OpenOffice.org Performance

cbbrowne-HInyCGIudOg at public.gmane.org cbbrowne-HInyCGIudOg at public.gmane.org
Tue Nov 4 04:15:46 UTC 2003


> On Sun, Nov 02, 2003 at 10:10:20PM -0500, cbbrowne-HInyCGIudOg at public.gmane.org wrote
> 
> > If you look at what is _actually happening_, there is nothing
> > ambiguous about it, except when you use ill-defined terms like
> > "running GNOME" to describe it.
> > 
> > What you are _truly_ doing is "running X," along with some set of
> > libraries and applications in addition to some window manager that may
> > or may not have any kind of association with any of these projects.
> > 
> > - KDE is not a window manager, as is quite well documented by that project.
> > - GNOME is not a window manager, as is rather less well documented.
> > 
> > Both are far and away best described as "application frameworks."
> 
>   I deliberately used the word "desktop", not "window manager".  The
> usual situation is...
>   - X at lowest level
>   - window manager on top of X
>   - optional "desktop" on top of the window manager; cutsie icons strewn
>     all over, and ooey-gui, touchy-feely interaction.
>   - actual applications that do the work that you bought your computer
>     to do

But that's not how the desktop environments function.

The "desktop" does NOT run 'on top of the window manager.'  Applications
do NOT run "on top of" the desktop.

- The window manager...  is an X application that runs atop X.  That is
the ONLY necessarily special part; window managers are special in that
they are exclusive.  You cannot run two window managers concurrently.

- The "desktop" is a set of X applications that run atop X.  

  - If you're running a "Panel", that is very much equivalent running a
  program launcher like TkDesk or the "dock" modules in AfterStep and
  WMaker.

  - If you are running an "icon object manager," that generally puts in
  an application that implements the equivalent to DFM
  <http://www.kaisersite.de/dfm/> or Nautilus or such; programs which
  try to open windows as large as possible and draw icons to represent
  files or applications.

  - GNOME and KDE both have 'server programs' that implement RPC
  servers.  GNOME somewhat prefers CORBA; KDE prefers DCOP.  These may
  not communicate with X; that's the closest we get to something that
  isn't an "application running atop X."

You don't have to take my word for any of this; just look at the
"Developer's View" diagram.  <http://www.kde.org/whatiskde/devview.php>
The only part that diagram shows that is at all "extra" to my
description is KParts, which, just like GNOME "Bonobo," is a way of
implementing parts of applications as embeddable widgets.  

Which still leaves it all as a set of applications that invoke a bunch
of libraries that all run atop X.

The emperor has no clothing; they are nothing more or less than a set of
X applications.  If you call it more, then you are fooling yourself into
thinking there's something truly special there.

The things that are _nearest_ to being "special" are the 'component
architecture' parts, but even that is something that dates back to the
Fresco system <http://www.fresco.org/> that came after InterViews, back
before Motif was created.  Hardly anyone can remember that far back.
(Henry probably remembers further :-).)
--
let name="cbbrowne" and tld="ntlug.org" in String.concat "@" [name;tld];;
http://www.ntlug.org/~cbbrowne/postgresql.html
"Linux  is not  ready  for  the Enterprise.   There  is not a   single
voice-controlled app for any of the  mission critical functions of the
Enterprise. Conspicuously absent  are warp  core control, phaser  bank
activation,  interstellar  navigation,  transporter operation, and the
all-important  self-destruct  sequence. Until  these and  thousands of
other important apps are  written and deployed, Linux  will just be  a
toy in the Enterprise." -- Kevin Novak, Network Computing Magazine
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