3 ms·

I’d really love to see a KDE-native browser based on Gecko instead of Chromium or WebKit.

by notpushkin 2y ago

dismalaf 2y ago
I mean, WekKit started life as a fork of KDE's web engine so only makes sense they'd use it...
- notpushkin 2y ago
  I’m not saying they shouldn’t use it, of course! I just want there to be an alternative, too :-) (It could be a part of KDE – they do have multiple media players, why not multiple browsers as well? But it could also be an independent project. I might tinker with this idea sometime, although I don’t have a KDE setup right now as my main laptop broke down.)
cosmic_cheese 2y ago
Not likely unfortunately thanks to Mozilla, which in all its wisdom, dropped embedding support from Gecko. This means it effectively cannot be hosted outside of Firefox/Seamonkey and forks thereof. This is contrasted by WebKit, which is largely UI toolkit agnostic and can be dropped in just about anywhere. Funny thing, Epiphany (now known as GNOME Web) was originally built around Gecko, but when Mozilla axed embedding, the project had no choice except to switch web engines and so it’s now built around WebKit instead.
- jeroenhd 2y ago
  I think that was a fine decision by Mozilla, even if I'm not happy with it. Firefox is already a web browser with barely enough market share to support it. Wasting resources on making even smaller special purpose web browsers integrate with the engine is not a move for a company that has been struggling with a lack of independent funding for years now. Of course the decision was made back in the Firefox 5 days, but back then Chrome was rapidly growing, mostly at the cost of Firefox. Had Firefox remained embeddable, I think it would've only been held back in important performance areas like threading and rendering because of the API around the web view. Interesting enough, with the Firefox for Android rewrite, Mozilla actually went back to making Gecko embeddable: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/GeckoView https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/GeckoView This design decision is also claimed to be the reason for them to disable about:config in production builds, because misconfiguring geckoview can disconnect it from the app and leave users with a broken browser (apparently). So now there is an official way of embedding Gecko in your application, but it's limited to Android only.
  - homarp 2y ago
    >Wasting resources talking about Mozilla wasting resources is quite funny. Do you think having a competitor to Electron would be worse than + Pocket + LLM + VPN + https://mozillalifeboat.com/ https://mozillalifeboat.com/
    - EasyMark 2y ago
      any proof that they are losing money on VPN or Pocket? That's my only concern, if they're profitable they should live, if they are cost centers, drop them (obviously they're outside core mission of the browser, internet standards, internet freedom)
    - jeroenhd 2y ago
      Diversifying the business so they're not dependent on Google is a good thing. I disagree with most of their business choices, but if the American DoJ gets its way, Mozilla will lose 86% of its funding next year. As for Electron, I don't really care. I open most Electron apps in pinned Firefox tabs already. As for the ones that integrate natively and can't run in the browser, Firefox is slower than Chrome so I'd rather have these 3MiB of JS apps ship with another slightly outdated copy of Chrome than with a slightly outdated copy of Firefox.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
    I think embedded gecko would have been the way they could answer electron, and that would have helped them stay relevant.
    - tomnipotent 2y ago
      Mozilla Positron, their attempt at an Electron-compatible runtime on top of Gecko, did not pick up any traction and was cancelled.
      - cosmic_cheese 2y ago
        That was quite late in the game, though. Kind of like closing the barn doors after the horses have already bolted.
- bionade24 2y ago
  Embedlite is still maintained, even though it's not a Mozilla project nor very active. Since it's the base for the Sailfish browser, it even does have Qt bindings. Relevant repos: https://github.com/sailfishos/qtmozembed https://github.com/sailfishos/qtmozembed https://github.com/sailfishos/embedlite-components https://github.com/sailfishos/embedlite-components https://github.com/sailfishos/gecko-dev https://github.com/sailfishos/gecko-dev
- raffraffraff 2y ago
  What about using GeckoView? https://mozilla.github.io/geckoview/ https://mozilla.github.io/geckoview/ I don't know what I'm talking about though. I just found that and have no idea how useful it is
  - notpushkin 2y ago
    It’s geared towatds Android mostly, though it might be possble to adapt it for desktop.

I’d really love to see a KDE-native browser based on Gecko instead of Chromium or WebKit.

dismalaf 2y ago

I mean, WekKit started life as a fork of KDE's web engine so only makes sense they'd use it...

notpushkin 2y ago
I’m not saying they shouldn’t use it, of course! I just want there to be an alternative, too :-) (It could be a part of KDE – they do have multiple media players, why not multiple browsers as well? But it could also be an independent project. I might tinker with this idea sometime, although I don’t have a KDE setup right now as my main laptop broke down.)

cosmic_cheese 2y ago

Not likely unfortunately thanks to Mozilla, which in all its wisdom, dropped embedding support from Gecko. This means it effectively cannot be hosted outside of Firefox/Seamonkey and forks thereof. This is contrasted by WebKit, which is largely UI toolkit agnostic and can be dropped in just about anywhere. Funny thing, Epiphany (now known as GNOME Web) was originally built around Gecko, but when Mozilla axed embedding, the project had no choice except to switch web engines and so it’s now built around WebKit instead.

jeroenhd 2y ago
I think that was a fine decision by Mozilla, even if I'm not happy with it. Firefox is already a web browser with barely enough market share to support it. Wasting resources on making even smaller special purpose web browsers integrate with the engine is not a move for a company that has been struggling with a lack of independent funding for years now. Of course the decision was made back in the Firefox 5 days, but back then Chrome was rapidly growing, mostly at the cost of Firefox. Had Firefox remained embeddable, I think it would've only been held back in important performance areas like threading and rendering because of the API around the web view. Interesting enough, with the Firefox for Android rewrite, Mozilla actually went back to making Gecko embeddable: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/GeckoView https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/GeckoView This design decision is also claimed to be the reason for them to disable about:config in production builds, because misconfiguring geckoview can disconnect it from the app and leave users with a broken browser (apparently). So now there is an official way of embedding Gecko in your application, but it's limited to Android only.
- homarp 2y ago
  >Wasting resources talking about Mozilla wasting resources is quite funny. Do you think having a competitor to Electron would be worse than + Pocket + LLM + VPN + https://mozillalifeboat.com/ https://mozillalifeboat.com/
  - EasyMark 2y ago
    any proof that they are losing money on VPN or Pocket? That's my only concern, if they're profitable they should live, if they are cost centers, drop them (obviously they're outside core mission of the browser, internet standards, internet freedom)
  - jeroenhd 2y ago
    Diversifying the business so they're not dependent on Google is a good thing. I disagree with most of their business choices, but if the American DoJ gets its way, Mozilla will lose 86% of its funding next year. As for Electron, I don't really care. I open most Electron apps in pinned Firefox tabs already. As for the ones that integrate natively and can't run in the browser, Firefox is slower than Chrome so I'd rather have these 3MiB of JS apps ship with another slightly outdated copy of Chrome than with a slightly outdated copy of Firefox.
- yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
  I think embedded gecko would have been the way they could answer electron, and that would have helped them stay relevant.
  - tomnipotent 2y ago
    Mozilla Positron, their attempt at an Electron-compatible runtime on top of Gecko, did not pick up any traction and was cancelled.
    - cosmic_cheese 2y ago
      That was quite late in the game, though. Kind of like closing the barn doors after the horses have already bolted.
bionade24 2y ago
Embedlite is still maintained, even though it's not a Mozilla project nor very active. Since it's the base for the Sailfish browser, it even does have Qt bindings. Relevant repos: https://github.com/sailfishos/qtmozembed https://github.com/sailfishos/qtmozembed https://github.com/sailfishos/embedlite-components https://github.com/sailfishos/embedlite-components https://github.com/sailfishos/gecko-dev https://github.com/sailfishos/gecko-dev
raffraffraff 2y ago
What about using GeckoView? https://mozilla.github.io/geckoview/ https://mozilla.github.io/geckoview/ I don't know what I'm talking about though. I just found that and have no idea how useful it is
- notpushkin 2y ago
  It’s geared towatds Android mostly, though it might be possble to adapt it for desktop.