December 2010 - Dillo-dev - lists.mailman3.com

FLTK 1.3.0 RC 1 released!

by obeythepenguin＠gmail.com

Getting off-topic, I know, but since this is quite interesting... On Tue, 28 Dec 2010 10:43:08 -0500, Jorge Arellano Cid <jcid(a)dillo.org> wrote: > I don't develop nor have a Windows machine, but have heard of > DLL hell (in the same sense as RPM hell ;). Having developed extensively for both -- at one point I was rolling my own Linux distribution -- I can say quite confidently that Linux/Unix has it worse. On the technical side, there's system-wide shared libraries and soname versioning; if the major version changes, everything linked to the library must be recompiled. To compound that, there's the larger development community's general disregard for backwards compatibility. The worst changes I had to make for Dillo-Win32 were patching two or three lines of FLTK-2.0, to support Windows 95. Even then, it was trivial to run a brand-new program on a fifteen-year-old operating system. (On a related note, it's nice that I can still use my nineteen-year-old copy of WordPerfect 5.1. When I ran Linux, I was lucky if I could run something I'd compiled just a year or two before.) > Anyway, the point seems clear to me. In the very old days, with > an Atari 800XL (or C64), developers had a great time. Binaries, > and even HW tricks were portable! > > These days, as you point out, it's very hard to acieve binary > compatibility with GNU/Linux (HW is different, distros are > different, libraries are different). If the problem was left to > the user, no progress could be made (most don't know what is to > compile, and shouldn't need IMHO). This is mainly solved by the > distro-packaged-SW, which users feel comfortable with. That's the > reason why it's so important for us to be back on this kind of > repositories. Windows achieves its binary compatibility largely because every Windows operating system is in the control of one vendor. If anything, the Linux distribution system is worse, because it places control of *applications* in the hands of the OS vendor as well. What I love most about Windows development is the ease of distribution: I just put the file online, and any user can download and run it without so much as a ./configure or even a chmod. No complication, and *no middleman*. I'm not disagreeing with you, by the way, just pointing out that the distribution system is badly flawed and unfriendly from both a user's and a developer's perspective. ~Benjamin

Dec. 28, 2010

FLTK 1.3.0 RC 1 released!

by jcid＠dillo.org

On Mon, Dec 27, 2010 at 04:41:04PM -0500, Benjamin Johnson wrote: > On Mon, 27 Dec 2010 15:38:55 -0500, Jorge Arellano Cid > <jcid(a)dillo.org> wrote: > > > Mainly GNU/Linux flavours. > > > > Most of them have a policy of not packing unreleased libraries > >(quite understandable if you ask me). FLTK-2.0 was never released > >so, as a most unfortunate side effect, we were left out of the > >repositories. > > That makes sense, though then again I've seen a lot of "released" > code in distributions much worse than FLTK-2.0... > > One thing I like about Windows development is that, with > comparatively little effort, you can produce a single executable > that runs on any Windows system. Binary compatibility isn't > possible to nearly that extent on Linux/Unix -- the software, even > the culture makes it limited and extremely difficult at best. Part > of the reason I stopped Unix development, but I digress. I know you > probably see things a bit differently. I don't develop nor have a Windows machine, but have heard of DLL hell (in the same sense as RPM hell ;). Anyway, the point seems clear to me. In the very old days, with an Atari 800XL (or C64), developers had a great time. Binaries, and even HW tricks were portable! These days, as you point out, it's very hard to acieve binary compatibility with GNU/Linux (HW is different, distros are different, libraries are different). If the problem was left to the user, no progress could be made (most don't know what is to compile, and shouldn't need IMHO). This is mainly solved by the distro-packaged-SW, which users feel comfortable with. That's the reason why it's so important for us to be back on this kind of repositories. -- Cheers Jorge.-

Dec. 28, 2010

Re: FLTK 1.3.0 RC 1 released!

by jcid＠dillo.org

On Mon, Dec 27, 2010 at 05:45:20PM -0900, rogerx.oss(a)gmail.com wrote: > Dunno about the *other* distros, but Gentoo has several versions of FLTK > available including 2.0_pre branch. And, somebody has volunteered a > FLTK-1.3_rc1 ebuild on bugs.gentoo.org. > > Dillo is extremely important on all my platforms as I use Intel P3 CPU's. That's soothing to hear. > Using any other browser, and I'm just wasting my CPU cycles with unneeded html > scripts -- even with noscript & no-ads plugins for Seamonkey! > > Maybe hook-up with the FLTK mailing list to see if they're really going to push > 1.3? They're committed to it. I've posted some links to their forums from time to time. > From what I read a week ago, they're devoting all efforts on 1.3 and > deprecated 2.0 branch. 2.0 branch might get it's features ported to 1.3. In a nutshell: 2.0 is dead. The remaining developers agreed to cuncur on 1.3 long ago, and to try to release near Christmas (still in the ballpark). -- Cheers Jorge.-

Dec. 28, 2010

FLTK 1.3.0 RC 1 released!

by jcid＠dillo.org

On Mon, Dec 27, 2010 at 07:53:20PM -0500, Rob S. wrote: > [...] > So this is perhaps a little off topic, but what is the status > of dillo with regard to FLTK 1.3.0? ?Will it be ported to that, > or is the plan to continue with the "dead" FLTK 2? As laconically stated in our [Current Plans] link, the idea is to give high priority to the FLTK 1.3 port (for the reasons higuita summarized very well in a former post). -- Cheers Jorge.-

Dec. 28, 2010