Hotline not dead yet? (Assets acquired by Hotsprings Inc.)
I know Hotline is basically dead in almost everyone's eyes...as Hotline Communications Ltd. went out of business before the release of Hotline 2.0 (which didn't look too promising, centralization and taking over your entire screen, etc, wish I had some screen shots but I don't. Carracho is promising, but in perpetual, crappy carbon port beta mode. I like the idea of putting all the administration tools, logs, etc. on the client side, much more useful when you are administrating one of those things (and less cumbersome than using Timbuktu, Remote Desktop, or some other such app.)
<a href="http://www.bigredh.com"; target="_blank">http://www.bigredh.com</a>; stopped loading the Hotline site after a while and went down, but I just recently noticed that it is now redirecting to <a href="http://www.hotspringsinc.com/"; target="_blank">http://www.hotspringsinc.com/</a>;
A quote from the site:
[quote]Hotsprings Inc.? has acquired the assets of Hotline Communications Ltd. Including the rights to all its intellectual properties such as Hotline Connect, the Hotline Client, Hotline Server and the Hotline Tracker.
Hotsprings Inc.? consists of some ex-employees, ex and new shareholders and fans of Hotline Communications Ltd., all die-hard users of the software and its avid supporters and communities that sprung up in the last five years.<hr></blockquote>
I wonder what this means for the future of the protocol...if it has one at all. There is at least one good client out there in <a href="http://ayanamichan.com/richard/frogblast/"; target="_blank">Frogblast</a>, which supports almost the entire 1.8 featureset. Maybe (but doubtfully) the protocol can be revamped...and a better X native client/server combo can be released.
I know Hotline is used almost exclusively for software/music/movie piracy, but it also has some legitimate uses.
[ 11-02-2002: Message edited by: Spart ]
[ 11-03-2002: Message edited by: Spart ]</p>
<a href="http://www.bigredh.com"; target="_blank">http://www.bigredh.com</a>; stopped loading the Hotline site after a while and went down, but I just recently noticed that it is now redirecting to <a href="http://www.hotspringsinc.com/"; target="_blank">http://www.hotspringsinc.com/</a>;
A quote from the site:
[quote]Hotsprings Inc.? has acquired the assets of Hotline Communications Ltd. Including the rights to all its intellectual properties such as Hotline Connect, the Hotline Client, Hotline Server and the Hotline Tracker.
Hotsprings Inc.? consists of some ex-employees, ex and new shareholders and fans of Hotline Communications Ltd., all die-hard users of the software and its avid supporters and communities that sprung up in the last five years.<hr></blockquote>
I wonder what this means for the future of the protocol...if it has one at all. There is at least one good client out there in <a href="http://ayanamichan.com/richard/frogblast/"; target="_blank">Frogblast</a>, which supports almost the entire 1.8 featureset. Maybe (but doubtfully) the protocol can be revamped...and a better X native client/server combo can be released.
I know Hotline is used almost exclusively for software/music/movie piracy, but it also has some legitimate uses.
[ 11-02-2002: Message edited by: Spart ]
[ 11-03-2002: Message edited by: Spart ]</p>
Comments
I just can't stand the Carracho X client. Crap Carbon port is not a taste I have acquired...
The main things I don't like about Carracho are it's interface, and the fact that it's a window nazi.
All of the buttons are those horrible-looking square ones, it doesn't even try to mimic other toolbars in OS X (i.e. Cocoa Toolbars.) Windows with lists don't use the standard X widgets (like in the Finder's list mode, or Transmit's file browser.) The icons (bar ones found when browsing files) are horrible and pixelated. And orange is not a good-looking color for Aqua.
Carracho seems to desire a different window for every function imaginable, and this gets really cumbersome on a 1024x768 display. There are more efficient methods of managing these things, as shown by Frogblast.
Other than that, it's featureset is great, and as a former administrator I can appreciate its administering tools (compared with the server-side-only administration of Hotline.)
I'm sorry, I just can't stand applications with bad interfaces. Especially those which have seperate OS X versions, and have no excuse (like OS 9 compatibility.)
[ 11-03-2002: Message edited by: Spart ]</p>