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From: Otto W. <ott...@bl...> - 2003-02-04 22:19:40
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Sorry for bringing this subject up here but IMO it's very important for a better success of Linux (specifically for Linux on the desktop). And IMO wxWindows is (or could be) one important component in helping bringing more acceptance to Linux. Besides also wxWindows would profit from a widespread Linux. I fully agree with James Simmons when he complains about "Linux will NEVER move into the desktop market!" (See "http://www.kerneltraffic.org/kernel-traffic/kt20030131_203.html"). But it's not only the free beer mentality or the missing jobs. It's also because there is no pressure for any manufacture to invest at least a minimum amount in Linux because not even home users are attracted by Linux not to speak of business users. Now why don't use everybody Linux if it's free? IMO one of the main reason is there isn't a nice looking GUI and what's there is much too complicate to set up. No end user (except "fanatics" like we) will ever go through fixing an X configuration if it doesn't work right out of the box which is much too much the case. And no end user will ever even look at the console. No reseller will ever sell a machine with Linux to an end user just because of these facts. Almost none of the PDA manufatures considers Linux since it's almost impossible to bring anything nice on the screen. And what about the framebuffer alternative? While it might have the potential to overcome the above obstacles, it's not even considered by the vast majority of the current Linux user base itself. It's obvious to anybody that the current framebuffer API isn't well suited as a base GUI interface. Otherwise everybody would start using it, porting their software to it. Even if it's done (like GTK 2.0) there is no use of the framebuffer except as a base for an X server or a bigger console. Just ask yourself, why isn't there already a framebuffer port in wxWindows? What could be done to change this situation, especially what can the wxWindows and the framebuffer people do? Since wxWindows has to draw its controls on many different machines it's probably well known how an easy to use interface of the underlying system should look like. And the framebuffer people certainly know well how such an interface could be implemented. So why don't sit some wxWindows guys together with some framebuffer guys and try to work out a solution which suits both sides? Of course anybody of us has more than enough of his own tasks but it's probably not asked too much about sharing its knowledge at least in giving ideas or hints in which direction such a task should head. Also to hear if this is altogether useless or if a successful solution could be reached is welcomed. I'd be very pleased if some could be persuaded into actually contributing anything, is it advice, knowledge or code. IMO it's time that this task gets started. What I'd like to know is what kind of API or functionality is necessary for using it directly from wxWindows so a useful port could be considered. Best would be if a specification or wish list could be worked out which could be given to the framebuffer people for consideration. They then might give feedback what can be done and how much effort it'd need to implement. Or if there are other alternatives? I'd like to keep this discussion here in the wx-dev mailing list (at least for the start) but welcome any suggestions for a better place. O. Wyss |