GNOME and KDE team up on the Linux desktop

[valdir.marcos]

What I know: under Windows, things are simple: there is only the GDI, and his successor the GDI+. Under the *nix, apparently, everything works with X11, and there are various drawing APIs over X11: GTK, QT,  CARBON, even fpGUI, etc, and LCLIntf Windows.pp (for Windows\GDI).
Of course, things would be easier if there was only one widgetset, but that's the way it is. I know that GNOME and KDE have decided to get together to write, with the best of their ideas, and with the best of their code, a common desktop (probably an API common to the latter), for which they hope it will be the future reference under Linux. But that's a long way.

Are you talking about recently ended Linux App Summit 2019?

GNOME and KDE work together on the Linux desktop
Fragmentation has long been a problem for the Linux desktop, but now the two biggest open-source desktop foundations are joining forces.
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols for Linux and Open Source | August 1, 2019 -- 18:26 GMT (11:26 PDT)
https://www.zdnet.com/article/gnome-and-kde-work-together-on-the-linux-desktop/

GNOME and KDE team up on the Linux desktop, docs for Nvidia GPUs open up, a powerful new way to scan for firmware vulnerabilities, and more news
Catch up on the biggest open source headlines from the past two weeks.
17 Aug 2019 Scott Nesbitt (Community Moderator)
Weekly news roundup with TV
https://opensource.com/article/19/8/news-august-17

Linux App Summit 2019
https://linuxappsummit.org/
https://linuxappsummit.org/media/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjSsbz2TDxIxBEarbDzNQ4w
https://twitter.com/LinuxAppSummit

Should this mean a new API since Wayland is spreading everywhere replacing X?
https://wayland.freedesktop.org/

GTK and QT's APIs should mean something between 70% and 80% of all Linux Desktop Environments. After Linux App Summit 2019, is there any chance of them becoming a unique API?
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/users/statistics

[dbannon]

Interesting that the press about this cooperation is all prior to the meeting. Is that an indication that the meeting did not go well ?

(Used to have a boss who would always say, as we left a meeting, "wow that was a positive meetings!" and I'd have to say, "no bill, they told us to p*ss off !")

Should this mean a new API since Wayland is spreading everywhere replacing X?

Not sure its fair to say its spreading everywhere. Of the biggies, only Fedora (and maybe OpenSUSE ?) are shipping it enabled. And even then they allow the user an easy reversion back to XOrg because it breaks so many things. Fedora is happy to experiment on its Fedora users but not its commercial RedHat ones.

As we are already well behind being depending as we do on GTK2, a new API is quite scary.  But given the authoritative way Gnome changes things, I see little prospect of a nice cooperative arrangement. But if it did eventuate, can you imagine just how big it would be ?

Davo

[valdir.marcos]

Interesting that the press about this cooperation is all prior to the meeting. Is that an indication that the meeting did not go well ?
(Used to have a boss who would always say, as we left a meeting, "wow that was a positive meetings!" and I'd have to say, "no bill, they told us to p*ss off !")

I agree with you. I sill could not find big news after that meeting.

Should this mean a new API since Wayland is spreading everywhere replacing X?

Not sure its fair to say its spreading everywhere. Of the biggies, only Fedora (and maybe OpenSUSE ?) are shipping it enabled. And even then they allow the user an easy reversion back to XOrg because it breaks so many things. Fedora is happy to experiment on its Fedora users but not its commercial RedHat ones.

I believe it's just a matter of time. Tic Tac.

Debian 10.0 "Buster" Now Available - Powered By Linux 4.19, GNOME + Wayland
Written by Michael Larabel in Debian on 6 July 2019 at 08:12 PM EDT. 64 Comments
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Debian-10.0-Released

Ubuntu 19.10 Is The First Time We've Seen (X)Wayland Gaming Performance Match X.Org
Written by Michael Larabel in Ubuntu on 29 October 2019 at 12:00 AM EDT. 55 Comments
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Ubuntu-19.10-X-Wayland-Gaming

Canonical Reportedly Not Planning To Enable Wayland-By-Default For Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
Written by Michael Larabel in Ubuntu on 25 March 2019 at 06:08 AM EDT. 61 Comments
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=No-Wayland-Default-20.04-LTS

Ubuntu 19.10 (Eoan Ermine)
http://releases.ubuntu.com/19.10/

CentOS 8, Wayland and fluxbox
https://forums.centos.org/viewtopic.php?f=54&t=72090

CentOS 8 & Wayland
https://www.reddit.com/r/CentOS/comments/dvk34x/centos_8_wayland/
"Full disclosure: I work at Red Hat and asked the same question on an internal list. Here is the solution in case future Internet searchers are looking for an answer:
There are a number of scenarios where wayland gets disabled and we force X11 usage:NVIDIA binary GPU drivers, unaccelerated server GPUs, unaccelerated virtualized GPUs (cirrus, qxl), hybrid graphics machines."

Wayland By Default
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/WaylandByDefault

As we are already well behind being depending as we do on GTK2, a new API is quite scary.  But given the authoritative way Gnome changes things, I see little prospect of a nice cooperative arrangement. But if it did eventuate, can you imagine just how big it would be?
Davo

Instead of working on QT5, QT6 etc, GTK3, GTK4, GTK5 etc . Lazarus team could join forces and work only a unique QT+GTK API...

[zeljko]

Instead of working on QT5, QT6 etc, GTK3, GTK4, GTK5 etc . Lazarus team could join forces and work only a unique QT+GTK API...

Lazarus already have unique Qt+GTK api and it's name is LCL.

[valdir.marcos]

Instead of working on QT5, QT6 etc, GTK3, GTK4, GTK5 etc . Lazarus team could join forces and work only a unique QT+GTK API...

Lazarus already have unique Qt+GTK api and it's name is LCL.

I was talking about a lower level...

[devEric69]

Are you talking about recently ended Linux App Summit 2019?
GNOME and KDE work together on the Linux desktop
Fragmentation has long been a problem for the Linux desktop, [SNIP]

Yes. About 10 years ago, they had already made this announcement... but it didn't lead to any cooperation.
But this summer, the operational directors of the "two teams" made this commitment together, again.
L. Torwalds said that this is a good thing, because "offices war" contributes to the fragmentation of the *nix desktop ecosystem.

Another significant event is that, due to the trade war between the Trump Administration and the Xi Administration, Huawei now sells its MateBooks with Linux Deepin (renowned for the aesthetics of its interface), instead of Windows 10 (Huawei has been excluded from the American market by a decision of D. Trump).

A lot, a lot of money has been invested on Linux server (the time of the Linux community, but also big companies like Sun, IBM, Microsoft,...): all companies that do not want to start with a handicap, use Linux server to increase their chance to earn money with their Cloud (lower fixed costs).
But in the meantime, in the desktop field, the main characteristic remains fragmentation, which frightens the user who is a "basic" consumer.

[MarkMLl]

I'm not sure this will ever work. Gnome's philosophy appears to be "we know best and will dictate what things look like, and they have a reputation for unexpected API changes. KDE's philosophy is that they're happy to provide settings for just about everything, including the look and feel of GTK programs it finds itself running.

People who are tolerant and prepared to negotiate rarely end up as equal partners.

MarkMLl

[dbannon]

I'm not sure this will ever work. Gnome's philosophy appears to be "we know best and will dictate what things look like, and they have a reputation for unexpected API changes. KDE's philosophy is that they're happy to provide settings for just about everything, including the look and feel of GTK programs it finds itself running.

People who are tolerant and prepared to negotiate rarely end up as equal partners.

MarkMLl

Yeah, like he said .....

Davo