I get that, but if it cant be used, then WTF is Apple distributing it?
Posted by Chiper at January 17, 2003 5:41 PMI think Apple is distributing it, Chiper, because they have to. KHTML is covered by the LGPL, which means that Apple has to distribute the source code to any changes they make.
My personal pet theory is that Apple may release not only WebCore and JavaScriptCore-- which are based on KHTML and KJS and must be released in source-code form to comply with the licenses on those components-- but also a public API for WebKit, making it possible for people to embed WebCore/JavaScriptCore into their applications very easily.
Who knows if this will happen, but we can hope, right?
Posted by Twirlip of the Mists at January 17, 2003 6:06 PMwell, david probably knows if it will happen.
Posted by cypherpunk at January 17, 2003 6:10 PMActually, "Twirlip of the Mists" you may well be correct.
Last Friday, 10th January 2003, the ADC Newsletter # 332 from Apple featured Safari, and it concluded with the words;
"In addition to providing the best web browser for Mac users, one of
the goals of Safari is to provide a fast and efficient HTML
rendering engine for Mac application developers. Apple is actively
preparing a Safari SDK that will be available later this year."
To my utter amazement I have not seen 1 comment on this yet !!!!!!!
Posted by Tony Wight at January 17, 2003 7:55 PMYep... WebKit is what people need... And a CVS module to get the latest versions of WebCore, JavascriptCore and WebKit ^_^; (or at least make sure that the downloadable versions are in sync with the available Safari version (they're still stuck at v48, not that it's really important right now))
Posted by Chris at January 17, 2003 8:01 PMI can't speak for everyone here, but I was trying implement WebCoreBridge out of pure intellectual curiosity, and because I was under the impression that Apple thought open source was "great." I emailed you about it because I evidently mistook your weblog, combined with the free publication of your email address, as an invitation to communicate with you.
As for your suggestion that WebCore's incompleteness should be "obvious"--maybe this is obvious to you, but it was not immediately clear to me, or anyone else who frequents the cocoa-dev list. Only after several failed attempts at exploring the code and creating WebCore clients did the bunch of us finally decide conclusively that it was a lost cause. Of course, you could have cleared this up for me in a moment's time by responding to my email.
Posted by Buzz Andersen at January 17, 2003 8:12 PMI second the call for synched versions of WebCore and JSCore on the dev site!
Posted by Mason at January 17, 2003 8:43 PMBuzz, I apologize if my comments seemed offensive to you. My post was simply an effort to keep people who were investigating the code for embedding purposes (and not merely out of intellectual curiosity) from wasting their time, since the code packages by themselves are not sufficient for embedding.
There will be a forthcoming API for embedding (WebKit) that - when released - will provide a full embedding solution.
Posted by hyatt at January 17, 2003 9:10 PMApologies--had a bad day. I realize now that you weren't intending to be offensive, even though I didn't initially take it that way. New years resolution: I will try not to take things so personally :-).
Posted by Buzz Andersen at January 17, 2003 10:24 PMhyatt re: WebKit: Yay! That's good news. (First order of business: get Project Builder using WebKit to render documentation pages.)
Chris: I also second (uhh... third?) the motion for CVS modules, but really just as a pro forma sort of thing. While we all could be hacking on WebCore and using Safari to test it (I wrote a brief howto on this last week or something, and David linked to it), I myself have found the KHTML/Kwq/WebCore SPI stuff to be more than I'm motivated to tackle in any meaningful way right now. It's important work, but the learning curve is pretty steep for those of us who've never laid eyes on KHTML before. (Not that it's spaghetti code; it actually looks to be pretty well designed and documented. But wrapping my head around the way the software works at a high level is where I got a little frustrated.)
Posted by Twirlip of the Mists at January 17, 2003 11:36 PMI'm glad to hear that WebKit will be made available to developers ... I just wish it had been made clear earlier that this would be the case, as it has been rather painful to watch the people on cocoa-dev try to figure out how to get WebCore to render into an NSView! :)
I also hope other Apple software (Project Builder, Help Center, etc.) will start using it at some point!
Posted by Tim Buchheim at January 18, 2003 12:15 AMChiper, even though apparently WebCore can't be used outside Safari right now, having its source code has enabled me (and possibly others) to make changes and improvements to Safari, and to be able to share them. So it does have its uses.
Posted by Mitz Pettel at January 18, 2003 1:23 AMPeople at Omnigroup are making noises about using WebCore/WebKit in a future version of OmniWeb!
Posted by Matt McIrvin at January 18, 2003 7:06 AMIf memory servesTwirlip, they do not have to release their source specifically because it is LGPL and not simply the GPL. The LGPL was designed for libraries and things that are meant to be included in commercial apps, and IIRC removed the requirements on releasing source code to speed adoption.
Posted by Llywelyn at January 18, 2003 11:03 AMThe actual URL for that issue of ADC News is
http://developer.apple.com/devnews/devnews011003.html
Llywelyn:
That is an incorrect interpretation of the LGPL.
The LGPL imposes pretty much the exact same requirements on distributors of derived works as the GPL, with the primary exception that you can link the code at run-time to non-GPLed works, and even though from an end-user perpsective what is being presented is a single application, you are not required to release the source to the non-LGPLed portions of the application.
You are still required to release the source to any modifications you make to the LGPLed component itself.
So in summary, if I understand Apple's terminology here, they are required to release the source to WebCore and JSCore, but not necessarily to any other part of Safari.
Posted by Doctor Memory at January 19, 2003 10:03 AMKool, thanks for clarifying :-)
Posted by Llywelyn at January 19, 2003 4:52 PMI personally think that Apple should take this one step further and release the source code for ALL of Safari. Even though the LGPL does not require them to do so I think it would be in everyone's interest. Of course in due time there will be the resources available to embed the Safari engine into various applications, Apple could be the nice guy and help developers by giving them the rest of the Safari code to work with.
Posted by Dan Semaya at January 20, 2003 9:37 PMI wanted to throw out two comments to anyone still reading this thread...
1) WebCore can be used without WebKit if you build up a proper Bridge and some solid Image and Text renders. A guy named Kazutoshi Kubota has already assembled a lot of work on this front and with continued contributions, this could be an alternative to a forthcoming Apple API to Safari technologies.
2) Naturally, however, reverse-engineering a WebCore bridge is a pointless effort as it has already been done in WebKit.... IF Apple plans to make WebKit open source. If for some reason, Apple keeps WebKit closed it is going to be a much less attractive option as a total embedding solution.
That's my two cents as a developer currently making use of browser emedding technolgies on Mac OS X and Windows.
thanks,
skylar