Anyone who's interested can get an early look at what's available here:
http://www.valve-erc.com/srcsdk/

I don't think Hammer 4.0 is actually available yet, although may be released to co-incide with HL2.

F.A.O. The guys who were interested in the Source 3D Skybox effect:
The above site contains an article about how the effect is achieved; and how you will be able to create your own in the new release of Hammer.

Looks awesome - can't wait to get my hands on it.

(thanks to Subdude for the link)

you could've just found out how it worked in game...just use free look to move out of the map, theres a huuuuuuuge gap on dust, and then some actual landscape miles away

couldn'tve done it on normal CS as after a certain distance it would all jst go black

Chaps, in reality how difficult is it putting things together like single player mods/CS maps? I pick stuff up pretty quick and would really like to start doing some of this coz I have plenty of nifty ideas.

Sput, Winter, Alex and J have all done maps of varying complexity, so its probably best to talk to one of them.

I know Wint's almost finished a 1.6 map, but I don't know if it will ever be finished now with the conversion to Source. Shame really because appeared to be a cracking map.

how do i make tomato source maps?? i'll start on one and you lot can let me know what it plays like

Well I dont know what it will play like, but I bet it tastes real good.

so what do i need for the next generation of mapping?? any new world builders out yet? or do i need source to get the benefits of this stuff?

Dunno then. There is a new section on the play games list, tools, at the bottom. There is source dedicated server, source sdk and dedicated server (for the other hl1 based games).

It's there for me and aparrently not for jimmeh reading .