Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

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dizt3mp3r
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by dizt3mp3r »

6.5 WebKit-based MSHTML implementation on the GSOC 2019 Wiki

Do we really want webkit as the rendering engine for the in-built ReactOS mini-browser? Surely we don't want to hoist ReactOS onto the coat-tails of Google's attempt to dominate the browser market. Gecko may not be the slimmest but it adheres to web standards, is not part of the Google commercial hegemony and is used by Linux browsers as well as Firefox variants on Windows.

If we have to incorporate Webkit - well, Google benefits commercially by everyone using Google-inspired o/ses and browsers and I see no reason why, if we are going to push a Google product, perhaps we could work out a deal whereby ReactOS receives a tiny bit of cash from users using it. As browsers generate usage and searches I believe there is a way of returning search revenue directly to the developing team. It generates income this way for the Palemoon team.

I am against using webkit engine in principle. This just feels like the 'wrong' choice.
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PurpleGurl
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by PurpleGurl »

Well, Webkit is old work. They now use Blink. I would love to see the speed enhancement of Webkit and see that available for the entire OS. If it is less than compliant, the fork we use could be modified.

But I also get your comments on it. Google would then have the main share. Microsoft dropped their own browser in favor of Chromium based.
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dizt3mp3r
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by dizt3mp3r »

Blink was derived from webkit but the point is not the code and not the technology, it is the originator. They don't create open source software to be generous, they create it to overload the market and stifle competition just as Microsoft used to with closed source software. They also shutdown development in the blinking of an eye if it suits them to just like MS.

If you are eventually stuck using the only rendering engine available (as all others will have have died) then you are at the mercy of Google's whims. Google is changing the blink engine so that it is optimised for sites such as facebook. Facebook in turn is being optimised for multi-process browsers such as Chrome, these are not disconnected events, this is breaking the web just as Microsoft intended to do (but failed) meaning that one day the main areas of the web will only run on one particular browser and that will be Google's browser or using their rendering engine. Sites are meant to be browser agnostic but from this point they will become increasingly less so (death of Edge is the current example where rapid FB changes deliberately designed to break Edge resulted in Edge being unable to keep up).

My feeling is that ReactOS should not be part of the Google mega-corporation that is to come. It seems 'wrong'.
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by erkinalp »

Embeddable Servo is not yet ready. After it is ready, we could use it.
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binarymaster
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by binarymaster »

dizt3mp3r wrote: Thu Jan 31, 2019 12:15 pm Blink was derived from webkit but the point is not the code and not the technology, it is the originator.
I see no point in that discussion. We just need working code, nothing more.
dizt3mp3r wrote: Thu Jan 31, 2019 12:15 pm My feeling is that ReactOS should not be part of the Google mega-corporation that is to come. It seems 'wrong'.
By using third-party project code ReactOS doesn't become a part of it. You're overreacting here.
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by hbelusca »

What about using (Wine) Gecko?
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dizt3mp3r
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by dizt3mp3r »

I don't think I'm over-ReacTing, well perhaps I am. Experience has left me damaged by using Google's products in the past, so I am wary. Provenance is important as it points to a direction for the future.

We know Gecko works, we have it available. Is it so important to have a replacement? Is Webkit SO much smaller, so much more lightweight?

If we assume that the future is webkit and that Gecko will die then perhaps it is the right choice just for the wrong reasons.
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Ancient
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by Ancient »

dizt3mp3r wrote: Thu Jan 31, 2019 2:28 pm I don't think I'm over-ReacTing, well perhaps I am. Experience has left me damaged by using Google's products in the past, so I am wary. Provenance is important as it points to a direction for the future.
You are not over reacting. Google benefits at least from studying ReactOS and it's development / misdevelopment. At the time ReactOS is comfortable compromising to embed Google's products it harms arguments about independence. Substituting Google for Microsoft is really going through a long torturous exercise resulting in substituting one corporate master for another.

Your concern is legitimate.
justincase
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by justincase »

The ideal situation for mshtml would be to not include any rendering engine as part of it, but rather to make it more like a compatibility layer for multiple rendering engines, where you could install an embeddable version of any of its supported rendering engines, and have it use that. That way people have choice, and if your current preferred rendering engine stops being properly supported (e.g. Embedding of Gecko is no longer supported...) then you can drop in one of the other supported engines as a replacement.

Also, if you actually look into the history of WebKit/Blink/Chromium, you'll find that prior to Google's involvement, WebKit was an Apple project, which itself was a fork from KHTML, by KDE. And what's more, this particular engine has basically gone full circle, as KDE has adopted Falkon (previously QupZilla) based on QtWebEngine (renamed from QtWebKit when they adapted it to use newer chromium/blink code).
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binarymaster
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by binarymaster »

justincase wrote: Thu Jan 31, 2019 9:04 pm The ideal situation for mshtml would be to not include any rendering engine as part of it, but rather to make it more like a compatibility layer for multiple rendering engines, where you could install an embeddable version of any of its supported rendering engines, and have it use that.
+1 interesting idea, I like it. :)

But how hard and challenging it would be to implement...
justincase
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by justincase »

binarymaster wrote: Fri Feb 01, 2019 12:12 amBut how hard and challenging it would be to implement...
If I knew that, I'd probably know enough to be able to do it, and if that was the case, I think I'd do it. Sorry.
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bobbykennedy
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by bobbykennedy »

dizt3mp3r wrote: Thu Jan 31, 2019 12:15 pm Blink was derived from webkit but the point is not the code and not the technology, it is the originator. They don't create open source software to be generous, they create it to overload the market and stifle competition just as Microsoft used to with closed source software. They also shutdown development in the blinking of an eye if it suits them to just like MS.

If you are eventually stuck using the only rendering engine available (as all others will have have died) then you are at the mercy of Google's whims. Google is changing the blink engine so that it is optimised for sites such as facebook. Facebook in turn is being optimised for multi-process browsers such as Chrome, these are not disconnected events, this is breaking the web just as Microsoft intended to do (but failed) meaning that one day the main areas of the web will only run on one particular browser and that will be Google's browser or using their rendering engine. Sites are meant to be browser agnostic but from this point they will become increasingly less so (death of Edge is the current example where rapid FB changes deliberately designed to break Edge resulted in Edge being unable to keep up).

My feeling is that ReactOS should not be part of the Google mega-corporation that is to come. It seems 'wrong'.
I dislike Google as much as anyone and wouldn't bat an eyelash if there was a revolution in America where it ended up with all of Google's assets being seized and all its former major shareholders and executives were exiled or incarcerated for re-education à la China. But if they have the best available and most proliferated open-source software components to suit our needs, it is irrational and undialectical to refuse to harness and take the utmost advantage of it just because you have a critical view of the monopolistic behaviour of the originator of said software. This same logic applies in all other fields, because I'm sure you can come up with criticisms for all inventors, theorists and producers of whatever technologies and applied scientific theories you are currently using right now that you take for granted. Besides, it is not Google's fault for their behaviour, as maximisation of profit no matter the social or environmental cost is rewarded under the rules and mechanisms of this global economic system we all have no choice but to operate under until it disintegrates and evolves.
shunesburg
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by shunesburg »

ReactOS target to replace Windows, and Windows use Gecko. Even Microsoft will use Chromium for the browser, the browser engine for "application" as no link to the "browser engine" of the browser itself, Windows use Gecko and will always use it for the "browser engine of application".
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dizt3mp3r
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by dizt3mp3r »

Not sure if I understand that Shune, something seems wrong there.

Regardless, let's get back on topic please. Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas
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justincase
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Re: Google Summer of Code 2019 Ideas

Post by justincase »

shunesburg wrote: Thu Feb 07, 2019 2:55 pmReactOS target to replace Windows, and Windows use Gecko.
Actually, Microsoft doesn't use Gecko for anything.
We're discussing mshtml.dll, which (in Windows) supplies Trident, the engine behind Internet Explorer.
shunesburg wrote: Thu Feb 07, 2019 2:55 pmEven Microsoft will use Chromium for the browser, the browser engine for "application" as no link to the "browser engine" of the browser itself, ...
Microsoft has announced that future versions of Edge will be based on Chromium, so we can expect it to use the Blink engine. This announcement doesn't appear to indicate a change to Internet Explorer, so we can expect that Microsoft's mshtml.dll will continue to supply the Trident engine.
shunesburg wrote: Thu Feb 07, 2019 2:55 pm... Windows use Gecko and will always use it for the "browser engine of application".
Just because Microsoft hasn't announced anything that indicates that they're changing mshtml.dll from Trident to some other engine doesn't mean they never will. If their move from EdgeHTML to Chromium/Blink in Edge goes well, it's not inconceivable that they might decide to drop Internet Explorer entirely, and replace Trident with Blink in mshtml.dll as well.

Also, where did you even get the idea that Windows used Gecko? Microsoft has never included Gecko in any of its releases. Gecko is Mozilla's engine, which they've used in Firefox for ages. Gecko (as part of Firefox) is what killed Internet Explorer in the eyes of the general public. You can ask just about anyone these days about browsers, and a large majority will tell you that they don't like Internet Explorer, even if they themselves are too far removed from the situation to know why, and that's why Microsoft created Edge.

Note 1: Wine-gecko uses Gecko as a backend for their mshtml implementation, but that's not part of Windows. It's by the Wine developers, not Microsoft.
Note 2: Internet Explorer's User Agent string may contain the word Gecko, but that's just a remnant from the browser wars, where each browser would implement some new feature that people would want to use, which would break when viewed on another browser, then developers would 'fix' their site for other browsers by disabling the part of their page that used the cool new feature if the browser didn't claim to be the browser that had that feature, then the other browser would implement the feature, and websites still wouldn't let their users see those parts because of the ua string, and thus browsers adopted parts of eachother's ua strings.


Anyway, if you want to continue this discussion about browsers and their engines, please do so in the HTML Renderers topic.
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