Imagine being able to d/l the source unpack it and be able to do:
$ make xmozconfig
or just edit the config.h
you could use the big unwieldy mozilla that comes with your distro -- you know the one with eveything compiled in
or recompile with just the parts you want
Here are my thoughts on why SVG is going to kick Flash (if only people realize it!)
* Programmable using any language supporting the w3c DOM.
Rather than use Flash4's pissweak internal scripting language, or flash5's JavaScript-syntax-similar scripting, you can use anything - ECMAScript,Java,PerlScript, whatever.
Think about this: when browsers support SVG properly, each vendor can provide a custom/standard backend (to handle keyframing, sound, whatever) matched to its authoring tool, if they want (java classes that read some definition file, javascript files etc) -- there is no tie to a proprietary viewer, like flash. The whole functionality of flash can be easily replicated, Java could provide sound support.
It already has some SMIL compatibility built in.
* XML namespaces
Mix'n'match HTML and SVG (and any other XML namespace). Eliminate the need for any bitmaps on a webpage -- just inline or instantiate some SVG -- you can't do it in Flash, and never will (can't do it yet with SVG either, because no browsers support it yet)
* Flash is becoming bloated.
* XML
The enterprise Flash Generator costs some obscene amount of cash.
SVG is just XML -- produce it or read it using any XML tools (eg Apache XML tools, perl's XML::* etc etc).
Create it from some other XML using XSLT.
The whole basis is simply several orders of magnitude more flexible than flash. Off the shelf XML tools can be used with no modification. (Drawing it might be harder, but creating it programmatically/manipulating it is easy)
"Its ascii & too big" -- gzip it, there's a heap of redundancy to be exploited (adobe's svg viewer supports gzipped svg)
I think that one of the biggest obstacles is that heaps of www developers have specialized in flash -- it owns a heap of mindshare.
Adobe sees SVG as its way to beat Macromedia/Flash, and are putting their full force behind it (SVG viewer, SVG support in Illustrator)
Hope I've been coherent enough to get my point across: SVG is so much better than flash, especially for the programmer.
Anyone read the Night's Dawn Trilogy by Peter F Hamilton (Reality Dysfunction, Neutronium Alchemist, The Naked God)? In those books, the heat from rockets escaping Earth's gravity well eventually heats up the atmosphere, and screws up the weather patterns... the result is these huge storms called Armada Storms -- because you'd need an armada of butterflies to cause one. (Of course, the solution is space elevators on the equator)
Wonder if launching rockets has changed the atmosphere to any degree (or, how long until it does)...
There is a problem with Linux versus Windows9x/2000 ease of configurability... root and su
In windows9x/2000 you just right click on the desktop and change your settings In Linux you first have to su, somehow (su, ksu whatever) then configure (somehow).
This means that in windows your little cousin coming to stay will quite likely result in a 640x480x16colour display But its easy... su introduces the whole user hierachy thang, which "Joe A User" doesn't necessarily need to know.
I think that this is a big thing that people are missing in relation to usability and Linux
I thought Evolution was all made up of Bonobo components, glued together with the "Evolution Shell"
Surely all Calendars (for example) look the same/provide the same functionality. So if you don't want it to look like Outlook, just rewrite the shell, using the nice, current Calendar (etc.) components.
Maybe, it could be written using libglade, then you wouldn't even have to recompile to change how it looks.
Or write your own calendar with the same programming interface as the current calendar component. You can rewrite bits without rewriting it all... whether you should, well, thats another matter...
I must say I like the wine (and many others) way of versioning: (yy)yymmdd. Its most practical in a development situation, where lots of changes happen quickly, or daily builds are made; Not as nice for marketing I spose.
And Microsoft may be moving away from numbering to codenames too. I believe the next version of consumer windows is called "Millenium" (isn't everything these days)
Slashdot Mirror
$ make xmozconfig
or just edit the config.h
you could use the big unwieldy mozilla that comes with your distro -- you know the one with eveything compiled in or recompile with just the parts you want
CONFIG_MAILER=N
CONFIG_NEWSREADER=N
CONFIG_ASTEROIDS=N
CONFIG_USER_TYPE=hacker
can you do that yet??
one day RSN, I guess...
Lach
Here are my thoughts on why SVG is going to kick Flash (if only people realize it!)
* Programmable using any language supporting the w3c DOM.
Rather than use Flash4's pissweak internal scripting language, or flash5's JavaScript-syntax-similar scripting, you can use anything - ECMAScript,Java,PerlScript, whatever.
Think about this: when browsers support SVG properly, each vendor can provide a custom/standard backend (to handle keyframing, sound, whatever) matched to its authoring tool, if they want (java classes that read some definition file, javascript files etc) -- there is no tie to a proprietary viewer, like flash. The whole functionality of flash can be easily replicated, Java could provide sound support.
It already has some SMIL compatibility built in.
* XML namespaces
Mix'n'match HTML and SVG (and any other XML namespace). Eliminate the need for any bitmaps on a webpage -- just inline or instantiate some SVG -- you can't do it in Flash, and never will (can't do it yet with SVG either, because no browsers support it yet)
* Flash is becoming bloated.
* XML
The enterprise Flash Generator costs some obscene amount of cash.
SVG is just XML -- produce it or read it using any XML tools (eg Apache XML tools, perl's XML::* etc etc).
Create it from some other XML using XSLT.
The whole basis is simply several orders of magnitude more flexible than flash. Off the shelf XML tools can be used with no modification. (Drawing it might be harder, but creating it programmatically/manipulating it is easy)
"Its ascii & too big" -- gzip it, there's a heap of redundancy to be exploited (adobe's svg viewer supports gzipped svg)
I think that one of the biggest obstacles is that heaps of www developers have specialized in flash -- it owns a heap of mindshare.
Adobe sees SVG as its way to beat Macromedia/Flash, and are putting their full force behind it (SVG viewer, SVG support in Illustrator)
Hope I've been coherent enough to get my point across: SVG is so much better than flash, especially for the programmer.
Lach
Anyone read the Night's Dawn Trilogy by Peter F Hamilton (Reality Dysfunction, Neutronium Alchemist, The Naked God)? In those books, the heat from rockets escaping Earth's gravity well eventually heats up the atmosphere, and screws up the weather patterns...
the result is these huge storms called Armada Storms -- because you'd need an armada of butterflies to cause one.
(Of course, the solution is space elevators on the equator)
Wonder if launching rockets has changed the atmosphere to any degree (or, how long until it does)...
There is a problem with Linux versus Windows9x/2000 ease of configurability...
root and su
In windows9x/2000 you just right click on the desktop and change your settings
In Linux you first have to su, somehow (su, ksu whatever) then configure (somehow).
This means that in windows your little cousin coming to stay will quite likely result in a 640x480x16colour display
But its easy...
su introduces the whole user hierachy thang, which "Joe A User" doesn't necessarily need to know.
I think that this is a big thing that people are missing in relation to usability and Linux
Lajorn
Surely all Calendars (for example) look the same/provide the same functionality. So if you don't want it to look like Outlook, just rewrite the shell, using the nice, current Calendar (etc.) components.
Maybe, it could be written using libglade, then you wouldn't even have to recompile to change how it looks.
Or write your own calendar with the same programming interface as the current calendar component. You can rewrite bits without rewriting it all...
whether you should, well, thats another matter...
Lajorn
And Microsoft may be moving away from numbering to codenames too. I believe the next version of consumer windows is called "Millenium" (isn't everything these days)
Lach