The freedesktop.org is no longer a viable resource for *nix desktop development reddit / BSD ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-13 21:10 I’m not sure how long this has been the case, but the freedesktop.org site has become predominantly a site for Linux (only) desktop development. If you look for information on how to write a display manager, you’ll get a page telling you how to connect an already existing display manager to systemd. If you look for information on how to write a desktop environment, you’ll get a page telling you how to connect an already existing desktop environment to logind. We’re going to need to setup our own development resources (documentation). It’s more than obvious that trying to share with the Linux community doesn’t really work, as their ecosystem’s development is on a continuously divergent path from ours -unless we’re going to pick up systemd. For reference: https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/writing-display- managers/ https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/writing-desktop- environments/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- digifuzzy · 2021-07-13 21:22 You've got a point. I've been disappointed in what RedHat/Fedora has shoved down the throats of \*nix users these past few years. [This gif](https://gfycat.com/sizzlinghappygrouse-explainlikeimfive) is old, but seems most apropos. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-13 21:28 The real question is: what are we going to do to about it? How’re we going to ensure that we don’t suffer a catastrophic loss of knowledge, as the resources that we currently use are completely overwritten with Linux-specific documentation -leaving knowledge relevant to us as lost forever? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- digifuzzy · 2021-07-13 21:31 I pine for the days of the Apple "Human Interface Design Guidelines" (very early Macintosh days). Short of a POSIX-desktop standard, I got nothing. Sorry. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- AskJeevesIsBest · 2021-07-13 21:43 Archive the knowledge so it will not be lost, and uploading it somewhere else night be the solution. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-13 21:56 Without documentation on how to write window managers & display managers, we may find ourselves without desktops to implement such a standard on. Something else that I’ve had no luck finding is documentation on how to write a X11 GUI toolkit. Trying to map out the flow of the current toolkits by reading the source code hasn’t been working out. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-13 22:22 This might be the perfect time to write BSD-specific versions of this sort of documentation. It’s could be an opportunity to document how to write such components using common BSD utilities for hardware access, etc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- digifuzzy · 2021-07-13 22:32 And the sad part is the silo-structure created. Look up GUI libraries for Linux and your choices are limited to two mainstream options: * based on gtk (gnome, wxwidgets, et al) * based on qt There are no other options. Each of the above add an obscene amount of complexity to their ecosystems more than graphical elements (e.g. QArray for std::vector, or any of the g\*\*\*\* structures from gnome). Sure there are other "choices", but they are not prevalent and/or incomplete for general use (for kicks look up how to change styling of gitk to get an idea of tcl/tk issues - and that's just one program). There are very few all-encompassing GUI libraries that "just draw" stuff even though we have the cairo library. This is the inherent rot at that core of Linux, do it the way some organization(gnome, redhat, qt) has devised it(\*cough\*paid development\*cough\*) or else suffer. Be prepared to rewrite the whole thing in a couple years time because someone changed their mind. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-13 22:35 There’re more, but people don’t really use them because of the influence of commercial entities. For instance, I’ve downloaded the source to these toolkits in order to learn how to construct a GUI toolkit: Fox GTK FLTK I’m looking into using AGG as the rendering layer. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- minus_minus · 2021-07-13 23:30 Is there not any kind of cross-BSD/\*nix organization where common like these issues can be addressed and worked on collaboratively? I’m a bsd newb so totally ignorant. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-13 23:34 No. This type of thing used to be handle by freedesktop.org, but they’ve been increasingly becoming more Linux-centric by the year. The Linux community now has sapped up almost all resources that were shared by the overall *nix community. If we’re going to survive, we must rebuild our resources & make them BSD-specific. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- wheezybackports · 2021-07-13 23:45 Systemd is the reason why I appreciate the BSDs. Not to mention the directory hierarchy is so much more organized than your average kinda LSB spec Linux distro. I hope Systemd doesn't stomp on UNIX history. Also Systemd web browser when? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- asveikau · 2021-07-14 00:06 How many people are writing new display managers? Personally, I feel like I've got xdm and that's enough. If someone is writing a new one and decides to depend on systemd, it's probably not worth running. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- deafphate · 2021-07-14 00:14 Most of the "new" ones I've seen in recent years are forks of existing (often simple) window managers. Very few write them from scratch. I tried years ago using the X programming manual and it isn't very easy. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 00:27 Same with CUPS and O3DE, they're operated in large part by the Linux foundation. CUPS seems to have two homes, after the ~~FreeDesktop~~ *OpenPrinting* fork. That they retain Apache or BSD licenses rather than GPL is fortunate. CUPS or FreeDesktop are capable of having a fork or BSD replacements for some dependencies. Parts of these programs or dependencies that interlink are GPL though. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 00:31 >Something else that I’ve had no luck finding is documentation on how to write a X11 GUI toolkit. Trying to map out the flow of the current toolkits by reading the source code hasn’t been working out. Lumina is the closet thing. It's written on QT5, but doesn't have Linux restrictions. More primitive ones are Motif, Xaw (X Athena Widget) and Tcl/Tk. For any display window application that doesn't need interactive tabs, Xaw or Motif need to be a direct replacement. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2021-07-14 00:47 One thing many of you didn't notice is that you are on the systemd sub-site of freedesktop.org. Of course it will tell you to use systemd. See: www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/**systemd**/writing-display- managers/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 01:00 Lumina and its applications are written in QT5, and they don't have any of those problems. QT5 may be under GPL, but Lumina is under a BSD license. They don't require dbus, and each application can be installed independently of the desktop. This is only an issue if you rather have applications that are in C, and not in C++. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:11 It might not happen often, but it still happens. However, regardless of the quantity of people are writing them, the knowledge of how to do so doesn’t need to die out. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:14 That’s because the Linux community has been very prolific in regards to developing projects. The BSD community has been rather lazy in that aspect. As a consequence, most of those forks are GPL licensed. We need more MIT & BSD licensed graphics stack components. We need a full graphics stack. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2021-07-14 01:15 There are quite a few new WMs, but they are for Wayland. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:17 I’ve looked at the Fox & FLTK toolkits. We really need a BSD-licensed toolkit. In fact, we need a while graphics stack. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 01:22 QT5 may be GPL licensed, but Lumina carries a BSD license, despite being made off of it. Athena and a few of its forks are MIT licensed. It needs to be used for anything that doesn't require mouse tabs. If anything, it needs to be a starting point for making a modern GUI toolkit. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:28 Yes, I noticed it. I also noticed that there didn’t seem to be a non- systemd version of the document. My best guess is that this document might’ve been edited to include systemd & then moved to the systemd side. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:29 I’d suggest that we need a toolkit that’s based on XCB, rather than xlib. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 01:31 XCB can work on top of Xlib to simplify it. Xaw may be on top of Xlib. Maybe if Xaw is forked, to have direct XCB replacements, and used automatically for graphical applications that don't need tabs, then made comparable in presentation to GTK or QT5. Either drop direct Xlib, or let it remain simple and reverse compatible with a primitive GUI for applications that still use Xlib. Let XCB programs have better presentation. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:39 Ok, but what about graphical applications that DO need tabs? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 01:43 Make an advanced fork of Xaw, that uses XCB, which has a GUI comparable to GTK or QT5. It remains backward compatible with Xlib applications that don't need tabs. Either, programs that need tabs that are Xlib get upgraded to XCB, or Xlib applications that need tabs also remain backward compatible while having a primative GUI than XCB applications. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- masta · 2021-07-14 01:49 >No. This type of thing used to be handle by freedesktop.org, but they’ve been increasingly becoming more Linux-centric by the year. My recommendation is to "be the change you wish to see". Or put another way, go forth and make it happen. Too many people on the sidelines, we need more people contributing. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:51 Trying to get off the sidelines is how I found those pages. I was trying to find resources to help me with writing a display manager & a window manager. The eventual goal is to create a new DE. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 01:54 I’ll definitely look over Xaw. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LukeShu · 2021-07-14 03:03 FWIW the Linux Foundation is pretty hostile toward the GPL (ironic given Linux itself) and prefers that member projects use the Apache license. Source: My day job is contributing to a Linux Foundation project (Apache licensed). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- masta · 2021-07-14 03:13 That's really awesome. My advice would be to look at fluxbox or openbox as a starting point, and go from there. A few years ago (more like 10 ~ 15 years ago, time flies) I was in your same place, doing the same thing, and had good luck forking flux as a starting point. I still want to get back to that project some day. Good luck on your journey. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LukeShu · 2021-07-14 03:20 freedesktop.org has always kind of been a mixed bag. Like, I remember as far back as 2011 a large portion of it was "how to write things for Gnome". Same kind of thinking, "we [non-Gnome DE folks] are going to need to need to setup our own development resources (documentation)". But even then, it was still kinda the best resource for writing cross- DE stuff. You just had to know that a large portion of the people contributing were coming from a Gnome perspective, and so you had to keep that in mind and take everything with a grain of salt. And so that kind of thing is still true today, just systemd is a new common bias that you'll have to keep in mind. Regarding : > > you are on the systemd sub-site of freedesktop.org > > I also noticed that there didn’t seem to be a non-systemd version of the document. My best guess is that this document might’ve been edited to include systemd & then moved to the systemd side. Honestly, I don't think so. The systemd folks have actually done a fantastic job with documentation and writing down things for systemd that were previously not written down very well (esp. on GNU/Linux where documentation tends to be worse than on the BSDs), and were just "tribal knowledge" before. IMO, some of the best documentation for non-systemd Linux-based systems is the systemd documentation talking about the "old" way of doing things. I would be 0% surprised that the documents you mention just didn't exist in the pre-systemd world. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 03:29 That's very ironic, and also interesting. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2021-07-14 03:58 Freedesktop is more of a repository for projects related to FOSS on the desktop, not unlike say the Linux or Apache foundations. IMHO contrary to popular opinion they don't exactly have an "agenda" towards Linux homogeneity, it's just that it became Linux-heavy. They do host a few BSD-related and OSX-related projects also. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- digifuzzy · 2021-07-14 04:01 Might want to check sources, from Wikipedia, Lumina is shown as being written in C++. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumina\_(desktop\_envir onment)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumina_(desktop_environment)) This bit was disconcerting: >Some features are specific to TrueOS, including hardware control of screen brightness (monitor backlight), preventing shutdown of an updating system, and integration with various TrueOS utilities. However, insightful chart with links at the bottom of page showing different desktop environments. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 04:06 It's written with the QT5 toolkit, which is in C++. So, it's both. I heard that TrueOS just got folded into the ports tree. Lumina's applications can be used without Lumina. They're pretty lightweight and don't rely on a lot of dependencies. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- digifuzzy · 2021-07-14 04:24 Qt-Based. And they have their own ideas about how a desktop environment works. I wasn't a fan when I tried TrueOS. I go to do something simple and environment kept getting in the way. Glad you like but that's not the point of the thread. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MrRichBOB · 2021-07-14 04:58 Just as a full-time Linux User, and I know many of us here are or were, and I use OpenBSD on the side (sorry, but I just can't do FreeBSD—it is hard), I use Void Linux (an anti-Systemd distro that uses Runnit instead of Systemd), and I can say that I have found the sheer hate for Systemd is spreading like wildfire. I really think most users, even new users, are switching to Arch or Manjaro, and Debian, but then eventually switch to Artix (which uses S6, Runnit, or Gentoo's init system), and eventually stay on Debian. And even the Debian devs are discussing supporting something other than Systemd full-time. A lot of people don't like Poettering, and many even are beginning to refuse to use Pulseaudio in favour of PipeWire, even ignoring the necessity for Wayland. But simply because Pulseaudio was made by Poettering and PipeWire was not. And PipeWire, though made for SystemD, actually works okay outside of it. And even still, there are WAY more Gentoo users than I ever would have thought. I wouldn't be surprised if maybe FreeDesktop may begin to shift focuses, sooner than it may seem. But I'll say this: _I have learned more about \*NIX using VoidLinux and a BSD than anything else_. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- deafphate · 2021-07-14 04:58 That's fair. I don't follow Wayland development since I don't use it. I'm more familiar with X :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- flipper1935 · 2021-07-14 05:09 CUPS - CUPS has been an Apple driven + owned thing, and has been for a long time. www.cups.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 05:36 [https://openprinting.github.io/OpenPrinting-News- March-2021/](https://openprinting.github.io/OpenPrinting-News- March-2021/) As of March 2021, OpenPrinting claims to be the official repository for CUPS. It wasn't updated for a long time at [cups.org](https://cups.org). As I was saying, CUPS seems to have two homes now. The new home is perhaps a temporary home. OpenPrinting is under the Linux Foundation. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 05:54 It kind of is the point of the thread. Lumina applications use QT5, while they're lighter weight than other QT5 applications. It's as authentic to a desktop or applications meant for FreeBSD, other than Xaw (X Athena Widgets). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- digifuzzy · 2021-07-14 06:03 No. OP is raising concern that the website that considers itself to be a *de facto standard* is being broken by a lack of examples that do not involve a Linux-Only technology (specifically systemd). I'm pointing out that the ecosystem of libraries has long been corrupted and have coalesced around specific libraries due to economics. All the while, you're going on (or otherwise appear to be shilling for) a specific desktop environment because you disagree with my observations. This is not helpful to the discussion at large. Over and Out ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-14 06:11 I don't use the Lumina desktop, but I use a few applications from it. Accusing someone of shilling is ridiculous. You shouldn't bring up QT at all, since you say this doesn't have anything to do with QT or QT related applications now. I know FreeDesktop is Linux leaning, and I know it doesn't fit BSD's. Lumina is its own alternative to this, and it isn't complete at it. I don't even use all of its applications, nor it's window-manager. It's actually BSD licensed, even though it's built off of a GPL toolkit. What else is there for GUI applications that is made for BSD's, other than Xaw? Lumina applications are actually light on dependencies and don't rely on Potterings. It offers its own environment that it doesn't need to rely on dbus, Alsa and Systemd. This is the point of that desktop environment. When bringing up alternatives that don't need FreeDesktop's Linuxism dependencies, there's Xaw and Lumina applications which fit the bill. I can go with programs built off of FreeDesktop's infrastructure too, which I do. When I get any suitable alternative, I'll not use those any more. I don't have ideal applications based on a perfect toolkit. I'll use some from GTK, some from QT5, some from Xaw, some from Motif and very few from Lumina. I rather have applications from a C toolkit, but it's still great that something with a BSD license can be made from QT which is GPL. I'm stuck with Linuxism related dependencies on my computer, and I'll have to accept that. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- kraileth · 2021-07-14 06:14 Have you taken a look at [Fyne](https://fyne.io/)? I once tried to build it on FreeBSD but failed since I'm not knowledgeable about the Go ecosystem. It's a new and modern TK plus there's even a desktop and some applications already available. It's also permissively licensed (BSD-3-clause) and one of the goals is being cross-platform. I'd imagine that the Fyne project would very much appreciate if BSD people started using it. It probably deserves a closer look as it might be just the thing that we're looking for (or can help go in the right direction). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- deafphate · 2021-07-14 07:33 Systemd is fine as long as it works. It's a pain to debug though when it's broke. Especially since it has its hand in so many components. What happened with the doing one thing and doing it well philosophy? At work we run RedHat on our servers and I really miss SysVinit. It's simple and works great. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LiamW · 2021-07-14 09:19 Pulse audio is a steaming pile of garbage, as is avahi (also a poettering project). There are now thankfully far better alternatives. Systemd annoys me, but it seems to actually work and work well for it’s intended uses. What I don’t like about it is the change itself that made the last 8 years of desktop distro updates an unnecessary pain, and that it’s intended uses are not necessarily aligned with my intended activities. It feels very enterprise-y. I just migrated my workstation and media server to FreeBSD 13 as I wanted to do better supporting multiple platforms with my code and evaluate nanobsd for embedded applications. It’s good to eat your own dog food basically. In that migration I discovered I can have a high performance Unix workstation with the same user land (nearly) as my Mac, without the instability of Linux distros. I get reasonably up to date packages (in between Ubuntu and Arch in update speed it seems), and a far more consistent system. I hope I’m an example of more people looking at FreeBSD going forward, as perhaps that will bring the talent necessary to support more improvements to the underlying system. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mtemmerm · 2021-07-14 10:32 Regarding comments about needing a full gui stack ... I'm not familiar with dm development, but always appreciated Motif (now OpenMotif). Looking at the resources online, I think it has good documentation, supports modern fonts, understands tabs etc. It also is supposedly the de facto gui toolkit for unix systems. CDE uses it. I also think it's quite nice to look at and use, but that's me. Not much of an addition to the thread perhaps just my thoughts :). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- liveoneggs · 2021-07-14 11:17 the way to get chrome on ubuntu is via a snap, which needs snapd, which needs systemd ---------------------------------------------------------------------- liveoneggs · 2021-07-14 11:20 I'd say it's been the case for about 15 years ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:09 Thanks. I’ve been looking into them. One of them is MIT licensed. That’s the one I’m probably going with. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:10 Those are fair points. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:13 Perhaps it’s time for the overall BSD community to take ownership of hosting & heavily documenting BSD-related projects, so that the existence of our information well won’t depend on others. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:17 Wow, that actually looks great. It seems that they also have their own desktop. That might be the solution! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:17 It’s odd that someone downvoted you for this comment. I voted you back up. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:26 It was still a very valuable comment. In most cases, the biggest problem with old toolkits are their appearances. It might be something as simple as updating their rendering layer & add a theme engine that ends up drastically improving them. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- umlcat · 2021-07-14 13:47 Many developers are just waiting for Wayland to be more stable, cause of this. Remember many X11 libraries were propertary, and some open sourced, but more like "abandonware". ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 13:53 I agree. But that will only result in the same situation as we have now -being drug in whatever direction the Linux community goes in, instead of the community guiding itself. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- kraileth · 2021-07-14 14:03 Just took a look at the TK and desktop again (they've added FreeBSD support since my last attempt it seems). It's not a full-blown DE at this point (e.g. missing workspaces support that I rely on) but what is there is not half bad! I might give creating a port for this a try (need to familiarize myself with Go infrastructure in ports, first). As I'm a bit short on free time right now however, I wouldn't mind if anybody else gets to it first. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 14:19 Yeh, it looks very nice! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- umlcat · 2021-07-14 14:20 That applies not just with Windows Managers. Anyway, several years ago, I was trying to implement the screen part of a game console emulator, and checked a general idea on how X11 worked. And, of course there wasn't much of a documentation. And how Wayland was supposed to going to work. That was just a proposal, but from someone who worked with ( P.C. ) D.O.S. & Windows with a more direct access to the screen, seemed more reasonable to wait for Wayland. I wasn't surprised why a lot of companies & their developers dropped already X11 and its documentation. Just keep using it 'as it is", until Wayland is finished by Open Source enthusiasts... ..., and investing themselves. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 14:26 >That applies not just with Windows Managers. I agree ​ >Anyway, several years ago, I was trying to implement the screen part of a game console emulator, and checked a general idea on how X11 worked. > >And, of course there wasn't much of a documentation. > >And how Wayland was supposed to going to work. > >That was just a proposal, but from someone who worked with ( P.C. ) D.O.S. & Windows with a more direct access to the screen, seemed more reasonable to wait for Wayland. Yes, it does seem more reasonable to wait for it, until you realize that most of it is going to be Linux-centric with every other \*nix being second & third class citizens. ​ >I wasn't surprised why a lot of companies & their developers dropped already X11 and its documentation. In this case, the X11 documentation wasn't dropped. What was dropped was non-systemd systems trying to use X11. Systemd isn't going anywhere, its here to stay. So, we can expect systemd to become a main part of Wayland when it's eventually finished. ​ >Just keep using it 'as it is", until Wayland is finished by Open Source enthusiasts... > >..., and investing themselves. Indeed. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- umlcat · 2021-07-14 14:33 Many *nix companies seems very unatentive / unsupported. The problem is that a lot of developers still need to work with *nix systems. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 14:43 >Many \*nix companies seems very unatentive / unsupported. Indeed. ​ >The problem is that a lot of developers still need to work with \*nix systems. I've actually been trying to find a way to make BSD development more developer friendly. One thing that would be great is an IDE that doesn't make assumptions that aren't leaning against the norms of BSD. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SmallerBork · 2021-07-14 15:35 systemd good, snapd bad ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FarhanYusufzai · 2021-07-14 17:18 We should discuss why... If FreeBSD et al aim to be desktop players, then they need to focus on features meaningful to desktop users - device drivers, graphics, power management configuration, getting Google Drive to mount through a GUI, having a unified updating system not segmenting freebsd-update and pkg) stuff like that. As a desktop user, I am really not interested in yet another ZFS feature. Not a fan of systemd? Cool. What's the alternative? As a desktop user, speed matters and systemd is much faster than OpenRC. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 17:18 Now that I think about it, it seems that a full DE would require more than just graphical elements in a toolkit. They’ll definitely need ways to tie their various parts together, including data objects. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 17:20 If you scroll up, you’ll see that the question of what we’re going to do about it has been asked. I agree with your assessment, which is why I made the post in the first place. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- karr0n · 2021-07-14 17:36 Why is EFL/Enlightenment never being mentioned? Pretty much a complete ecosystem availabe for use and nobody is talking about it at all. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 17:40 For me because their libraries are complicated to use as standalones & they use a mixed bag of licenses, so building something based on that is hit or miss. Attempting to use their environment was also difficult the last time I tried it, but I do intend to try it out again. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MrRichBOB · 2021-07-14 17:55 To be fair, systemd is enterprise software 😝 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- jamfour · 2021-07-14 17:58 > beginning to refuse to use Pulseaudio in favour of PipeWire, even ignoring the necessity for Wayland. But simply because Pulseaudio was made by Poettering and PipeWire was not. Neither Pulse nor PipeWire are a “necessity for Wayland”, and both work fine with it. Perhaps you’re referring to Pulse’s inability to be sandboxed well? Overall, I don’t think people are abandoning Pulse because of Poettering, they’re abandoning it because it has *a lot* of problems and PipeWire solves many of those problems with near-full backwards compatibility with Alsa, Pulse, and JACK. PipeWire is trying to be the best of Pulse and JACK and then some, and doing a decent job at it while overall being less complicated. PipeWire feels like a pipe dream that actually became reality: combining the best aspects of disparate systems while keeping compatibility with them. Personally I think much of the hate for systemd is based on misunderstanding and rose-colored glasses for current systems that make them ignore all the problems with sysvinit etc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MrRichBOB · 2021-07-14 18:33 The antecedent for “even ignoring the necessity for Wayland” is _Pipewire_. Many people are switching to Pipewire because it fixes a lot of issues with Bluetooth but also video capturing, etc. issues with programs on Wayland. You _need_ Pipewire for Wayland to get the most functionality out of it. But a lot of people still holding onto X seem to be moving to Pipewire to distance themself from Pulseaudio. I see it a LOT in the communities I run around with. Of course, a few dozen thousand is not the entirety of the Linux user- base. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- karr0n · 2021-07-14 20:38 Yes I see the issue. I think they are restructuring their whole project currently to make it more accessible (their naming scheme sucked, you basically have to memorize the names and what hides behind it xD). The license situation isn't as bad as one might think. The readme provides a great overview of what is licensed under which license and it looks to be primarily bsd 2 clause with the exception of what seems to interface with the linux kernel. 34 libs, 6.5 LGPL, 1 zlib, the rest is BSD based. At least it looks like a good foundation to build something without having to reinvent everything. Nonblocking disk io, helper routines for memory/locking/data structures and memory passing sounds like something that could benefit from a tightly integrated reimplementation. At least, it shouldn't be ignored entirely when talking about a non-systemd DE, I think. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Brotten · 2021-07-14 20:48 >I really think most users, even new users, are switching to \[...\] Artix Boy, what are you smoking? Ubuntu towers. Now as always. There's probably more contributors in the Debian project than people who know what precisely Artix is. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-14 20:54 Fair enough. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- AskJeevesIsBest · 2021-07-14 21:01 Someone should make this happen ASAP. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MrRichBOB · 2021-07-14 21:41 I didn't say switching to Artix, I said switching to Arch, then to Artix. Few move from Windows to Artix, they move to Arch then to Artix, but most often Manjaro, then Arch, then Artix. It is because Arch is "the best gaming-distro". But a lot of people that just web browse, they just switch to Ubuntu or Mint. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LiamW · 2021-07-14 23:30 I honestly love how simple it is to create intelligent services in systemd. I hate the changes to user-level automated script launching. I know there’s a way to do this in systemd, I just don’t see it being an improvement over how things were done before. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mrdeworde · 2021-07-15 01:49 Have you taken a look at something ancient like Motif or the materials Oreilly opened up for OPEN LOOK? They might be decent places to start since they're now open source and originated as attempts at a standardized UNIX gui toolkit, made with an eye towards portability. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- demetrioussharpe · 2021-07-15 02:04 I’m slowly working though the kids stuff. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JakoDel · 2021-07-16 08:17 or.. just use google's site? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- nextbern · 2021-07-18 01:24 Or just use Firefox? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dynseli · 2021-07-30 05:40 There's a lightweight window manager called mcwm, that only uses XCB, and it's under the ISC license. There's also Lemonbar (MIT licensed) which is a taskbar that's written in XCB. They're not toolkits by any means, but it's a starting point for anything XCB based. ​ Xaw (Athena) library implementations are libx11 based, rather than XCB. They are MIT licensed as well. What if a toolkit can be modeled after Xaw, by replacing libx11 components with libxcb components? xpaint (which is GPL) and its associated libxaw3dxft (an Athena implementation) are alternatives to a Gimp and gtk model. The Apache license would make more sense than GPL for an end XCB toolkit, while a BSD license makes sense for a library. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Current_Hearing_6138 · 2021-12-30 03:41 once gtk goes the systemd route, we'll be using java's awt and similar frameworks. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Current_Hearing_6138 · 2021-12-30 03:58 Its been a while, but iirc glut can be used as generic x11 gui toolkit. should be able to use it to make a windowing system from scratch or work within the confines of your wm. Edit: glfw, not glut.