First off, Clickable version 7 is out for testing. Just to explain, this is the desktop app which handles all aspects of building, uploading, versioning and maintaining for apps made for the Ubuntu Touch OS. Version 7 is a huge step up from version 6. For those who are used to chaining commands together they now have the ability to use ‘Chain’ command explicitly, to avoid confusion with other syntaxes.

If you import libraries to function with your app, you can now use the Clickable build command itself to incorporate those. clickable.json has been removed and you now have clickable.jaml. You could still use .json if you feel you must but .jaml is just much cleaner and easier to read. For new users it will be much simpler to understand and if developers want to ‘borrow’ existing code, that will be much less of a hassle to do. There have been a lot of other changes, notably some improvements to Rust integration. If you are struggling a bit with making the transition from 6 to 7, a tool is available to help you and that has been built in Rust! [Dalton made a joke about Rust and ‘Fanfare’ so obscure that I have no clue what it was about but you get 7 zillion geek points if you get it].

Big thanks to the Clickable team for their amazing efforts on this new version.

To pat ourselves on the back, Clickable is the kind of comprehensive app building environment that you just don’t find with other operating systems. It is a real breath of fresh air and something we can be proud of.

OpenStore new apps

In new apps, we have Simple Reader by Nicolas Colla. Just as it says, it is wildly simple. You just open an ePub file and there it is, including a very cool sepia rendering. Also from Nicolas is Headline, which is an RSS news reader. In addition to those we have a game, Costumemaster Reloaded. Finally there is a de-compressor for compressed files, called UT zipper but actually with the ability to handle a range of formats, not just Zip. This app is by LionelD [the French Lionel :)].