Re: [Qemu-devel] [PATCH 6/6] gtk: make default UI

[Stefano Stabellini]

On Mon, 20 Feb 2012, Anthony Liguori wrote:
> On 02/19/2012 08:52 PM, Brad Smith wrote:
> > On 19/02/12 9:44 PM, Anthony Liguori wrote:
> >> On 02/19/2012 08:24 PM, Brad Smith wrote:
> >>> On 19/02/12 8:10 PM, Anthony Liguori wrote:
> >>>>> If not, it will be nice to keep
> >>>>> SDL because GTK huge and not that portable for win32 users.
> >>>>
> >>>> Neither are true. GTK is a reasonably small dependency especially given
> >>>> that GLIB is a mandatory dependency. I can't imagine that in terms of
> >>>> binary size, libsdl is much bigger than gtk/gdk.
> >>>
> >>> Double check your facts. That's not even close to being true.
> >>>
> >>> SDL is a tiny fraction of Gtk+.
> >>>
> >>> Just as an example taking a look at package sizes..
> >>>
> >>> 549KB for SDL vs 17.3MB for just Gtk+ and its dependencies (7 libraries)
> >>> excluding Glib2 and what it depends on.
> >>
> >> I don't see how 17.3MB qualifies as "huge".
> >
> > It's FAR from small not to mention dragging in A LOT of libraries for what?
> > A prettier looking UI?
> 
> An accessible UI that meets the most basic definition of usable.  Sit someone 
> down with the SDL interface for the first time, how in the world are they 
> supposed to figure out that you hit Ctrl+Alt+2 to get to a command prompt?

I think that having a GTK UI is quite important for QEMU and having it
be the default is also a good idea.

BUT we should not deprecate and plan to remove SDL.

Do we really want to force everybody that uses QEMU on X11 to compile
the entire set of GTK dependencies?
Keep in mind that QEMU is not just used on Linux distros but it also
used as a component in other projects that might have very different
constraints.
I think that having a lightweight graphical UI with very few and small
dependencies is NOT something we should give up.