It dates back from when OpenBeOS was renamed. There was some discussion and then a contest to pick the new name (Haiku was the name, eventually). At some point, bga (one of the developers) suggested (not very seriously) “we could call it Walter?”
Eventually this led to the main conference about OpenBeOS in the US being named WalterCon, and the first edition of WalterCon was where the new name would be revealed (of course if the conference was called HaikuCon everyone would have guessed…). And so there was this logo to go with it, and all that.
The name keeps popping up now and then in various places (the name of one of the servers hosting our infra, as a default placeholder for de-branded Haiku builds for people who want to use our code without our trademarks, …). Inside Haiku of course, but bga also used the same name in other contexts later on.
Considering the projects history with Walter, and the Japanese origins of haiku poetry, Haiku’s mascot should be a koi goldfish named Walter. it’s a zen thing.
I stumbled upon this image while researching about Haiku;
I was curious if it was the mascot of Haiku, as I recognised the mascot of Linux there. I liked Haiku when i first encountered it because it had the feathers in the name.
But then when I looked into this site, I read the discussions about the mascot/logo of the OS and I saw people calling it leaves, autumn leaves and trying to simplify it.
As an artist and IT-er I think the name ‘Haiku’ for the OS is amazing as it’s a Japanese word which is basically a name of a poem style. I also saw that this OS is an opensource one.
I think the OS deserves a mascot, and i think it would be very cute for it to be the parrot in the image here above. Of course it’s only obvious that the OS needs a simplified logo, but i’m just saying.
But wasn’t that of Haiku a leaf rather than a feather?
Anyways, searching in the forum can show you the threads where this topic is discussed:
As you could find, there are some who thinks that Haiku doesn’t need a mascot, that is OK to have what it has now. And others think like you about it should have a mascot. One proposal was about a fish called Walter, for historical reasons that newer members not deeply involved wouldn’t understand.
Whatever is the proposal from, if most of the community thinks the project should have one, it should be a “representative” depiction and personification of the project, not just -for example- a random anime girl. Or even it could have a mascot and a OSたん like mascot well done. Or if you want her to have a companion, a OS君 too. Just a good artist with enough creativity and motivation to start is needed to begin this journey.
but i find no connection between walter gecko and haiku japanese poetry
and yes a mascot is good for the recognition (Wiedererkennbarkeit) of the system but the focus at the moment should be on the system and not on the mascot, which might be interesting for an end product from haiku.
Walter is a fish - a Trout to be more specific. I like to think of Walter as an Unofficial/fun mascot of Haiku. Walter has played a humorous roll in Haiku’s early days & should be remembered in some capacity. Think Classic Mac OS’s dogcow.
I hate to necropost like this, but I wholeheartedly agree with making a mascot in a manga/gacha style, it would really appeal to 13-21 ages and fit with the name Haiku, it being a Japanese word.
I love the idea of Haiku, but now that we have a sound scheme and a set of wallpapers, a mascot would be the next logical step in my opinion to add more soul and originality to Haiku, and I’m sure it’d be a lot of fun to come up with characters designs and such, and I also agree with keeping Walter as sort of a Mac OS dogcow thing.
IMHO what makes an iconic mascot is a combination of how to design good characters in animation and games along with logo design:
identifiable by the silhouette and outline alone
works well both in colour and grayscale
can be used well across different types of mediums and displays
can be incorporated into all sorts of merchandise (i.e. shirts, plushies, pins, etc.) which can help with project finances
can be vectorized in part or fully while remaining recognizable at a glance
can be rendered in multiple artstyles without becoming unrecognizable*
has elements derived from the logo** (e.g. colours, motifs) without having the actual project logo or name present; a logo on the mascot may be fine if it is mostly symbolic
* more optional but highly recommended
** does not apply to projects that don’t have a logo yet (this does not apply to Haiku)
+1 all of this, I would buy a Haiku plushie, I think an extremely identifiable trait would be if said mascot was designed like a human, have a little autumn leaf in their hair because of our current logos and wallpapers.
Somebody made a pic like this. Why is it better than a leaf?
An eternal being which forced to follow the seasons of change is not ok, but a human is ok?
I don’t know why,but I like that idea.
The pictures both look very good.
Well,a dove has nothing to do with a operation system,but we could say the same about a penguin and still that’s a very popular mascot.
it’s a zen thing.
