Haiku such as "kyo" () may look like two syllables to English speakers but are in fact a single "on" (as well as a single syllable) in Japanese. In 1973, the Haiku Society of America noted that the norm for writers of haiku in English was to use 17 syllables, but they also noted a trend toward shorter haiku. Shorter haiku are very much more common in 21st century English haiku writing. Some translators of Japanese poetry have noted that about 12 syllables in English approximate the duration of 17 Japanese "on". Also in translations four lines is more appropriate for
Haiku Vector Icon Format Haiku Vector Icon Format Haiku Vector Icon Format (HVIF) is a vector storage format designed to store icons, specifically for Haiku. Haiku developers commonly agreed that Haiku could not be released with original BeOS R5 icons. Since Haiku needed its own artwork anyway, it was thought that icons could switch to vectors graphics from traditional BeOS bitmaps. In July 2006 Haiku developer Stephan Aßmus introduced Icon-O-Matic, the icon editor of Haiku, and a storage format with a rendering engine based on Anti-Grain Geometry. After a few days of discussion, Aßmus announced a contest to determine an icon theme for Haiku.