Forget Santa Claus. We've got a sackful of gifts for you. Lots to get through tonight - so I think we'll start with some visuals..

 

That's right folks - the kaiEngine now runs on the Linksys WRT54G/S router platform. You're going to need this file - flash your router as if this was a real Linksys update - ie. from the web control panel, then go to the front page of the router control panel - everything should make sense, but if it doesn't - head to our new WRT forum. For those of you who are using openWRT / some other WRT firmware - you can still use this release fully :)

You have the choice of ipkg, straight tar.bz2, or 2 individual files for you to wget. Again - please use our forum for assistance, should you need it. I'd just like to say what an awesome job ^S^ has done getting kaid to run on these boxes - and also, to deal out the props to Prestige for creating the excellent firmware packages for WRT - along with xboxgeek and Puma from the XR8D group for providing QA for this release - top job guys - seriously..

But that's not all! Linux users can enjoy an early Christmas present courtesy of Luis (^S^) - kaid 7.0.0.3. Luis has been hard at work over the past few weeks getting lots of fixes into his engine, which now provides *complete* XBox support, along with SpeeX, and we'd like to show our thanks to our Linux users, who are helping to ensure kaid becomes all which we know it will be. Your help doesn't go unrewarded at XLink ;) As always, you can grab a build for your platform from the downloads page.

What about some UI's? Why not! Interested in a UI for Linux? Then why not check out Luis' (Zipleen this time :D) UI - gKaiUI - or an installer version here. Here's some lovely screens for those interested... see picture1 - picture2.

Or how about some fancy ncurses UI for Linux or OSX?... see picture.
Remember to check this for more information about ncurses - or head straight for the SourceForge project site here. Also remember that both gKaiUI and ncurses are built using the now official libkaiui - a powerful C library for any developer who wishes to create a kaiUI! This is superb for developers - because each time the Kai UI API is updated, you just drag down the lib, recompile, and fix any callback parameter errors! Excellent work Zip! Now, perhaps Java is more your thing?... see picture1 - picture2.
The jKaiUI is an awesome piece of work - and development is proceeding at an astounding pace - be *sure* to visit these guys, on their SourceForge project homepage - right here. Or, cut the crap and download the package right here.

If you are still yet to to try out XBMC and Kai's integration, what are you waiting for! Everyday more features are being put into the CVS repository, and we'd like to thank runtime for the time and effort he's putting into this, because it simply kicks ass :) Please ensure you are able to play games using a PC before moving on and trying XBMC! XBMC SourceForge goodness is right here.

 

More Pictures: picture3 - picture4

With only a few weeks until Christmas, we'd like to say that development may slow down over the coming weeks, as we pop open a bottle of champagne and spend some time with our familes. It's at this point in time I'd like to wish everyone a safe and enjoyable holiday season! I'd like to extend a big thanks to our administrators and moderators who have been on full-time duty since we hit the 1000 user barrier - they make the Kai experience worthwhile - for all of us.

Finally, for those of you who were here when XLink first kicked off - and I know a few of you are still around ;) - you will remember I once made a dreamy post on XS about "8 Pillars" for XLink - at the time, people told us that we were being stupid - well - with 7 of the 8 pillars in place and working, and the 8th underway - Kai has done what it was designed to do. The future for XLink holds so much more - Open Source will bring Kai to everyone, and along with revolutionary concepts such as GeoLink fighting to get into the API, we're gonna be breaking completely new ground in online gaming sooner than you think. Thanks must go to each and everyone one of our users for making us what we, collectively, are today - you guys rock.