Google has announced that it is starting another round of closing or combining projects. Among those in its sights this time around is Picasa for Linux. Launched in 2006, Picasa for Linux was actually a Windows version of Picasa running on Linux using WINE. The Picasa application itself is not open source.

Google had been maintaining it, but says it "has become difficult to maintain parity on the Linux version". The company will be deprecating the Linux version of Picasa and will not be maintaining it in future. Existing users of Picasa on Linux will be able to continue to use their current versions. The most recent version of Picasa for Linux was 3.0 Beta. Users looking for an alternative way of exporting their pictures to the Google photo hosting service could look at Gwenview, digiKam or Shotwell, which all offer methods for uploading images to Picasa Web Albums.

Other projects scheduled for shuttering by Google include its mobile web app for Google Talk (users are directed to use native applications on mobile devices for XMPP chat), its Patent Search Homepage (because the functionality for patent searches is available from the Google front page), the One Pass payment system, Google Sync for BlackBerry and the Google Related browsing assistant.

See also:

Linux photo tools, a report from The H.

(djwm)