-wxWindows 2 beta 5
-------------------
-
-Welcome to wxWindows 2, a sophisticated cross-platform C++
+wxWidgets 2.5.3
+---------------
+
+*** Please note that this is an UNSTABLE DEVELOPMENT SNAPSHOT.
+*** Unless you need the new features and bug fixes, you may wish to
+*** use the official 2.4.x stable series. You are still encouraged
+*** to try the releases from 2.5.x branch, of course, and unstable
+*** doesn't mean that they crash all the time -- just that the API
+*** may change in backwards incompatible way. If this doesn't frighten
+*** you, do try this release and please let us know what you think!
+
+Welcome to wxWidgets, a sophisticated cross-platform C++
framework for writing advanced GUI applications using (where
possible) the native controls.
-In addition to common and advanced GUI facilities such as frames, scrolling
-windows, toolbars, tree controls, icons, device contexts,
-printing, splitter windows and so on, there are wrappers for common
-file operations and facilities for writing TCP/IP applications.
-Where certain features are not available on a platform, such as MDI and
-tree controls on Unix, they are emulated.
+In addition to common and advanced GUI facilities such as
+frames, scrolling windows, toolbars, tree controls, icons,
+device contexts, printing, splitter windows and so on, there are
+wrappers for common file operations, and facilities for writing
+TCP/IP applications, thread handling, and more. Where certain
+features are not available on a platform, such as MDI and tree
+controls on Unix, they are emulated.
+
+A detailed 1800-page reference manual is supplied in HTML, PDF
+and Windows Help form: see the docs hierarchy.
-A detailed 700-page reference manual is supplied in HTML, PDF and
-Windows Help form.
+For a quick start, point your Web browser at docs/html/index.htm
+for a list of important documents and samples.
-For a quick start, point your Web browser at docs/html/index.htm for a list of
-important documents and samples.
+Changes in this release
+-----------------------
+
+Please see changes.txt for details.
Platforms supported
-------------------
-wxWindows 2 currently supports the following platforms:
+wxWidgets currently supports the following platforms:
-- Windows 3.1, Windows 95/98, Windows NT
+- Windows 95/98/ME, Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Pocket PC
+- Most Unix variants with GTK+ 1 and GTK+ 2
+- Most Unix variants with X11 (beta)
- Most Unix variants with Motif/Lesstif
-- Most Unix variants with GTK+
+- MacOS 9.x and 10.x using Carbon (10.3 and above preferred)
+- MacOS 10.x using Cocoa (beta)
+- OS/2 (beta)
-Most popular C++ compilers are supported; see the release notes
-(available via docs/html/index.htm) for details.
+Most popular C++ compilers are supported; see the install.txt
+file for each platform (available via docs/html/index.htm) for details.
+See also http://www.wxwidgets.org/platform.htm.
Files
-----
-Depending on what you downloaded, you may have one or more of
-these ports. You may unarchive any or all of the ports into
-the same directory hierarchy. The zip archive set comprises the
-following:
-
-wx200gen.zip Generic source code and samples (required)
-wx200msw.zip Windows-specific source code
-wx200mot.zip Motif-specific source code
-wx200gtk.zip GTK-specific source code
-wx200stubs.zip Stubs ('empty port') source. Needs
- wx200gen.zip/wxgen.tgz.
-wx200doc.zip Documentation source code (not required)
-wx200hlp.zip WinHelp documentation
-wx200pdf.zip Acrobat PDF documentation
-wx200htm.zip HTML documentation
-wx200vc.zip MS VC++ 5/6 project files
-wx200bc.zip Borland C++ 5 project files
-wx200cw.zip Metrowerks CodeWarrior 4.1 project files
-
-The tarred, gzip archive comprises the following (or similar
-names). Not all of these files are available in all distributions, due
-to space restrictions.
-
-wxgtk.tgz All wxGTK source and samples
-wxmotif.tgz All wxMotif source and samples
-wxstubs.tgz Stubs ('empty port') source. Needs
- wx200gen.zip/wxgen.tgz.
-wxgen.tgz Generic code and samples (common to all ports)
-wxpdf.tgz Acrobat PDF documentation
-wxhtml.tgz HTML documentation
-wxdocsrc.tgz Documentation source
+The distribution is available in archive formats appropriate to the
+target system. See the download pages for details.
Installation
------------
-wxWindows 2 needs to be compiled before you can test out
-the samples or write your own applications.
-For installation information, please see the install.txt file
-in the individual directories:
+wxWidgets needs to be compiled before you can test out the samples
+or write your own applications. For installation information, please
+see the install.txt file in the individual directories:
docs/msw
docs/gtk
docs/motif
+ docs/mac
+ docs/cocoa
+ docs/x11
+ docs/mgl
+ docs/os2
Licence information
-------------------
docs/lgpl.txt
Although this may seem complex, it is there to allow authors of
-proprietary/commercial applications to use wxWindows in
+proprietary/commercial applications to use wxWidgets in
addition to those writing GPL'ed applications. In summary,
-the licence is L-GPL plus a clause allowing unrestricted
+the licence is LGPL plus a clause allowing unrestricted
distribution of application binaries. To answer a FAQ, you
don't have to distribute any source if you wish to write
-commercial applications using wxWindows.
+commercial applications using wxWidgets.
+
+However, if you distribute wxGTK or wxMotif (with Lesstif) version
+of your application, don't forget that it is linked against
+GTK+ (or Lesstif) which is covered by LGPL *without* exception
+notice. Under Linux systems your app is probably linked
+against LGPL glibc as well. Please read carefully LGPL, section 6.
+which describes conditions for distribution of closed source applications
+linked against LGPL library. Basically you should link dynamically and
+include source code of LGPL libraries with your product (unless it is
+already present in user's system - like glibc usually is).
+If compiled with --enable-odbc (Unix only), wxWidgets library will
+contain iODBC library which is covered by LGPL.
+
+If you use TIFF image handler, please see src/tiff/COPYRIGHT
+for libtiff licence details.
+
+If you use JPEG image handler, documentation for your program should
+contain following sentence: "This software is based in part on the work of
+the Independent JPEG Group". See src/jpeg/README for details.
+
+If you use wxRegEx class on a system without native regular expressions
+support (i.e. MS Windows), see src/regex/COPYRIGHT file for Henry Spencer's
+regular expression library copyright.
+
+If you use wxXML classes or XRC, see src/expat/COPYING for licence details.
Documentation
-------------
-See docs/changes.txt for a history of changes to wxWindows 2.
See docs/html/index.htm for an HTML index of the major documents.
+See docs/changes.txt for a summary of changes to wxWidgets.
+
+See docs/tech for an archive of technical notes.
+
+The wxWidgets bug database can be browsed at:
+
+ http://sourceforge.net/bugs/?group_id=9863
+
The Windows help files are located in docs/winhelp.
The PDF help files are located in docs/pdf.
Further information
-------------------
-The wxWindows Web site is located at:
+The wxWidgets Web site is located at:
- http://www.wxwindows.org
+ http://www.wxwidgets.org
-The wxGTK Web site (with further wxGTK-specific files and
-information) is located at:
+The main wxWidgets ftp site is at:
- http://www.freiburg.linux.de/~wxxt
+ ftp://biolpc22.york.ac.uk/pub
-The main wxWindows ftp site is at:
-
- ftp://www.remstar.com/pub/wxwin
-
-A wxWindows CD-ROM with the latest distribution plus an HTML
+A wxWidgets CD-ROM with the latest distribution plus an HTML
front-end and hundreds of MB of compilers, utilities and other
-material may be ordered from the CD-ROM page:
-
- http://www.wxwindows.org/cdrom.htm
-
-or contact Julian Smart <julian.smart@ukonline.co.uk>.
+material may be ordered from the CD-ROM page: see the wxWidgets
+web site.
-Good luck!
+Have fun!
-The wxWindows Team, February 1999
+The wxWidgets Team, October 2004