Re: SimpleWebKit (was GNUstep Web browser (was Re: WebKit Bounty))

[address@hidden]

On 25 Mrz., 12:18, Helge Hess <helge.h...@opengroupware.org> wrote:
> On Mar 23, 2007, at 17:50, h...@computer.org wrote:
>
> > There is no problem to expect with that. Both implement the documented
> > WebView and WebFrame API in two different frameworks. You can link to
> > either one in your applications (there is IMHO no reason to have both
> > in a single application).
>
> Well, I disagree with that and its exactly what I'm concerned about.  
> Since the API is *not* the same (the implemented HTML is obviously  
> part of the API in this case!), the code should be able to select  

I would not say that it is API. It is different capabilities - some of
them are mandatory and others optional. Would you also see NSImage's
set of supported formats as part of the API?

> which implementation it needs.

Hm. Since everybody appears to agree that full WebKit is more powerful
and robust and SimpleWebKit can only be a subset, you should in that
case simply use the ported WebKit and not SimpleWebKit.

I have no idea how to really solve that otherwise - besides renaming
all classes to avoid name conflicts. But that hurts those >80%
applications which just need either one.

> And since an application can be composed from different frameworks  
> (say an RSS framework and a browser framework), its also extremely  
> useful to have both in one application.

Yes. But neither WebKit nor SimpleWebKit supports RSS (directly). So,
you can link either one with the RSS framework. But both have a
compatible plugin architecture for adding new MIME content types since
it is part of WebView.

> In fact I expect that a lot of frameworks and apps will use HTML  
> plugins instead of native GUI elements over time (sometime  
> SimpleWebKit might be perfect for). Just check NewsFire or Adium.

There are IMHO exactly two sets of interfaces which applications
should use to remain portable:
Web* classes and NSAttributedString's -initWithHTML:

> If you only want to build two versions of a web browser, it doesn't  
> matter. But if you want to integrate an HTML engine in an app and use  
> it as a core component, it matters a lot.

I think -[NSAttributedString initWithHTML:] and -[WebView
stringByEvaluatingJavaScriptFromString:] should be the standard means
of integrating the HTML engine from a software architectural point of
view with the KISS-principle in mind. You would have to do it that way
as well if you port full WebKit or run on Cocoa. Or do you think of a
different task?

Nikolaus