project’s Mailing Lists to make everything easier to coordinate.

The new ideas have been also added to the eyeOS Launchpad page for Blueprints (ideas and projects). You can follow their continued development from there.

Once again, thanks to the whole community which does help to improve eyeOS day after day.