netlabs.org has published biweekly newsletter #165 to update everyone on their latest developments. Recent updates include ACPI, Dynamic Windows Library, Java, Lucide, QT4, Samba, and more. You can sponsor netlabs.org, which helps fund development on various projects. From VOICE News.

Lewis Rosenthal has been been working with Philip Chee of xSidebar fame, adding SeaMonkey support to some Firefox and Thunderbird extensions. They should show up on xSidebar in time, but Lewis has some available (5/11/2012) on his FTP server, including FireFTP.

Dave Yeo has released an unofficial build of Firefox 10.0.4 (5/7/2012) from the Gecko 10 "Extended Support Release" branch. This is similar to the earlier test build 3, but with the proper "Firefox" branding; it requires libc065. Firefox is a stand-alone browser based on Mozilla code. See my Warpzilla Tips page for more information.

Martin Iturbide recovered the source code of some old OS/2 apps written by Gary L. Robinson, and with his permission has released them as open source. Included are ZipZap, MailRun, Stats, NetChat, CMDHere, and DataPad.

Dave Yeo has released unofficial builds of SeaMonkey 2.7.2 and Thunderbird 10.0.4 (5/4 and 5/5 respectively) from the Gecko 10 "Extended Support Release" branch. SeaMonkey does not officially support ESR builds, which is why only the internal / Gecko version number (10.0.4) has changed. Compared to earlier Gecko 10 builds, it now requires libc065, and there should be much fewer focus issues. SeaMonkey 2.9, Firefox 12.0, and Thunderbird 12.0 have been released for the "tier 1" platforms; with the shortage of developer time, it is unlikely we will see OS/2 builds of these Gecko 12 applications any time soon. SeaMonkey is a continuation of the Mozilla Suite, while Thunderbird is a stand-alone mail/news client based on Mozilla code. See my Warpzilla Tips page for more information.

Warpstock 2012 will be held Friday through Sunday, August 17-19, at the Embassy Suites Airport in Portland, Oregon; a short ride on the light rail from downtown Portland. Topics and presenters are needed; current ideas include: C++ WORKSHOP; NETWORK TROUBLESHOOTING WORKSHOP; DOCUMENTATION ROUNDTABLE; INSTALLING GIMP WORKSHOP; OPENJDK INSTALLATION WORKSHOP; INSTALLING A SCSI SCANNER WITH SOFTWARE SUPPORT; and CUPS, NETDRIVE AND SAMBA. Friday's sessions will be tailored to provide help to those experiencing problems with their systems, followed by a Welcome Dinner on Friday night. The sessions on Saturday and Sunday morning will consist of more formal presentations, and end with lunch on Sunday. Thanks to Andy Willis for the info.

eComStation.Ru is collecting information about which POS printers work with OS/2. From VOICE News.

The IcedTea-Web browser plugin is being ported as part of the Java for OS/2 project, to support running Java applets in web browsers. In addition, the next release of Odin32 (most likely version 0.8.5) will contain additional fixes for running the old IBM Java tools, such as the TCP/IP configuration app.

Mensys is working on eComStation 2.2, which will include the latest driver updates, including ACPI, AHCI, and MultiMac. In addition, OpenOffice.org 3.4.0 is almost ready for release and will be available to Software Subscription Services members.

JExpress version 8.0.1 has been released (5/18/2012). This lets you create Java-based multilingual installers and auto-updaters. An easy to use Swing interface lets you design your installers quickly without requiring any programming. It can also select the exact classes your Java app uses, build your directory tree, and produce JAR files.

Stendhal version 1.00 has been released (5/17/2012). This is a multi-player online adventure game / MMORPG, which requires Java 1.5 or later.

Stunnel version 4.52 has been ported (5/16/2012) to OS/2. This is a program that allows you to encrypt arbitrary TCP connections inside SSL (Secure Sockets Layer); you can secure non-SSL aware daemons and protocols (like POP, IMAP, LDAP, etc).

Jmol version 12.2.25 has been released (5/16/2012). This is a Java molecular viewer for three dimensional chemical structures; it requires Java 1.4 or higher.

PMDLL version 2.10 has been released (5/15/2012). This allows you to view DLL dependencies of OS/2 executables. From VOICE News.

SMplayer version 0.8.0 has been ported (5/14/2012) to OS/2. This is a GUI frontend for MPlayer, based on the Qt4 graphics toolkit.

qBittorrent version 2.9.8 has been ported (5/14/2012) to OS/2; this QT app is a Bittorrent client.

Btrieve Commander has been updated (5/14/2012). This is a Btrieve file viewer / editor.

GeoGebra version 4.0.31.0 has been released. This is software for learning and teaching math, from elementary school to university level; it requires Java 1.5 or higher.

NZBGet version 0.8.0 has been ported (5/12/2012) to OS/2. This is a binary newsgrabber, which downloads files from usenet.

A test update for XWorkPlace to fix ACPI shutdown has been released (5/8/2012). It uses the latest ACPI toolkit code, so will work as long as "acpistat poweroff" does.

Alex Taylor has released Almost VIO, a monospaced bitmap font inspired by the "System VIO" font, offering larger point sizes. Also available is Almost Swiss version 1.00, which is a proportional bitmap font based on Helv, offering larger point sizes.

SmartSVN version 7.0.1 has been released (5/7/2012). This is a Java GUI client for Subversion version control systems, with many features. It does not officially work with OpenJDK, but apparently does function.