Mozilla as GTK Widget 95
AT
writes "The new Mozilla Gecko display engine has been embedded into a GTK widget. This means that you
can embed webpages into your application, just like you might with an ActiveX
control under Windows. " Can I embed mozilla in mozilla yet?
Re:bloating (Score:1)
- Someone decided that this was an itch they wanted to scratch, so they wrote it.
- Lots of applications need to display text in a window. Why shouldn't these applications also be able to handle HTML in a window? For that matter, why should they only display HTML when they can also win XML for relatively zero cost?
- For a help file, HTML is a lot more accessible than anything else out there. Linux needs documentation, and the surest way to not get it is to smack potential doc writers in the face and say "We're sorry, but unless you learn nroff your help is not welcome."
- And most importantly, useful feature parity with Windows. People are already using Windows HTML tool to author help files, and are using Internet Explorer for XML applications (though not on the accessible Web). It'd be a horrible shame if free software shrugged its collective shoulders and said unto the people who want to use Linux instead, "We're sorry, but your application is bloat to us. Continue making Microsoft rich."
Great Idea (Score:1)
What's a GTK Widget? (Score:2)
What about CORBA? (Score:2)
Mozilla is Extremely Slow (Score:2)
Re:License (Score:1)
Haha, listen to the ant-QT mafia finding excuses.
Of course it is NOT legal to link GPL applications to NPL or QPL licenced libraries/widgets! At least if you believe the anti-KDE stories circulating.
Of course nobody will care because it's open source after all and GPL isn't sacred.
Re:Licenses (Score:1)
> Unfortunately QT has a license that restricts its
> utilisation for commercial use (enterprises have
> to pay TT) and only separated patchs are allowed by TT as source code modifications.
NOOOOOOOO!
QT impairs closed sourced applications. commercial closed source ones have to pay for developers licenses.
GPL forbids closed sourced applications.
LGPL imposes no limits on closed sourced applications.
Excellent (if it's done right) (Score:4)
As long as it's quick, I'd be a great way to display online help in an application. If it's done well, it'll be very popular.
XEmacs can be a widget in an application, too, but I've never actually seen anyone use it for that, presumably because of incredibly extreme bloat. (It's great as an app, but as a widget!?)
There are a couple of other really nice new gtk widgets: GtkSheet (a spreadsheet with inplace editing, widgets inside the sheet, etc.) and GtkPlot (a really nice plotting widget). You can see them right here [ifir.edu.ar]
.Sod HTML... (Score:1)
How would that work? (Score:1)
Has anybody done this? Am I barking up the wrong tree? If so, how is it down, and what is the performance like?
Re:Great Idea (Score:1)
This is cool, but... (Score:4)
This widget approach is not really directly comparable (as I understand) to the IE CaptiveX control. There is not going to be the kind of insulation between mozilla changes and this widget that a true component environment would provide.
However, this could be a straw man kind of problem -- I haven't read the source.
Very cool regardless!
Good idea but.... (Score:4)
On another note though, for those who don't watch the mozilla status daily, M6 is probably going to hit the ftp site tommorrow they're saying...
Its already been pulled into a new branch, and I think the general trouble (particularly with Linux builds) in the tree are on the main branch leading to M7.
Hmmmm... maybe I'll pull the M6 branch and check this out.
Re:Standardized Widgetry. (Score:1)
Yeah, I guess you're right, every server needs a web browser to view a man page or helpfile. I'll throw out 'less' once Netscape 5 comes out.
It's thin... for a webbrowser. But who needs five or ten megs of code soaking up another ten megs of ram just to view a helpfile? Even if it is only two megs of ram, it is still two completely wasted megs of ram.
It's neat, but I hope it comes with an off switch.
Standardized Widgetry. (Score:2)
It would be nice to have the option of which bloated HTML/XML engine to use for displaying your help files.
I opt for 'less'. I'll save a few megabytes of ram and just parse it all in my head.
I love the idea regardless, I just fear that this may push the system requirements up for very simple applications... I guess it's the way of the future though.
Re:Mozilla is Extremely Slow (Score:1)
But that's Mozilla. It's my understanding that the layout engine is very fast, and I assume the gtk+ component would just wrap the layout engine and not all of Mozilla.
Jason.
Re:Absolutely Brilliant! (Score:1)
What are you talking about? For normal operation, Windows 9X/NT requires a shell to be running that implements a certain COM interface; MS supplies IE4 as the default shell and there are few alternatives. No such requirement exists for X; so I don't see why you think that we are suddenly going to be forced into loading web browsers we don't use.
Re:TeX plugin from IBM (Score:1)
possible applications (Score:1)
screenshots (Score:1)
Re:What's so groundbreaking about this? (Score:1)
GtkMozilla and GNOME (Score:3)
--
Ian Peters
Re:This is cool, but... (Score:3)
--
Ian Peters
Re:Standardized Widgetry. (Score:1)
Gecko promises to be anything but bloated... where have you been?
Re:Too much like windows. (Score:1)
I would guess that the WM you use with it will make a very great difference - something like FVWM or similar is much faster than E, purely because it is more mature and has a slimmer featureset. Yes, Gnome is bigger than other "user environments", although X itself is less than a model of efficiency, so to speak, but;
a) If you want slimness and speed above all else, use wm2. Features will slow your computer down, in the same way running lots of apps at the same time will - there is only so much RAM, and there are only so many clock cycles to go round.
It's a tradeoff - networking built-into the windowing system, as in X, could be regarded as bloat. I regard it as an invaluable feature.
Furthermore;
b) Use whatever suits your needs best. Me, I like the integrated desktop, as I use my Linux box primarily as a personal workstation. It may not be suited to your needs.
As for bugginess, Netscrape wins that award hands down. Crashes are not exactly rare for Netscape, let us remember (and I would be amazed if you do not use it) and Gnome does not crash nearly as much as Windows does. Given it is not designed for use on servers and other such mission-critical boxes, I'd say it's at least tolerably stable, and will get better.
As for idiot-proofing, I will agree that it is desirable, but Linux tends to act as a moron-filter at present - you still need a certain degree of technical ability in order to use it. Thus it is more important, I suspect, for the developers to concentrate on the feature set whilst it is a higl techy audience using it - the handholding can come later.
Re:Excellent (if it's done right) (Score:1)
Re:This is cool, but... (Score:1)
1. It doesn't do POST. Not correctly anyhow.
2. Doesn't do any auth at all.
3. Dragging randomly alternates between hilighting text and dragging out rubberbands, with no apparent way to switch behaviors.
4. Poor control over fonts. A case where integration is not what I want, I prefer larger fonts in my web browser than in my file manager.
5. Doesn't use the mousewheel. I can make netscape use it (oddly, it seems to have lost the ability just now though).
Re:This is cool, but... (Score:2)
Interface Scminterface (Score:1)
Absolutely Brilliant! (Score:1)
Lets just do some quick logical thought. You are saying that in certain implementations it is a GOOD thing to have a program sitting in memory that you don't need. Am I confused or are you just INSANE?
It is utter bullshit to say that you should have to get more RAM for a embedded program that you don't need. Why is it that we should upgrade computers every other year to accomidate the software that does little more than add more bulk into memory. The last time I checked on one of my Win98 systems, that was idling, with only two processes running 'Explorer and Systray' it was still eating 60 megs of memory! Win95 would idle at 15 megs. Yes, Einstein, this is the browser that you have at your beck and call. And since IE 4.0 memory leaked like mad, this was another GOOD thing. How do you fix a program that is leaking like mad that is embedded into the OS and that you can't kill. The only answer is reboot. If this were Linux it would mean kill X.
I agree with you on the point that it is a good thing if you want it. But there is no reason that you can't have it having embedded functionality yet still vulnerable to be killed.
What's so groundbreaking about this? (Score:1)
Re:What's so groundbreaking about this? (Score:1)
PICS support doesn't belong in an HTML widget, period. It's an HTTP (that can easily be abstracted to become HTTP independant) thing.
KHTML already has some JS stubs (read: JavaScript is probably not far off), and some CSS support. Not modern? Try something OO and GUI written in C.
Despite popular FUD, GPL is *not* opensource, it's strangulation of source. Incidentally, khtml is closer to the GPL than the NPL is. Thank you
Uh yeah scores of developers can use Linux and Win32. Whoopie. Mozilla is currently a bitch to compile out of the box, and for that matter so is Gnome. I'd rather just stick with KDE which is thankfully quite easy to build out of the box on my FreeBSD box.
Re:What's so groundbreaking about this? (Score:1)
Re:Too much like windows. (Score:2)
People also seem to forget that SGI had a web-enabled desktop in IRIX before Microsoft was able to embed IE in Explorer. Perhaps it was Microsoft making Windows more like IRIX.
The simple fact is that it is natural evolution. If SGI hadn't done it first, Microsoft would have. If Microsoft hadn't, perhaps GNOME would have. No matter who did it "first", the point is, someone would have done it, and it's a benefit to mankind, regardless of its inventor.
There are *no* disadvantages to having a web browser embedded in your desktop (at least, not in GNOME--having Explorer crash when you view a Java page is not a Good Thing, but that's Microsoft's fault.) If you don't want to use it, don't navigate to an HTTP address. There, now you don't even know it's there. "Bloat" you say? Get more RAM. The 80s are gone, and so is the 640k limit. A 128M PC100 DIMM is currently ~$80 on PriceWatch, so there's no excuse for not having enough RAM to support the needs of modern software.
Saying adding a browser to GNOME is making is MORE like Windows is like saying that adding wheels to a wheelbarrow is making it MORE like a car, in some derrogatory sense. Bullsh*t. It rolls, now, and helps you get your work done faster. You can carry your boulders all day, for all I care, but I want to wheel mine, thank you. I have better things to do with the time I save.
Re:Standardized Widgetry. (Score:1)
What's the footprint on Lynx anyway?
Mozilla in mozilla (Score:2)
The Gecko inside IE screenshots were really cool... I wouldn't mind browsing that way, if it means I get the best engine available.
GtkMozilla also going into main tree (Score:3)
Offhand, I'd say that this GTK widget *will* allow embedding like the ActiveX control. After all, even if GTK itself changed in the future, what then? I should think all it would mean was some "tweaking" of the GtkMozilla code to work with the newer GTK. Likewise if the Mozilla code changed. Same goes for the ActiveX control, if Micro$oft one day decided (heaven forbid) to change the ActiveX standards slightly. In fact, I wonder if this isn't already coming--I understand they are working on COM+ as we speak.
Incidently, I also know that the GNOME Project has been trying for some time to find a way of embedding browser-like functionality into things like the file manager and the help system... And so far, all they have really are things like the Express browser, which is not very far beyond the planning stage.
My hope is that GtkMozilla will finally bridge this gap... I wonder, does anybody know if the NPL/MPL would allow this? I am assuming it would, if they are already going to allow people to embed the ActiveX control in their programs. But does anyone here more knowledgeable about licenses than me want to confirm this?
Re:Mozilla is Extremely Slow (Score:3)
Basically, the problem is that incremental reflow causes the entire window to get repainted, often times more than once. You can probably imagine that this would slow it down. They are working on this, but it isn't easy... It is particularly a problem under Linux, with GTK (Windows doesn't notice it as much, from what I've heard). They need more GTK experts to help them.
So please, HELP MOZILLA!! And feel free to give it another try. Don't be scared. It's only a lizard.
Embedding Mozilla (Score:4)
Re:Moderating these kinds of posts (Score:1)
Re:This is cool, but... (Score:1)
I also believe that this will be used as the basic for a KOM/OP component.
Re:License (Score:1)
If it's bound too tightly with gecko, then it will probably need to be released under the NPL.
Re:What's a GTK Widget? (Score:3)
GTK: aka GTK+. The {Generic|GNU|GIMP} toolkit. A specific GUI toolkit that sits on top of X11. An alternative to Motif and Qt. Unlike Motif, it is not layered on Xt. Started as part of the GIMP project when Motif was dropped because of functionality/availability/licence concerns.
Re:no bloat at all (Score:1)
Re:Mozilla in mozilla (Score:1)
Okay. Im just theorizing here.
--
GPL ActiveX (Score:2)
I can _possibly_ see an Active X Gecko component being released under an LGPL. I suspect, though, that the Gecko Active X component is the Gecko code with the required Active X entry points added. If the internal Gecko code is already GPL, I don't think you can release such a component under LGPL.
FWIW, I think a Gecko component is one of the coolest ideas I've heard in a while.
Re:no bloat at all (Score:1)
Dying breed? I don't think so, but then again, I don't care. Look, "making your life easier and faster" and "cutting your learning curve" are all nice and dandy, but those are the same things that have made the net a slow swamp of clueless people clogging the wires with "multimedia" and "active content" and whatever you want to call that stuff.
Now, this is not necessarily evil. It was unavoidable, and yes I think that is very nice that most of my family can email me now, and my secretary don't have to cope with clumsy and noisy typewriters anymore. But you should try to understand why some of us sometimes loose our patience when trying to explain to some AOLer the deep concept of "current working directory", or close our eyes and sigh every time someone releases a new kind of "streaming multimedia gadget" or whatever.
And now, just to avoid been marked as offtopic: this GTK widget is a heaven-sent answer for a project I'm cooking right now. Actually, since the thing not only renders HTML, but XML, and has that cool XUL thing for building UIs, I'm starting to think that this could entirely change the way I build applications for X. One thing is for sure: this stuff is not only for showing help files. You'll see.
And I can't wait for this thing to reach beta...
Re:Mozilla in mozilla (Score:1)
I guess that allowing mozilla to embed GTK widgets, or (more probably) XPCOM components like mozilla itself, in a document, should be a feature really easy to add right now.
But I also think they won't going to do it. It would be a non-standard extension, hence as evil as the ActiveX extension that Micros~1 tried to force down our throats (and succeeded in some places -you should see some intranet projects I've seen in some banks here in México).
Re:Mozilla is Extremely Slow (Score:1)
but try some of the tests ie. Debug / ViewerDemos.
now resize mozilla see how fast it is at rendering tables? also try some more tests. [mozilla.org]
arent the css tests kewl? wouldnt it be nice to write webpages to spec. in that you would know they are rendered right.
nmarshall
#include "standard_disclaimer.h"
R.U. SIRIUS: THE ONLY POSSIBLE RESPONSE
license (Score:1)
this allowable? I wondered about this a while back
and decided that it is not.
TeX plugin from IBM (Score:2)
http://www.software.ibm.com/network/techexplore
Re:What's a GTK Widget? (Score:1)
And no, this is not specific to any window manager.
Re:GtkMozilla also going into main tree (Score:1)
But an ActiveX control might be considered to be an independent program, so that no GPL restrictions apply. Just like I can use Unix pipes to make the output of a GPL'd program the input of another program with incompatible license. (On the other hand, I guess the GPL might apply if the resulting application can't run without the ActiveX Mozilla control. And that could be solved by implementing a rather trivial ActiveX plain text viewer and distributing it with the application.)
Hmmm.. I should add I don't know anything about ActiveX
Why the moderation? (Score:1)
Re:GPL ActiveX (Score:1)
Re:License (Score:1)
Of course 'packaged together' can mean a lot of things.. not in one rpm, or not on one CD...
License (Score:2)
no bloat at all (Score:2)
Cool! (Score:1)
Re:The NPL or MPL? (Score:1)
bloating (Score:1)
Hmmm, a solitare game with a web browser for viewing help files... that is REAL necessary!
Bloatware at its finest.
Re:bloating (Score:1)
help files, but we can write E-Mail and NEWS-Clients which can deal well with HTML.
That`s the fact !!!