clarification requested: apparent termination of xrx project due to deletion of lbx from xorg

Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton lkcl at lkcl.net
Tue Mar 17 05:36:18 PDT 2009


hi, i just wanted to clarify what the implications are, from this:
http://wiki.x.org/wiki/ChangesForX11R71

and this:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg/2008-September/038602.html

the first one says that LBX is deprecated.  however, has any
replacement for LBX been written _before_ deprecating it? has any
replacement been considered?

the second one  says "xproxymngproto is no longer supported" due to
certain libraries having been deleted from xorg (presumably lbx). that
implies that the xrx project, the only way of embedding unix
applications into web browsers, is, by inference, "no longer
supported".

i'm just starting a project to create a desktop window manager to run
in web browser technology.  it's written in python, and is therefore
incredibly small, and is compiled to javascript using a dedicated
compiler.

the possibility of writing tiny amounts of code in a high-level
language, for execution in web browsers as quotes web 2.0 quotes is
both a very exciting and a very powerful prospect.  to make it
actually _useful_ however, you need to be able to execute actual
"real" applications, inside the web browser.

the use of AJAX techniques allows the "real" application to be moved
around, resized, brought to front, closed etc. all using simple,
simple javascript.  _anyone_ could write a desktop window manager in a
matter of a couple of hours (and i _did_ write a simple desktop window
manager in a couple of hours), and a really sophisticated one in a
matter of days, by knocking together a few bits of javascript
libraries off the internet.

this is the sort of thing that could be taught to university students
as a simple programming exercise.  "write your own window manager, in
javascript"

in order to embed actual "real" applications, i figured, "hey, let's
see if someone has done an NPAPI plugin to run an X-Server!" lo and
behold, a 2 minute search on the internet showed up xrx, which,
although it's not very well documented, is damn good, and it does
exactly what i need: fires up an X-Windows app, under the control of a
web browser, using < embed >.

this will therefore work in webkit, safari, firefox, netscape, and
anything else that supports the NPAPI plugin architecture.

... except... it won't, will it?  because, according to the above
message, xproxymngproto support has been destroyed, thanks
to the removal of lbx support.

please can someone clarify that i have this right: that a particularly
interesting and exciting line of possibilities for desktop
development, hosted by the "free desktop organisation", has been
terminated by the xorg developers.

l.



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