4 ms·

It's interesting that they are delaying Pop_OS! releases and behind the original schedule[1] writing a new desktop environment, but so much of their updates see

It's interesting that they are delaying Pop_OS! releases and behind the original schedule[1] writing a new desktop environment, but so much of their updates seem to be around their text editor. I would have prioritized having a basic, usable desktop environment, myself -- it being a release blocker and all. Of course, it's their business and they can do what they like, and I do wish them the best. Pop_OS! was my favorite Linux distribution before they indefinitely postponed releases. 1. TBF, I believe they revised their schedule to "when it's done". Edit: This is why they're spending time on the text editor: https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_updates_the_spirit_of_cosmic/kdfb3s7/ https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_up... Edit 2: Here's sort of a roadmap for Pop!_OS: https://github.com/orgs/pop-os/projects/23/views/1 https://github.com/orgs/pop-os/projects/23/views/1

askonomm 3y ago
I'm also a little confused. Cosmic is a desktop environment, but they are working on a text editor? How are these related? Or are they re-inventing all the wheels just because they can?
- JeremyMorgan 3y ago
  Exactly. With VS Code in existence, I'm not sure why they're wasting their time. This isn't a huge need for folks right now.
  - askonomm 3y ago
    And VSCode is just one of many that run on Linux. This feels like some sort of a unwritten rule that if you are making a new DE you also have to make a new text editor (ElementaryOS makes Code, KDE makes Kate, Gnome makes Gnome Text Editor) which honestly is a bit ridiculous to me.
    - type0 3y ago
      it's not as ridiculous when you install your DE as a bundle of packages
  - runjake 3y ago
    Because: https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_updates_the_spirit_of_cosmic/kdfb3s7/ https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_up...
  - mmstick76 3y ago
    VS Code is in an entirely separate category. This is a text editor, not an extensible code editor.
- vorticalbox 3y ago
  Seems they want a complete ecosystem they even have a screenshot utility. [0] [0]https://github.com/pop-os/cosmic-screenshot https://github.com/pop-os/cosmic-screenshot
- mmstick76 3y ago
  A desktop environment is more than a window manager. Can't remember installing a DE and not having a platform default text editor included as a core application.
  - askonomm 3y ago
    So a DE is a OS? Or why would a desktop environment be responsible for platform defaults? Wouldn't that further fragment the whole Linux ecosystem, which is, imo, ultimately why it's not a great user experience?
    - mmstick76 3y ago
      The desktop environment plays a major role in application defaults. Can you imagine installing GNOME and getting Kate as the text editor, bundled with all of its KF5 libraries? Or installing KDE and getting GNOME Text Editor bundled with libadwaita and GNOME libraries? That's what you're asking us to do with COSMIC. Which is insane because it's not that difficult to make a text editor when you have a mature platform toolkit.
      - askonomm 3y ago
        I mean I would expect an ecosystem not be so fragmented to be honest. Looking at DistroWatch it seems that for every Linux user there is a Linux distro, and seems to be going that way with DE's and text editors as well. You might think this is great - but it seems, to me at least, to have the opposite effect of no option having good quality, because nobody puts any effort together, but instead in siloes.
        mmstick76 3y ago
        That's just not how software development works. The quality of the software depends on the people who own the development of that software, and the technologies they used to build that software. You're advocating that COSMIC should be a hodgepodge of random projects built with completely different frameworks with conflicting design philosophies. The end result of this is the exact opposite of good quality.
SonOfAPenguin 3y ago
I think it's so they can figure out the application parts of the DE. Like how a lot of gnome stuff has the same menus. I'd say that the DE is usable though. Not at feature parity, but usable. At least for anyone who lives in a browser which... is most people these days?
- runjake 3y ago
  Very good point! Edit: In fact, one of their engineers states as such here: https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_updates_the_spirit_of_cosmic/kdfb3s7/ https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_up...
- verdverm 3y ago
  How many people (want to) write desktop apps with native libraries vs building something on electron & JS that runs the same everywhere?
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - mmstick76 3y ago
    Lots of them. I've read a lot of comments from the Rust community that they'd love to build native applications in Rust. This will be their moment to make something as C programmers had with GNOME, and C++ programmers had with KDE.
    - jwells89 3y ago
      And it’s not just Rust. I think there’s a handful of newer languages people would love to use for writing native desktop apps, but the frameworks and tooling aren’t there. For me that’s Swift. I don’t even need a UI framework that tries to be a silver bullet write-once-run-everywhere or one that strives to fit into the paradigm-du-jour; just give me something that’s serviceable with a decent loudout of widgets (many newer frameworks weirdly skip critical pillars like tableviews/datagrids) that I use to write per-platform UIs around a common Swift core.
mmstick76 3y ago
The text editor is being developed solely by our principal engineer thus far. Application updates may be the most visually interesting thing to share in an update, but it's far from the only thing being worked on. A default text editor doesn't need to be complex, and if you look at the source code, it's very lean and readable. It's a fun side project that tests our platform toolkit, and not at all taking anything from development of the cosmic compositor or its applets.
lioeters 3y ago
To quote the explanation about why they're working on the editor in parallel with the desktop environment: > As is often the case with scientific research which many people believe to be pointless, technological innovations aren't always made by achieving the end goal, but through the technologies developed to reach that goal. > Development on COSMIC Edit has lead towards improvements to the cosmic-text library, which is used by many GUI libraries in the Rust ecosystem now. Similarly, the UX designs for the text editor improves the COSMIC interface guidelines, and puts design theories to practice. Likewise, widgets that are necessary for the editor are added to the COSMIC platform toolkit, and existing widgets and features are improved to improve the development experience for applications like this. > No one would want to build applications for a platform that lacks widgets capable of properly displaying, formatting, and editing text. Also, we're talking about a default text editor. It's a fun side project that's being developed solely by our principal engineer. Many would also find it debilitating to have a desktop environment without a text editor preinstalled. Imagine if GNOME didn't have Gedit, and KDE didn't have Kate.
Thonanth 3y ago
Unfortunately why I switched to Arch. I was mostly happy with pop_os!, but not happy with a slower and buggier Gnome

askonomm 3y ago

I'm also a little confused. Cosmic is a desktop environment, but they are working on a text editor? How are these related? Or are they re-inventing all the wheels just because they can?

JeremyMorgan 3y ago
Exactly. With VS Code in existence, I'm not sure why they're wasting their time. This isn't a huge need for folks right now.
- askonomm 3y ago
  And VSCode is just one of many that run on Linux. This feels like some sort of a unwritten rule that if you are making a new DE you also have to make a new text editor (ElementaryOS makes Code, KDE makes Kate, Gnome makes Gnome Text Editor) which honestly is a bit ridiculous to me.
  - type0 3y ago
    it's not as ridiculous when you install your DE as a bundle of packages
- runjake 3y ago
  Because: https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_updates_the_spirit_of_cosmic/kdfb3s7/ https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_up...
- mmstick76 3y ago
  VS Code is in an entirely separate category. This is a text editor, not an extensible code editor.
vorticalbox 3y ago
Seems they want a complete ecosystem they even have a screenshot utility. [0] [0]https://github.com/pop-os/cosmic-screenshot https://github.com/pop-os/cosmic-screenshot
mmstick76 3y ago
A desktop environment is more than a window manager. Can't remember installing a DE and not having a platform default text editor included as a core application.
- askonomm 3y ago
  So a DE is a OS? Or why would a desktop environment be responsible for platform defaults? Wouldn't that further fragment the whole Linux ecosystem, which is, imo, ultimately why it's not a great user experience?
  - mmstick76 3y ago
    The desktop environment plays a major role in application defaults. Can you imagine installing GNOME and getting Kate as the text editor, bundled with all of its KF5 libraries? Or installing KDE and getting GNOME Text Editor bundled with libadwaita and GNOME libraries? That's what you're asking us to do with COSMIC. Which is insane because it's not that difficult to make a text editor when you have a mature platform toolkit.
    - askonomm 3y ago
      I mean I would expect an ecosystem not be so fragmented to be honest. Looking at DistroWatch it seems that for every Linux user there is a Linux distro, and seems to be going that way with DE's and text editors as well. You might think this is great - but it seems, to me at least, to have the opposite effect of no option having good quality, because nobody puts any effort together, but instead in siloes.
      - mmstick76 3y ago
        That's just not how software development works. The quality of the software depends on the people who own the development of that software, and the technologies they used to build that software. You're advocating that COSMIC should be a hodgepodge of random projects built with completely different frameworks with conflicting design philosophies. The end result of this is the exact opposite of good quality.

SonOfAPenguin 3y ago

I think it's so they can figure out the application parts of the DE. Like how a lot of gnome stuff has the same menus. I'd say that the DE is usable though. Not at feature parity, but usable. At least for anyone who lives in a browser which... is most people these days?

runjake 3y ago
Very good point! Edit: In fact, one of their engineers states as such here: https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_updates_the_spirit_of_cosmic/kdfb3s7/ https://old.reddit.com/r/pop_os/comments/18ike40/december_up...
verdverm 3y ago
How many people (want to) write desktop apps with native libraries vs building something on electron & JS that runs the same everywhere?
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- mmstick76 3y ago
  Lots of them. I've read a lot of comments from the Rust community that they'd love to build native applications in Rust. This will be their moment to make something as C programmers had with GNOME, and C++ programmers had with KDE.
  - jwells89 3y ago
    And it’s not just Rust. I think there’s a handful of newer languages people would love to use for writing native desktop apps, but the frameworks and tooling aren’t there. For me that’s Swift. I don’t even need a UI framework that tries to be a silver bullet write-once-run-everywhere or one that strives to fit into the paradigm-du-jour; just give me something that’s serviceable with a decent loudout of widgets (many newer frameworks weirdly skip critical pillars like tableviews/datagrids) that I use to write per-platform UIs around a common Swift core.

mmstick76 3y ago

The text editor is being developed solely by our principal engineer thus far. Application updates may be the most visually interesting thing to share in an update, but it's far from the only thing being worked on. A default text editor doesn't need to be complex, and if you look at the source code, it's very lean and readable. It's a fun side project that tests our platform toolkit, and not at all taking anything from development of the cosmic compositor or its applets.

lioeters 3y ago

To quote the explanation about why they're working on the editor in parallel with the desktop environment: > As is often the case with scientific research which many people believe to be pointless, technological innovations aren't always made by achieving the end goal, but through the technologies developed to reach that goal. > Development on COSMIC Edit has lead towards improvements to the cosmic-text library, which is used by many GUI libraries in the Rust ecosystem now. Similarly, the UX designs for the text editor improves the COSMIC interface guidelines, and puts design theories to practice. Likewise, widgets that are necessary for the editor are added to the COSMIC platform toolkit, and existing widgets and features are improved to improve the development experience for applications like this. > No one would want to build applications for a platform that lacks widgets capable of properly displaying, formatting, and editing text. Also, we're talking about a default text editor. It's a fun side project that's being developed solely by our principal engineer. Many would also find it debilitating to have a desktop environment without a text editor preinstalled. Imagine if GNOME didn't have Gedit, and KDE didn't have Kate.

Thonanth 3y ago

Unfortunately why I switched to Arch. I was mostly happy with pop_os!, but not happy with a slower and buggier Gnome