* Moving away from GTK?
@ 2013-07-26 17:14 Alan Jump
2013-07-26 18:35 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
0 siblings, 1 reply; 6+ messages in thread
From: Alan Jump @ 2013-07-26 17:14 UTC (permalink / raw)
I'm seeing quite a few large-scale projects and high-visibility people saying that they're going to move, or in fact have moved, away from GTK in favor of the QT graphics toolkit, especially in the FOSS world. That leads me to ask for opinions on whether there might be a similar migration in the Ada development arena. I'm a long way from developing any graphic environments or interactions, but it would be good to know whether this is a fad or an actual trend.
Operators are standing by, this is a free call...
- -
73 de N5ILN
Alan
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Moving away from GTK?
2013-07-26 17:14 Moving away from GTK? Alan Jump
@ 2013-07-26 18:35 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
2013-07-26 21:16 ` Maciej Sobczak
2013-07-27 5:59 ` Gour
0 siblings, 2 replies; 6+ messages in thread
From: Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2013-07-26 18:35 UTC (permalink / raw)
On Fri, 26 Jul 2013 10:14:00 -0700 (PDT), Alan Jump wrote:
> I'm seeing quite a few large-scale projects and high-visibility people
> saying that they're going to move, or in fact have moved, away from GTK in
> favor of the QT graphics toolkit, especially in the FOSS world.
Examples?
> That leads me to ask for opinions on whether there might be a similar
> migration in the Ada development arena.
I don't know. Gtk 3 turned to be a disaster due to massive and far reaching
incompatibilities it introduced. I am busy poring my projects from Gtk 2
since spring when AdaCore published GtkAda 3.x bindings. It is much work
and I am not even close to the end of it.
However, I don't see how migrating to Qt could alleviate that. Clearly
porting to Qt would mean much more work. So I better stick to Gtk.
Regarding new projects, I don't see evident technical merits in Qt. In my
view both toolkits are mess and there is nothing to improve that unless
they become natively Ada. I heard that there might be Qt for VxWorks. That
could be an argument in favor of Qt to me, but Qt looks huge even comparing
to Gtk, not good for embedded solutions...
What indeed is troubling about Gtk is no interest in Windows support. Gtk 3
is more than one year old and there still is no official binary
distribution of it for Windows. Also GtkAda 3.x for Linux still is not
packaged.
--
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Moving away from GTK?
2013-07-26 18:35 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
@ 2013-07-26 21:16 ` Maciej Sobczak
2013-07-26 22:02 ` Alan Jump
2013-07-27 6:15 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
2013-07-27 5:59 ` Gour
1 sibling, 2 replies; 6+ messages in thread
From: Maciej Sobczak @ 2013-07-26 21:16 UTC (permalink / raw)
> Regarding new projects, I don't see evident technical merits in Qt.
You have listed them yourself. Portability across different platforms is an important technical merit and we are not talking about Windows only.
> but Qt looks huge even comparing
> to Gtk, not good for embedded solutions...
Wrong. Qt is very modular and it looks huge due to all the non-GUI modules that come with it (network, XML, databases, etc.). The core part with GUI is quite manageable and if we are talking about embedded solutions, don't forget that Qt was acquired by Nokia (before it began to sink) - phones look like perfect examples of "embedded solutions" to me.
--
Maciej Sobczak * http://www.msobczak.com * http://www.inspirel.com
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Moving away from GTK?
2013-07-26 21:16 ` Maciej Sobczak
@ 2013-07-26 22:02 ` Alan Jump
2013-07-27 6:15 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
1 sibling, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread
From: Alan Jump @ 2013-07-26 22:02 UTC (permalink / raw)
[snip]
On first glance, the framework itself doesn't appear to be any more difficult to apply than GTK. But I'm less concerned with having to wade through the various modules and prune out what won't get used in a given project than I am the licensing of the toolkit. That, however, is a topic for more in-depth examination than I have time for right this moment (although I know what I'll be doing over the weekend...).
- -
73 de N5ILN
Alan
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Moving away from GTK?
2013-07-26 21:16 ` Maciej Sobczak
2013-07-26 22:02 ` Alan Jump
@ 2013-07-27 6:15 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
1 sibling, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread
From: Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2013-07-27 6:15 UTC (permalink / raw)
On Fri, 26 Jul 2013 14:16:06 -0700 (PDT), Maciej Sobczak wrote:
>> but Qt looks huge even comparing
>> to Gtk, not good for embedded solutions...
>
> Wrong. Qt is very modular and it looks huge due to all the non-GUI modules
> that come with it (network, XML, databases, etc.).
That is the same discussion as Ada for bare boards vs. full Ada. No matter
how modular it is, it is always all or nothing. Because it is not really
that modular, of course...
> The core part with GUI
> is quite manageable and if we are talking about embedded solutions, don't
> forget that Qt was acquired by Nokia (before it began to sink) - phones
> look like perfect examples of "embedded solutions" to me.
Ah, it was Qt that sunk Nokia! Could Qt to do that to MS too, as they have
Nokia now? That would be a great service... But no, they will do it in
Windows API... (:-))
--
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Moving away from GTK?
2013-07-26 18:35 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
2013-07-26 21:16 ` Maciej Sobczak
@ 2013-07-27 5:59 ` Gour
1 sibling, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread
From: Gour @ 2013-07-27 5:59 UTC (permalink / raw)
On Fri, 26 Jul 2013 20:35:38 +0200
"Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> wrote:
> Examples?
Maybe not in the category of 'large-scale' projects, but here are some
recent examples:
- LXDE (http://www.zdnet.com/lxde-waves-goodbye-to-gtk-in-merge-with-razor-qt-7000018476/)
- Ubuntu is also moving to Qt (http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2013/03/unity-next-project-announced)
- OpenShot video editor (http://www.openshotvideo.com/2013/04/development-update-schedule-and-funds.html)
- http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/1iew0w/linus_subsurface_moves_from_gtk_to_qt/
Actually, I must say that I'm not aware of *single* FOSS project moving
from Qt to GTK+....
Sincerely,
Gour
--
As a blazing fire turns firewood to ashes, O Arjuna, so does the
fire of knowledge burn to ashes all reactions to material activities.
http://www.atmarama.net | Hlapicina (Croatia) | GPG: 52B5C810
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2013-07-26 17:14 Moving away from GTK? Alan Jump
2013-07-26 18:35 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
2013-07-26 21:16 ` Maciej Sobczak
2013-07-26 22:02 ` Alan Jump
2013-07-27 6:15 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov
2013-07-27 5:59 ` Gour
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