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cjubon
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Joined: 03 Jul 2007
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Location: Vienna/Europe
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 Posted: Sun Jul 06, 2008 9:43 am Post subject: firefox-3.0 explanation of use flag "xulrunner" [S |
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Hi, I'd like to upgrade to firefox-3.0. There's a new USE flag "xulrunner" which pulls in net-libs/xulrunner (33MB).
Now I'm not sure if I need xulrunner: | '$ qsearch xulrunner' wrote: | | net-libs/xulrunner Mozilla runtime package that can be used to bootstrap XUL+XPCOM applications |
Can anybody tell what this package does and if I need it in a normal desktop environment.
Thanks.
EDIT: Sorry, I opened this thread without really searching before. http://wiki.mozilla.org/XULRunner:Roadmap says: "Firefox 3 is built on top of a »private« XULRunner". So I should need it in any case. If I activate the xulrunner use flag, xulrunner will be built as a separate lib, and the firefox sourcecode to download is only 11 MB. If I deactivate it, firefox will build its "private" xulrunner and the downloaded sourcecode is blown up to 44 MB. - Seems to work somehow like "qt-static" use flag for opera.
Thanks for your interest anyhow.
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Mandrake Dec 2001 · Debian "Woody" Aug 2002 · Gentoo Jan 2004 · Funtoo Oct 2009
Last edited by cjubon on Sun Jul 06, 2008 10:00 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Desintegr
l33t
Joined: 25 Mar 2004
Posts: 863
Location: France - Orléans
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| Posted: Sun Jul 06, 2008 9:54 am Post subject: |
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From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xulrunner
| Quote: | XULRunner is a runtime environment developed by the Mozilla Foundation for providing a common back-end for XUL applications. It replaced the Gecko Runtime Environment, a stalled project with a similar purpose.
All XUL-based applications like Mozilla Firefox, Mozilla Thunderbird, Songbird, Flickr Uploader, SeaMonkey, Conkeror, Sunbird, Miro, Joost, Instantbird and TomTom Home 2.0 will be able to run on XULRunner.
The new installment of the computer game series Simon the Sorcerer, Simon the Sorcerer 4: Chaos Happens, uses XULrunner.
The eMusic service has a download application called eMusic Remote that uses XULRunner.
Benefits of having a separate shared run-time environment are the same as those with shared libraries. Benefits to developers and source-based systems – that is, systems on which programs are compiled from source as opposed to downloaded in binary form – are decreased compilation time, less bandwidth needs and less storage space needed. Benefits for use on binary-based systems are similarly less bandwidth and storage use.
Less storage space and, in the case of running multiple XUL-based applications at once, less memory use only apply when the system uses more than one application that depends on the run-time environment. If either the run-time environment or the application are updated separately at different times, which is more likely in the case that it is widely used for software other than that written by Mozilla, then this would be more commonplace. In the case of source-based systems, developers using common code would not have to include said code in distributed packages.
Additionally in the case of XULRunner, being a markup and interpreted or possibly in the future "just-in-time" pre-compiled script run-time environment, developers may not need to compile any source code into object code (binary) at all for their applications that solely use markup and script languages.
Possible problems with using a common run-time environment include applications that are written using features of one version of the run-time environment that are not included (perhaps due to obsolescence), and replaced with different functionality, which would result in "dependency hell" – a technical jargon term for dependencies on specific versions. This may be avoided by making systems able to install multiple versions of XULRunner and allowing developers to use a specific version at run-time, or by providing compatibility layers. This is not a problem with dependent software that is continually updated and rewritten. |
If you don't use xulrunner USE flag with Firefox, the XUL platform will be builted-in Firefox.
In the future, it would be a good idea to active the xulrunner USE flag : only one XUL platform will be installed on your machine for all XUL-based applications : Firefox, Thunderbird, Sunbird, etc.
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Hoc Volo, Sic Jubeo !
Mon wiki : http://desintegr.free.fr |
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cjubon
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Joined: 03 Jul 2007
Posts: 450
Location: Vienna/Europe
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| Posted: Sun Jul 06, 2008 10:07 am Post subject: |
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Thanks for your answer, Desintegr. I was editing my original post while you submitted yours. | Desintegr wrote: | | In the future, it would be a good idea to active the xulrunner USE flag : only one XUL platform will be installed on your machine for all XUL-based applications : Firefox, Thunderbird, Sunbird, etc. |
That's probably why the flag is activated in my profile (2007.0/destop) by default. I just wanted to be smarter than the gentoo devs  .
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Jenk
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 18 Sep 2006
Posts: 112
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| Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2008 7:07 pm Post subject: |
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May be worth noting that after upgrading to xulrunner 1.9.0.1, firefox would not start error message of | Code: | | Could not start XPCOM. |
to solve this I removed the use flag xulrunner from firefox | Code: | | echo "www-client/mozilla-firefox -xulrunner" >> /etc/portage/packgage.use |
and remerged firefox. |
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cjubon
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Posts: 450
Location: Vienna/Europe
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| Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 7:44 am Post subject: |
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Jenk, I think it would have been sufficient just to re-emerge firefox after the xulrunner-upgrade, without changing use flags, or to run revdep-rebuild. I don't have any problem with xulrunner-1.9.0.1 + firefox-3.0.1, nor on i386 nor on ppc.
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