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KDE 3.3.2 Released
MROD writes "The KDE Project has announced the release of KDE 3.3.2 with what looks like lots of fixes for the HTML engine and kmail. So, it looks like the Sun SPARC machines at work will be chewing on the source for the next week or so to get a running version."
KDE and it's applications can be very modular but konqueror isn't one example of it. It is an application which is written to serve multiple purposes in a non-modular way, using KDE widgets. It isn't at all like Kontact, where it uses existing applications (Kmail, KNode, KOrganizer, etc etc etc...) as it's components.
If someone wants to use only a mail client, it can ditch Kontact and use only KMail. If someone wants a newsreader but doesn't want all the clutter, then use KNode. What do I have to ditch in Konqueror to have a simple file manager that doesn't need to handle HTML rendering, cookies, java applets, RSS feeds, CSS, etc.. ? Nothing. It isn't possible.
I agree that KDE is modular but unfortunately that modularity is missing in konqueror and IMHO, being the KDE app that I and others use the most, it is hurting a bit.
Slashdot, fix your code or at least hire someone who is competent at it to do it for you.
No. Konqueror is just the shell. khtml supports HTML rendering, cookies, Java applets, CSS and so on. When you use Konqueror as a web browser, it's just a wrapper with a toolbar around khtml. Similarly, when you're browsing your local disk, Konqueror is just a shell for the KDE file browsing part (kfmclient?).
In fact, if and whenever the Gecko kpart gets approved for inclusion into the standard KDE distribution, it's quite likely that you'll be able to compile KDE without khtml at all. Then you'll have Gecko embedded in Konqueror for browsing. It may even be possible to compile KDE without khtml now, although I can't guarantee it.
When you load up Konqueror, pretty much all the functionality it has is a menu, toolbars, tabs, and split panes. Then, if you load a web site, it loads up khtml. If you open your local filesystem, it loads up that kpart. If you open a pdf, it can open up an embedded pdf viewer part and display it. Any file that can be viewed in a kpart can be viewed embedded in Konqueror. It is modular like Kontact. Konqueror did it first.
The fact that you and many other people don't even realize that Konqueror is modular like it is speaks a lot to how well it's done. Konqueror's just a bunch of parts that fit together, but it provides you with a pretty seamless experience like a monolithic program would. It's quite an accomplishment.
I've come for the woman, and your head.