3 ms·

I disagree about Windows and Linux. Windows users aren't particularly used to "90s" UIs. Windows users are used to every application looking different, includin

I disagree about Windows and Linux. Windows users aren't particularly used to "90s" UIs. Windows users are used to every application looking different, including those from Microsoft. On Linux you "only" have GTK+, Qt, and the odd wxWidgets application. Oh, and Electron, sadly.

badsectoracula 7y ago
And Motif, FLTK, and others (though personally i've mainly encountered these two in addition to Gtk and Qt) as well as bespoke toolkits. Also Gtk isn't just "Gtk" but Gtk2 and Gtk3 use separate themeing systems and Gtk4 seems to introduce something new. Similarly Qt isn't just "Qt" but Qt4 and Qt5 also use separate themeing systems. If you only use a desktop-focused distribution like Mint or Ubuntu and stick to only using applications for the desktop environment you use, then yes you are only going to see Gtk or Qt apps. But there are way more toolkits than those two - check your distribution's repositories (and even Debian doesn't contain everything).
- ahartmetz 7y ago
  Motif and FLTK apps exist, but they are very, very rare these days. If you count Motif, you can as well count Xt and X Athena Widgets. FLTK isn't as old, but was AFAICT never widely used in any case. Motif used to be the standard toolkit for commercial Unix applications in the 90s I guess, and you might still see it when using some expensive but minimally maintained software originating from that time.
  - badsectoracula 7y ago
    Debian includes a lot of applications using Motif (e.g. Xpdf, Nedit, DDD, etc). I think you underestimate how many such applications exist out there. If you silo yourself in the GNOME or KDE (or derivatives) world, yeah chances are you wont see them. FLTK is used for many smaller applications. Again, chances are if you are into GNOME/KDE you wont see those, but some smaller environments and distributions use FLTK for their utilities. Though yes, Xaw applications exist too (and they come preinstalled with most Xorg installations - Xedit, Xman, etc). Also i forgot Tk applications - Tk is the default toolkit for both Tcl and Python and a lot of such applications exist (gitk would be a very common one).
zerr 7y ago
What's odd with wx? It mostly wraps native APIs - on Linux it's just a C++ wrapper for GTK+.
- ahartmetz 7y ago
  I meant rare

badsectoracula 7y ago

And Motif, FLTK, and others (though personally i've mainly encountered these two in addition to Gtk and Qt) as well as bespoke toolkits. Also Gtk isn't just "Gtk" but Gtk2 and Gtk3 use separate themeing systems and Gtk4 seems to introduce something new. Similarly Qt isn't just "Qt" but Qt4 and Qt5 also use separate themeing systems. If you only use a desktop-focused distribution like Mint or Ubuntu and stick to only using applications for the desktop environment you use, then yes you are only going to see Gtk or Qt apps. But there are way more toolkits than those two - check your distribution's repositories (and even Debian doesn't contain everything).

ahartmetz 7y ago
Motif and FLTK apps exist, but they are very, very rare these days. If you count Motif, you can as well count Xt and X Athena Widgets. FLTK isn't as old, but was AFAICT never widely used in any case. Motif used to be the standard toolkit for commercial Unix applications in the 90s I guess, and you might still see it when using some expensive but minimally maintained software originating from that time.
- badsectoracula 7y ago
  Debian includes a lot of applications using Motif (e.g. Xpdf, Nedit, DDD, etc). I think you underestimate how many such applications exist out there. If you silo yourself in the GNOME or KDE (or derivatives) world, yeah chances are you wont see them. FLTK is used for many smaller applications. Again, chances are if you are into GNOME/KDE you wont see those, but some smaller environments and distributions use FLTK for their utilities. Though yes, Xaw applications exist too (and they come preinstalled with most Xorg installations - Xedit, Xman, etc). Also i forgot Tk applications - Tk is the default toolkit for both Tcl and Python and a lot of such applications exist (gitk would be a very common one).

zerr 7y ago

What's odd with wx? It mostly wraps native APIs - on Linux it's just a C++ wrapper for GTK+.

ahartmetz 7y ago
I meant rare