Eazel releases Nautilus 1.0 on the sly

Hasn't told anyone it's there - yet

By Tony Smith • Get more from this author

Posted in Software, 13th March 2001 13:54 GMT

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Eazel has released the first full version of its 'Linux for the rest of us' desktop user interface, Nautilus.

Version 1.0 was made available for download yesterday, along with the source code, though the company has yet to make any official announcement of Nautilus' availability. The software will be launched fully later this month, according to company spokesfolks.

Nautilus 1.0 follows Eazel's three preview releases, and offers improved stability and performance, said Tom Goguen, Eazel's director of product management, according to a Newsforge report last week.

The new release adds full support for Eazel's online services - the basis for the company's business model, since the software itself is to be offered free of charge - and an installer app for Red Hat Linux 6.1/6.2/7.0.

Red Hat plans to bundle Nautilus in due course. Sun intends to use it as Solaris' shell.

Nautilus 1.0 currently sits on top of Gnome 1.2, but it will eventually be built into Gnome 2.0, providing the desktop environment with integrated remote and local file and system management, and Web browsing. Essentially Nautilus brings all these services together through a single, consistent interface.

For example, Nautilus can take text selected in a document and use it as the basis for a Google search - saving users from having to copy the text, fire up a browser, load Google's home page, paste in the text and hitting the Search button.

"Now everything in a document is a potential hyperlink," said Goguen.

Other features include an easy-to-use software update system and a suite of integrated digital music apps to record, rip, catalog and play MP3 files. ®