OSNews > Thread > "Linux is only a kernel" by Z

OSNews Asks: Creating a Native Feeling on Mac OS X, Linux

Linked by ephracis on Mon 23rd Jan 2012 13:18 UTC

This is a call out for help on creating a consistent and native feeling on Mac OS X and Linux. As I have never owned a Mac and haven't used Linux as my main OS for over 3 years I need the community of OSNews to help me do this.

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Linux is only a kernel

by Z_God on Mon 23rd Jan 2012 15:43 UTC

Member since:
2006-06-11

There is no such thing as a native UI for Linux because Linux has nothing to do with UI. As a kernel, it really only functions as a part of what you could see as a complete operating system.

If you want to have a native UI then you have to focus on the platform used for the UI, not just some kernel. Popular desktops that are used in combination with the Linux kernel on a GNU system are KDE and Gnome. I use Trinity. These desktops can work with different types of underlying operating systems, which may be interesting to support as well.

Good luck!

Reply Permalink Score: 4

RE: Linux is only a kernel

by ephracis on Mon 23rd Jan 2012 22:28 in reply to "Linux is only a kernel"

Member since:
2007-09-23

Instead of repeating myself too much I will refer you to the answer I gave to the poster above you. In short: my aim is one interface for each environment. So tell me what you use and how it should look and work there.

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE[2]: Linux is only a kernel

by Z_God on Tue 24th Jan 2012 09:53 in reply to "RE: Linux is only a kernel"

Member since:
2006-06-11

I use the Trinity Desktop Environment, which is basically a branch of an old version of KDE (version 3.5). You can find information about it here:
http://www.trinitydesktop.org/

It is not shipped with any major GNU/Linux distribution (anymore/yet) and most people will consider its components outdated. It is still being used in many large scale desktop deployments however.

To get a fully native application for this environment, you would have to have it compile against all the outdated libraries that this desktop environment depends on. (Qt3 and kdelibs version 3.5.)
Because normally few people are going to develop their applications against these old libraries, right now there are development efforts from the Trinity side to get GTK and Qt4 applications to at least look as native. Using one of those two toolkits would be the safest.

I guess you already want to develop both a version targeted towards KDE 4 and a version for Gnome, so one of these versions should be relatively ok for Trinity as well. If you really do not want a to stand out at all, you will have to have a version that compiles against the Trinity libraries. Then it would be perfect for my environment.

Reply Parent Score: 1