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Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

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Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"oh no" that Firefox is dropping support for a slightly older technology (again)? "oh no" that GTK2 is a sinking ship that everyone is fleeing from? or do you mean "oh no" that Firefox is going to be at the center of yet another incendiary (and ultimately fruitless) debate. Because I can agree that any one of those is a good reason to say "oh no".

I've been out of the gtk loop for a while now—I built a couple apps on gtk2 back in the day. What is wrong with gtk3? Why would this be controversial at all?

Below link may shed some light on gtk3 controversy.

https://igurublog.wordpress.com/2012/11/05/gnome-et-al-rotti...

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#12
post #2

oh no.

"oh no" that Firefox is dropping support for a slightly older technology (again)? "oh no" that GTK2 is a sinking ship that everyone is fleeing from? or do you mean "oh no" that Firefox is going to be at the center of yet another incendiary (and ultimately fruitless) debate. Because I can agree that any one of those is a good reason to say "oh no".

Its actually because I hate gtk3 theming. Every update seems to break something & figuring out what css rule to change is hell and a half.

So my knee-jerk reaction to say 'oh no' is just frustration that yet another app is going to start looking funny every time I update my system

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"oh no" that Firefox is dropping support for a slightly older technology (again)? "oh no" that GTK2 is a sinking ship that everyone is fleeing from? or do you mean "oh no" that Firefox is going to be at the center of yet another incendiary (and ultimately fruitless) debate. Because I can agree that any one of those is a good reason to say "oh no".

I've been out of the gtk loop for a while now—I built a couple apps on gtk2 back in the day. What is wrong with gtk3? Why would this be controversial at all?

I don't have a definitive answer, but I think it'd be from association with Gnome 3, which draws out all sorts of pointless and tiresome flame wars amongst people who thrive on creating (and then wading into) emotionally charged drama about software, of all things. :(

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#14
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"oh no" that Firefox is dropping support for a slightly older technology (again)? "oh no" that GTK2 is a sinking ship that everyone is fleeing from? or do you mean "oh no" that Firefox is going to be at the center of yet another incendiary (and ultimately fruitless) debate. Because I can agree that any one of those is a good reason to say "oh no".

Its actually because I hate gtk3 theming. Every update seems to break something & figuring out what css rule to change is hell and a half. So my knee-jerk reaction to say 'oh no' is just frustration that yet another app is going to start looking funny every time I update my system

Personally, I'm happy that Firefox will finally respect the theming that applies to all of my other applications.

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#16
Chrome used GTK2 as that was current at the time, and when we looked into GTK3 we concluded that it'd be a pain to target both simultaneously (the point of the new major version number is that the API changed) and that as long as we were supporting old distros (e.g. "Long Term Support" versions) we should keep GTK2.

These days, those older versions are dying away, but Chrome doesn't use much GTK anyway. I wonder how hard it would be to target both. But that doesn't solve the binary compat problem anyway.

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#17
post #16

Chrome used GTK2 as that was current at the time, and when we looked into GTK3 we concluded that it'd be a pain to target both simultaneously (the point of the new major version number is that the API changed) and that as long as we were supporting old distros (e.g. "Long Term Support" versions) we should keep GTK2. These days, those older versions are dying away, but Chrome doesn't use much GTK anyway. I wonder how…

So Chrome has its own GUI toolkit?

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#18
post #16

Chrome used GTK2 as that was current at the time, and when we looked into GTK3 we concluded that it'd be a pain to target both simultaneously (the point of the new major version number is that the API changed) and that as long as we were supporting old distros (e.g. "Long Term Support" versions) we should keep GTK2. These days, those older versions are dying away, but Chrome doesn't use much GTK anyway. I wonder how…

I wonder if the difference in decision here has to do with Firefox having its own Long Term Support version. So people needing GTK2 on say Ubuntu LTS can use Firefox LTS for that, and latest Firefox is more free to focus on GTK3.

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#19
post #16

Chrome used GTK2 as that was current at the time, and when we looked into GTK3 we concluded that it'd be a pain to target both simultaneously (the point of the new major version number is that the API changed) and that as long as we were supporting old distros (e.g. "Long Term Support" versions) we should keep GTK2. These days, those older versions are dying away, but Chrome doesn't use much GTK anyway. I wonder how…

So Chrome has its own GUI toolkit?

Yes: http://dev.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/aura

Re: Firefox nightlies for Linux are now using Gtk+3

#20

And https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=958868 indicates that it has true smooth scrolling. That is, in my opinion, the poster feature for upgrading to GTK+ 3.

It does. The GTK3 version of Firefox already shipped with Fedora 21 (last December), and has been scrolling very smoothly ever since.
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