Re: [PHP-GTK-DEV] History, "Dead" and community

Elizabeth,

It's been a long time :D things have picked up here though the IRC
channel has remained rather quiet when ever i have popped in.

As for the documentation I have a working knowledge of the system if
anyone is interested in learning but it would be much more advised to
upgrade the documentation to a new docbook version.

Regards Leon

On Mon, Jun 22, 2015 at 5:22 PM, Gage Morgan <[email protected]> wrote=
:
> Not for Long:
>
> We're gonna bring this back around, even if it kills us (I hope; this com=
munity needs some revitalization badly). Bruno is testing some stuff, and A=
lexandre is working on an actual implementation. I hope to help both at two=
 points in time, particularly mid- to late-July. Thank you for your support=
, and I appreciate those of you that stayed theough the darker times to hel=
p usher me in.
>
> --MGage--
>
>> On Jun 22, 2015, at 12:35 PM, Elizabeth M Smith <[email protected]=
> wrote:
>>
>> Hi folks.
>>
>> The mailing list got REALLY busy all of the sudden.
>>
>> I've been having issues with php mailing lists (they REALLY don't like
>> my email) and just realized all the stuff going on here.
>>
>> First of all it's great to have people interested in the project.  For
>> a LONG time it's been 1 or 2 people... with a few popping up here or
>> there to get interested and then moving on quickly (usually when they
>> realize how much work needs to be done)
>>
>> And although there's been someone keeping track of the actual code
>> itself - the website was completely abandoned (thanks for taking that
>> monstrosity on) and the documentation has been similarly abandoned
>> (it's in old docbook and uses xsl to generate) - the people who once
>> knew how that worked are gone
>>
>> There have actually been a couple of attempts to start up a php-gtk3
>> project before.  But it's a BIG undertaking and only having 1 or 2
>> people work on it makes it difficult to get off the ground.
>>
>> There's also the fact that a fully introspected version of the
>> extension (like pythons gobject) have some pretty deep underlying
>> issues (mostly related to the typelibs and the fact that they are
>> strongly linked in many aspects to the python gobject wrapping
>> implementation) - which is why although there's a prototype of an
>> introspected solution it doesn't really work well.
>>
>> If you're interested in some of the code you can find it
>> https://github.com/gtkforphp/ - some of it was actually working once
>> upon a time.
>>
>> I think it's a good idea to do a "new" gtk for php but I think there
>> are some things to keep in mind.
>>
>> 1. We do have an irc channel on freenode #php-gtk - this is a great
>> way to connect with the people who still work on the project and know
>> the code - not  only the php-gtk code and php internals code, but the
>> gnome libraries as well.  Especially when talking technical details
>> it's nice to do it in realtime.
>> 2. The project has never been completely dead - it just basically only
>> had one dev  (who is poor at recruiting) for a long time - which is
>> never a good thing
>> 3. The php-gtk source code is on php.net and mirrored on github -
>> there have been some prs but not a lot - and none from the people now
>> currently conversing on the list -  and it's also limited to the
>> problem of basically 1 developer to look at and pull them
>> 4. Discussions on the future should be all on list - not in private emai=
ls :)
>>
>> Some thoughts on a complete rewrite
>>
>> 1. a monolithic extension is not very useful - php-gtk should become
>> several small extensions
>>
>> right now php-gtk has wrappings for gtk, gdk, some glib, atk, some
>> cairo integration (although most of cairo was pulled into it's own
>> extension)  and many others
>>
>> parts of glib, cairo, and other gnome libraries such as clutter make
>> sense to use not only in a gui environment, but even in a server
>> environment
>>
>> This would even allow for things like a gtk2 and gtk3 extension
>>
>> the extension(s) should probably mirror the underlying libraries
>>
>> glib, gobject, gio, cairo(exists, is getting a php7 fix), pango (also
>> exists), atk, gtk2, gtk3, gdk, clutter, gstreamer, etc.
>>
>> 2. If you're rewriting from scratch, a PHP7 only version is probably a g=
ood idea
>>
>> The internal apis of php have changed an incredible amount from 5 -> 7
>> and it would be both very ugly and very hard to support both PHP7 and
>> PHP 5.6(and higher) in the same code base
>>
>> 3. PHP-gtk has very very few tests... and needs them
>>
>> This is probably as important as the rewrite - although you really
>> don't need to test the functionality of the gtk library itself, it IS
>> important to make sure the bindings are tight.
>>
>> As far as getting php-gtk commit karma, that's really not that hard
>> Submit some PR's - usually 2 or 3 good ones with tests
>> Discuss things on list and/or in IRC
>> As long as stuff doesn't break the build and works it gets pulled -
>> but remember right now there's 1 dev... so expect lag time (maybe a
>> week) until there are 2 or 3 or more devs capable of code reviewing,
>> building, and testing - because you need those checks
>>
>> If you need help getting an environment for compiling set up on
>> windows or linux - I'm happy to help.  Pop into irc.  If you're really
>> ambitious someone could update the documentation :)
>>
>> Also php-gtk could really use someone to roll releases.  We actually
>> should have had about 3-4 - there's been new functionality added and
>> build fixes done and features integrated.. just no release.
>>
>> For example - there is complete gtkbuilder integration in the git
>> version of php-gtk (that's the format glade3 outputs btw) - but none
>> of that is documented beyond some demo files.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Elizabeth M Smith
>>
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>>
>
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