In June, I posted a survey on the Dutch Facebookgroup Astrology Blog. I was curious about favorite environments to run astrology software. 77 people responded and the results were as follows:
- Windows (desktop/laptop): 51%
- Apple MacOs (desktop/laptop): 10%
- Linux (desktop/laptop): 3%
- Apple iOs/iPadOs (smartphone/tablet): 25%
- Android (smartphone/tablet): 11%
For me, this was a surprise. The once all-important Windows is still favored by only half of astrologers. And mobile platforms already account for a third.
Enigma is now only compatible with Windows, and that’s no longer enough. What you need is a cross-platform application, a program that works on desktops running Apple, Linux or Windows as well as Apple and Android mobile devices. I will try to create such a solution and make Enigma cross-platform.
An astrology application that works on all the aforementioned platforms has great advantages. In astrology courses, you can then work with one application that behaves the same on all students’ hardware. And in astrology publications you can use software that everyone can run.
Realizing this will take a lot of time. I don’t want the development of new functionality for Enigma to come to a halt for a long time, so for now I will continue to develop Enigma in the current way, that is, only for Windows. In parallel, I will start converting to another environment that is cross-platform. At the latest by the time Enigma is ready for release 1.0, and the main functionality is built, I will make the switch. I expect it will take a year or two. There is also a chance that I won’t get there and have to start over based on other techniques, but for now I am reasonably hopeful.
It would be nice if other astrological programs also become cross-platform. I am happy to contribute to that: the experiences I will gain will be available to everyone. Enigma is open source, which means that any programmer can see my approach and code, and reuse it in their own software. The only condition is that that software is also open source. In addition, I describe the progress of this process on the website https://radixpro.org . This site is about the technical and programming aspects, and aimed at other programmers of astrology software.