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200705 Feb
Posted in Browsers
Recently I posted about Konqueror 3.5.6 and said:
It really is a shame that only a tiny proportion of web users have access to this excellent browser.
That comment was picked up by this blogger who responded:
Virtually every web user can use Konqueror. All they would need to do is install an operating system like Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, NetBSD, Solaris, or Mac OS X.
Which, I admit, is true. I would suggest, however, that installing a new OS is perhaps a little too much work for people who just want to try Konqueror. But as I mentioned in this comment on another post, you could instead try using one of the many excellent Live CDs such as Kubuntu or Knoppix, which allow you to boot from a CD and use Linux without interfering with any existing installs.That way you can try out the many CSS3 features implemented in the Konqueror browser without having to take any drastic technical measures. I’m not sure if the Live CDs feature the very latest version, but if not then I’m sure they soon will.
You can skip to the end and leave a response.
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Comments
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Ferris says:Comment » February 5th, 2007 at 2:09 am
Typical Linux user crapittude. If its such a great browser publish it for windows, or stop complaining when no-one uses it.
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I’m not sure you got the point of this post, Ferris; I’m not advocating Konqueror over any other browser, or Linux over any other OS, I’m just giving a tip on the best way to see CSS3 in action – and at the moment, the most CSS3-compliant browser is Konqueror. As soon as there’s an easier way, I’ll post that too.
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Philippe says:Comment » February 5th, 2007 at 2:26 am
If you’re running OS X (10.4.8), you can install (compile) the whole KDE through Fink (or MacPorts). Takes a bit of time (ahem) to compile, but no problems otherwise.
Konqueror (3.5.5 atm) runs very well on my PowerBook G4.
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Norberto says:Comment » February 5th, 2007 at 5:03 am
To Ferris:
do you know konqueror has features so advanced that crappy windows API can’t deal with?
Porting Unix/Linux application to an underpowered operating system like Windows is not always easy. Fortunatelly this will change soon with the release of KDE 4.0 (kdelibs, will implement many of the missing Windows features.)
Thanks and have a nice day using your toy OS :)
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Don’t y’all know Mac OS is the only really fun OS out there? :P Now let’s be gentle to each other and all enjoy our browsers :)
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I think there is even easier way to try Konqueror.
1. Download the VMware Player: http://www.vmware.com/products/player/
2. Download openSUSE VMware image with KDE: http://developer.kde.org/~binner/vmware/
Install WMware player, open the openSUSE image and you can use Konqueror without ever leaving your favorite OS.
By the way, there’s no need to start arguments about operating systems here – we’re all using what we’re using before we either like it or must use it for some reason. It’s as easy as that. Whether you consider Windows a toy OS or not is irrelevant – if there’s a will, there’s a way.
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Hey Michal, thx for your info! That is indeed a perfect way to test it.
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The only drawback with using VMWare is that you need a fairly decent processor and lots of RAM; otherwise, yes, a very easy solution also.
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Konqueror will run natively on OSX, but this is at best alpha level quality. Will be some time before it’s at par with the native version.
Live cd’s are cool if you just want to check it out, but for real use it’s a joke. As a web developer, do I save everything, shut down, run the cd, close it all down, start up my primary OS, make some changes and repeat the cycle?
As a “dumb as rocks” user, do I play some freecell, decide I need to pay bills online (haha, like they won’t kick Konq out) shut everything down, boot the cd, then restart it so I can watch porn or let IE involuntarily install some spyware?
For any type of user, bootable cds are useless outside the context of “trying it out before I switch”.
Me, I run Konq on a linux VM with Parallels. But their lack of drivers means its a pain to use there (can’t switch the mouse back and forth between the VM and host easily).
Besides, I feel everyone is missing the point, which is: all real browsers are pretty good. Which is everything except putrid IE.
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Most browsers are pretty good indeed John, we at css3.info are very focussed on CSS3 development though, which is something Konq put’s a lot of effort in :)
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The suggestion to use a Live CD (in order to avoid installing Linux) instead/besides Windows is *one* way.
But running the Live CD still requires to shut down the current OS, and reboot from CD.
You’ll get the best of both worlds if you run the Live CD inside a VMWare (or any other OS virtualization application) session:
– you can either run it from the CD drive (with the disadvantage of blocking that device for other usage),
– or you can copy the CD’s ISO image to a 700 MByte file on Windows, and tell VMWare to use that ISO image as its second CD driver and boot that….
The latter variant one will make it really easy to switch between various ISO images to boot into a VMWare session. No need to leave Windows for trying Konqueror (until you’re convinced to leave it behind forever…) :-)
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Mordechai Peller says:Comment » February 6th, 2007 at 7:59 am
Konqueror is a great browser, though I don;t think its UI is as polished as Firefox’s. On the flip side, Firefox is a memory hog. Konqueror is also a very good file manager. Firefox, though, has two indispensable plugins: Web Developer’s toolbar and Firebug.
The net result is I use them both, often simultaneously, and I’m not quite sure which I use more. When Konqueror finally makes it to Windows, if properly promoted, the results should be interesting.
Another browser of note, quickly cathing up to Konqueror’s CSS3 support is Opera. The next release in adding many new selectors (see: http://my.opera.com/dstorey/blog/show.dml/701902)
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Phil says:Comment » February 6th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
Actually, there’s an even better way to try Konqueror (or the WebKit rendering engine, at least) on Windows -> http://try.swift.ws/
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I was quite excited about Swift when it was announced, but development seems to have stalled – plus, I don’t know how recent it’s version of webkit is.
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The selectors Konqueror does so incredibly well aren’t that greatly done in WebKit yet… They still have to be ported over, and that won’t be happening soon as WebKit’s source tree is closed at the moment for anything but P1 bugfixes.
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I had noticed that Webkit wouldn’t allow my checkbox styling trick… but originally Konq didn’t get this right either. I don’t think it was until 3.5.4 that it did. Until then, only Firefox and Opera 9 got it right.
Webkit supports the necessary selectors, but it won’t update an adjacent sibling when :checked changes… some bug in the code with dynamic updates. I believe one of the Konq guys claimed the same when I showed him (hmm… and didn’t 3.5.4 come out working just a couple weeks later?).
Anyway, they all need some work. Implementing selectors is nice, but often that’s only the beginning and there is often more work to do to get them right in all the most complex cases.
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Broken Links » Blog Archive » KHTML 3.5.6 is the most CSS3-compliant of all says:Comment » February 10th, 2007 at 6:53 pm
[…] I wrote a follow-up to this post, on how to use Konqueror without installing Linux. See the comments for even more […]
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If we’re gonna port Konqueror to Windows, we need to get Safari to Windows and Linux. Ah, how nice it would be to browser test with ALL browsers!
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Jake Dust says:Comment » February 11th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Just a bit of info: Konqueror needs the Qt library, which “doesn’t give a good Windows support” (or, in better words, the GPL version is new, needs the GCC and some other things which make easier using GTK than Qt, and the Konqueror is deeply connected with the KDE, which doesn’t contribute to a port).
Yet, anyone can use the KHTML engine and create a browser, it’s free software! And there is always the CVS version, for those who cannot wait and want to have fun first!
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zooplah says:Comment » February 14th, 2007 at 7:43 am
Well, given some time I’m sure the Cygwin version will get updated to this new version (if it hasn’t already). Sure, it’s as slow as a snail in Cygwin, but then again, isn’t everything on Windows?
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I don’t really like this browser though. I like Opera best
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Eleanor Robbins says:Comment » September 4th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Someone here said that the Windows API is less powerful (in favour of the words originally chosen) than Linux/UNIX. I have been programming for both the worlds since the last 10 years and I disagree.
In the more recent past I have been able to compile and run Amarok on Windows Vista and am running many K-apps on Windows with little or no problem at all. Konqueror however remains elusive because of its tight coupling with KDE (which is not a very good design IMHO).
The Windows API is quite powerful (if not as elegant as the Linux API) and though you don’t have a one-to-one mapping, you can find loads of stuff in the Windows API that have no counterpart (at least as of now) in the Linux world (and the reverse is true of course).
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Tom says:Comment » October 23rd, 2008 at 3:11 am
KDE is being ported to Windows, and it includes Konqueror. It’s still undevelopment, but it has a working version on Konqueror and a few other linux apps.
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