Fix QtWebEngine or work on WebKit?

nephele · July 21, 2022, 1:43pm

I don’t get paid. Pulkomandy doesn’t get paid. madmax doesn’t get paid.

PulkoMandy · July 21, 2022, 1:45pm

The inc does not make technical decisions like this. When I worked full time on the web browser, the agreement with the inc was “work on improving the web browser”. Then it all depends on the person doing the work (and you have to find someone who is willing to work under contract from Haiku inc, for me that’s not possible right now because I would have to leave my current job which is stable, for something that would work for maybe 2-3 years with no certainty that funds would continue to come).

Also, funds from users will not get to the inc if they are not happy with the work funded by the inc. They will go directly to developers or other places.

In the end, it all depends on who will work on fixing bugs one way or another. Until now it was easier to find people willing to fix limitations in app_server than finding people who want to do a Cairo-based haikuwebkit.

jscipione · July 21, 2022, 4:09pm

This is not an either or option IMHO. We need to both fix WebPositive, the Media Kit and app_server to render videos and other content correctly as well as port QtWebKit and browsers. We can’t put the burden all on PulkoMandy to do this work. Someone has got to step up to the plate here eventually and they will.

nephele · July 21, 2022, 4:31pm

QtWebkit is unmaintained for years. do you mean qtwebengine (chromium base)?

Starcrasher · July 21, 2022, 4:35pm

It can be me but, seen from user point of view, the whole thing looks too scary to get people involved.
Perhaps, people who have work on it, and so have clear vision of what needs to be done, could define a roadmap and for each stone some little steps.
This could hopefully drag more people into it and avoid dispersion of efforts.

nephele · July 21, 2022, 4:43pm

The tl;dr
clone the repo
follow build instructions in the readme
try haikulauncher (or copy the wevpositive binary into the release folder to start it with new webkit)

If you have questions about specfic components, basically “where is this?” for the webkit tree you can check the tickets I linked above, sometimes info is already there, othertimes you can ask and some knowledgeable people will probably give you the info (likely pulkomandy, madmax or myself)

jscipione · July 21, 2022, 4:47pm

Yes, I meant QtWebEngine.

extrowerk · July 21, 2022, 5:42pm

For @everybody in this thread: this is the n+1 reincarnation of the same topic with basically the same content. Would it be possible in the future to read the previous ones (using the search function), instead of talking about the same thing over and over again?
If we could spend the time on developing instead of “i know it better than you”, then in some days the problem would be solved. But interestingly it seems the community doesnt want to solve problems but to generate new ones.
Maybe this phenomen have an own name and analyzed already, i however dont know about it, so i call it “BS-talk”.

PeterW · July 21, 2022, 6:17pm

@extrowerk OK, maybe you are right. But I have some questions:

Can you point to an example thread?
Do you mean the discussion “haiku-native solution stack or linux software stack” has been done before many times? Or do you mean rather technical discussion in general?
Isn’t there already a list of recommended threads when you open a new discussion? Maybe no one really reads that?

nephele · July 21, 2022, 6:24pm

I don’t read it because it’s never relevant, and the search function never returns relevant stuff for me either.

win8linux · July 21, 2022, 6:39pm

Definitely sure that there are many, many more threads where similar discussions around web browsers on Haiku have taken place.

Edit: This is not an invitation or suggestion to start posting on all or most of these threads. At least one or more might’ve been locked even due to overly heated discussions.

P.S. This might be useful to you @extrowerk as a reference in the future when yet another thread inevitably starts going into the upper two digits in post count regarding web browsers on Haiku.

PeterW · July 21, 2022, 7:08pm

Wow, I wasn’t aware that the same discussion has been done some many times before.

Well, maybe a default reply pointing to development projects for (a) HaikuWebKit etc. and (b) porting Chromium etc. should be done in future. So people might go there and start contributing or else shut up. Ok, people will still not shut up. But maybe some people change fron demanding/advicing to making.

Greetings
Peter

extrowerk · July 21, 2022, 7:35pm

I would say it was already ongoing in the BeOS time, eg. 20+ years ago.

SCollins · July 21, 2022, 8:27pm

the inc should ask the 20k or so of us users for a specific funding commitment. i would certainly contribute to sich a endeavor.

for instance

hire 2 developers at a cost of XX,XXX per yr

need 500 people to contribute $xx per month

as an example.

in that however it would need some focus. I’d be happy to have you back working on haiku fulltime.

you did a lot of high quality work as is waddlesplash currently.

so, yeah many of us are aware, and many of us can pour some resources in. but it needs a bit of leadership.

PulkoMandy · July 21, 2022, 8:48pm

First of all it needs people who wants to be hired. Under current conditions that is not the case for me. And the inc already has a funding goal ($20000 this year) that allows them to continue Waddlesplash contract this year (but not in the longer term). They rise this goal every year until hopefully it becomes high enough to sustain a full-time developer at a reasonable cost. Then maybe it will raise more and they can start having interns or short-term contracts in addition to one full-time developer. And then maybe later they can consider hiring a second developer.

But to have two full time developers the costs would probably be somewhere around $100K/year? So that’s 5x more than what we have now. For now the donations received are simply not enough.

And personally, I don’t want to leave my current job for something that uncertain. Last time I did it, it was because I had just left my previous job anyway, for a variety of reasons. Initially my 2014 contract was signed for just 2 months, but the donations allowed to renew it several times and keep going for about a year. Then Haiku inc ran out of money.

SCollins · July 21, 2022, 9:17pm

let me ask you a different question, what could the inc accomplish with 250k annually ??

could hire 3 or 4 top notch decs ???

PulkoMandy · July 21, 2022, 9:36pm

Yes, but that’s 12 times the current donations.

SCollins · July 22, 2022, 12:36am

I’m going to go shopping for a large Patreon, likely they will want something in exchange, let me see what i can dig up

dsizzle · July 22, 2022, 2:46am

It also depends on where you find the devs. Here in Silicon Valley, California top notch devs are more than $200k each unfortunately.

SCollins · July 22, 2022, 3:47am

good info to have