AKFAvatar

Version: 0.18.0

AKFAvatar is software where an image of an avatar appears on the screen and tells things written in a balloon. First the avatar moves slowly in from the right side. Then text is shown in a balloon.

You can use the libakfavatar library for your own C programs. There is also a Pascal-binding for GNU-Pascal and Free Pascal.

The program avatarsay can be used as a fancy user interface for textconsole programs¹, or as a fancy text-reader or manpage-viewer¹. Furthermore the program supports some basic commands, so it can be used as a scripting-language for simple demos.

Please check out the Max and Maurice Demo!

AKFavatar is Free Software. Free Software is about freedom, not price. Free Software means, users have the freedom to run it for any purpose, to read the source code and to change it to their needs, and to redistribute copies with or without changes.

It has been a long time since the last official release. But work on the next version is ongoing. It just takes a little longer this time.

The next release will come with Lua as integrated scripting language. So writing applications for AKFAvatar will be a lot easier.

Those who want to test it can already get a test-version. But it is still undocumented and the interface can still change until the release.

Status:

• Alpha (under construction, but usable)
• News — (Feed)
• ChangeLog (current development state)

Author:

• about Andreas K. Förster
• Contact
• GnuPG key: 0xB8D66FEA
  (needed to check the digital signatures)

Source:

• akfavatar-0.18.0.tar.bz2 (signature)
• Git Repository — Browse Source Code
• Anonymous Checkout:
  git clone git://git.sv.nongnu.org/akfavatar.git

Exexutable forms for avatarsay and the AKFAvatar-runtime-library:

Can be used from any directory; not suited for software-development.

• GNU+Linux:
  akfavatar-0.18.0.bin.gnu-linux.x86.tar.bz2 (signature)
• FreeBSD:
  akfavatar-0.18.0.bin.freebsd.x86.tar.bz2 (signature)
• Windows 95 or newer: (just partly supported)
  akfavatar-0.18.0.bin.w32.zip (signature)
  Items marked with ¹ are not relevant for Windows.
  Limitations: Under Windows you cannot use avatarsay for viewing manpages and you cannot use it as user interface for textconsole programs.

Additional Software:

• required: SDL-1.2
  You need the “Runtime Libraries” as well as the “Development Libraries” to compile the source code!
• recommended: SDL_image for extended functionality
• optional: XdgUtils¹

Demos:

Hint: press F11 for fullscreen-mode and Pause for a pause.

• Max and Maurice Demo (5.8MB, English version without audio, Public Domain)
• Max und Moritz Demo (14MB, German version with audio, Public Domain)

Manual:

• AKFAvatar Manual as HTML
• AKFAvatar Manual as PDF (A4)
• AKFAvatar Manual as compressed PostScript (A4)
• other formats and languages

Other websites:

• Savannah project
• Free Software Directory
• FreshMeat
• AKFAvatar in the german LinuxWiki
• New: AKFAvatar and a role-playing game TextRPG (German)

Communication:

Note: to post a message on savannah when you are not logged in, you have to enter a given number at the bottom of the form. That is a basic anti-spam test.

• Discussion Forum: browse items or submit an item
• Bug-reports: browse items or submit items

License:

• GPLv3 or any later version

Notes about the license:

• The GPL is only relevant for you, if you want to give copies to others. If you use the software in private for your own use or your own pleasure, there are no obligations at all.
• This software is not in the Public Domain, but it is covered by Copyright law. Being Free Software means, a lot of things are allowed, but it does not mean that anything goes. Especially it is not allowed to make it practically unfree for others.
• You are welcome to share copies of the software. For example you can put them on your own website. But please keep in mind, that you are not allowed to distribute only binaries, you also have to make the source code available then (for details see section 6 of the license). Without the source code, the freedom to learn from it or to modify it to ones needs would no longer be given.
• Also commerial use and distribution is explicitely allowed by this license.
• The license is quite long and complicated. But please read at least the Preamble. That is a good summary of the whole license.
• The library is also licensed under the GPL version 3. It is not licensed under the LGPL and there is no linking exception.
• This means, if you publish a program that is linked with the library, you are bound by the terms of the GPL and your software must be published under the same license.
• Programs running in the terminal emulation or use pipes to communicate with avatarsay are however separate entities and are not bound by the GPL. Such programs may be distributed together with AKFAvatar (look for the keyword “aggregate” in the GPL).

¹ Items marked with ¹ are not relevant for Windows.

AKFAvatar was inspired by cowsay. (Comparison with cowsay)

AKFAvatar has nothing to do with the film “Avatar”. The name was chosen long before I heard of that film prooject.