09:55 am, 9 Mar 06
gtk 2.10 overview
GTK 2.10 overview slides. (Especially impressive: native OSX backend!)
It's nice to see the chain of events: first a nice 2D API (cairo), then GTK standardizing on it (in 2.8), and now all apps get cross-platform printing (2.10).
I've also been following some GTK/GNOME developer blogs and they've been putting a lot of effort into performance, which is pretty neat, and uncharacteristic of free software developers in general ("fast enough on my computer, whatever"). Everything's already really zippy on the computers I use but I'm sure faster can't hurt.
It's nice to see the chain of events: first a nice 2D API (cairo), then GTK standardizing on it (in 2.8), and now all apps get cross-platform printing (2.10).
I've also been following some GTK/GNOME developer blogs and they've been putting a lot of effort into performance, which is pretty neat, and uncharacteristic of free software developers in general ("fast enough on my computer, whatever"). Everything's already really zippy on the computers I use but I'm sure faster can't hurt.
Memory vs CPU optimization
I wholeheartedly agree that optimization is something that will always need focus in the F/OSS world. I think we're relatively aware of CPU costs and are making good headroads in, but memory is quickly becoming more of a concern. People can wait for their Pentium to catch up, but if they only have 256MB of ram (on a pentium!!), their experience is going to be unbearable.For instance: evince (the Gnome PDF/PS viewer) was working really hard at OOMing my machine earlier, loading a somewhat complicated
graphmess. Adobe's AcroRead, while it's not exactly light on the memory, is much better-behaved about this sort of thing.Just curious.
Comments? Is this just another case of free software building their own wheels?