Re: module viewer

[Ali Abdin <ALIABDIN aucegypt edu>]

> Just the opposite, you will be using more features from the library rather
> then hand coding them, they will be therefore shared among apps and you will
> actually have better memory usage.
> 
> Another thing you gain by using GNOME is a lot of consistency, translated
> standard menus, buttons and messages, session managment support, framework
> for application windows, easy and consistent MDI, simple sound, consistent
> configuration, standard dialogs (which also makes apps use less code and
> easier to write), much easier graphics engine (the canvas), and a whole bunch
> of other stuff.  As far as I can see you have almost nothing to loose and
> everything to gain by using GNOME over just GTK.  And this list will get much
> larger with GNOME 2.0.
> 
> I think the single biggest gain of using gnome is reducing the amount of GUI
> code in your app, and making your app consistent with other apps in
> behaviour.  Imagine if everyone implemented everything from scratch, such as
> property dialogs or MDI's.  Every MDI would work a bit different, and it
> would get annoying.  I for example like all my mdi apps to work with the
> tabbed MDI model, if everyone implemented their own MDI, some would support
> it but I'd have to set it in each app, and some would not support it and
> support some other form.   It's a hassle for the user.

There deffinately is some bloat when linking to libgnome and/or 
libgnomeui as opposed to pure GTK+. All the Gnome libs does (Gtk+ wise) 
is provide a convient wrapper for it. The underlying code DOES get 
executed. There are MANY MANY things in a lib that just won't get 
executed (gnome-dns, gnome-score, etc). And some people DO like to make 
staticly-linked apps (for commercial reasons???) so it'll cause big bloat 
that wise. Note: I think Havoc Pennington(sp?) raised this issue. Touche on 
the Internationalization and Session management. But 
I don't think session management really is a strong requirement for a 
small simple app (some stuff just doesn't need to be remembered). Again, not 
every 
app uses MDI - so if you're not gonna use it, why would you need GNOME. 
As for the buttons and menus - not really that 'essential' (i.e. I'm 
gonna port a Gtk+ app to GNOME because of some stock icons in GNOME??? I 
can use the icons in plain Gtk+)

> Just about every place that has GTK has GNOME, unless you're talking about a
> really exotic port such as windows.

Thats an assumption. Some people install Gtk+ and not GNOME - some of 
those people include other non-Linux OS's - some people don't use GNOME 
because of lack of system support or lack of GNU tools to build it. There 
also aren't many binary versions of GNOME. In fact, the only ones I've 
seen are the Gurulabs i386 RPMS
> 
> You don't need to run the 'enviroment' to run an app that uses the GNOME
> libs, just as much as you don't need the 'enviroment' to run an app that uses
> KDE libs.  All people have to install is GNOME libs, and I'd say most systems
> that come with GTK+ already come with GNOME libs, and most systems that come
> with Qt, come with KDE.  I don't see any advantage to not having gnome or kde
> libs installed.

again, that is an assumption. Yes, some people do install gnome-libs, 
gnome-core, kde-libs, and kde-core. But others don't. Why the hell should 
I install all of KDE just to use some Qt apps that I have. Also, believe 
it or not, some people are strapped for hard disk space. Some people find 
their distribution install both GNOME and KDE, but they only use GNOME so 
they delete KDE - and vice versa
 
> So I think not porting to GNOME, unless there is a pressing reason not to do
> so, is a dumb idea.  I think it's better to write it from scratch as a GNOME
> app in fact.

Again, why is it better to write it as a GNOME app. It works in Gtk+. 
It's a simple program that won't use any fancy libart or gnome-config or 
session management. 

Oh as for internationalization which you mentioned above - Thats not 
really GNOME now is it - isn't that xgettext related?

People shouldn't feel obligated to port Gtk+ apps to GNOME. They work, 
they fit in with widget styles/themes. If they plan to use stuff that 
will look BETTER in GNOME (MDI,etc.) then they should consider, but if 
not then there is no /NEED/ to. Again, somebody could port it for fun or 
just for the heck of it. But you shouldn't feel OBLIGATED to do it.

just my opinion ;)