Arora, a refreshing new Qt/WebKit browser
The Gentoo Qt maintainers have been doing a fantastic job of getting cutting edge Qt software into shape with the qting-edge overlay. I’ve been running Qt 4.5 since beta1 and am pleased with the direction it is going. Recently the devs bumped the Arora ebuild to version 0.5. Arora is a lightweight browser based on Qt and WebKit.
I must say, I am impressed. This browser is lightning fast. The interface is pleasing, yet minimalist. You get all the benefits of recent WebKit, and the nice cross-platform nature of Qt. It feels much faster than Konqueror4.2, and the recent WebKit engine means better compatibility.
It works with all the sites I’ve thrown at it so far and performs great on the Acid 3 test.
Arora 0.5 Acid3 Test - 100/100
All in all it reminds me of Firefox’s early days. Very mean and lean. Firefox 3.1 beta2 has served me pretty well, so I don’t think I’ll abandon it yet, but WebKit browsers are becoming quite compelling.
The WebKit devs are also pushing some interesting new ideas out with CSS animation. This example gives Flash-esque falling leaves. Maybe we will see less reliance on Flash in the future with the new video/audio tags and work such as this. It would be nice to move presentation back into structured [X]HTML and CSS, which is portable, easier to parse, and light weight.
Leaves CSS Animation
If you are on Gentoo, bump to Qt 4.5rc1 and take a look easily (both are in portage):
emerge -av arora
I’ve seen it hit Fedora Rawhide recently as well.
Only one problem: icon is a bit conspicuous :-P
Related posts:
- Getting Beautiful Fonts in Gentoo Linux Here’s my easy and modern guide to getting pleasant looking...
- Sun Ultra 27 Review – The Ultimate Linux Workstation Sun Microsystems has a powerful and favorably priced entry in...
- KDE 4.2 beta 1 on Gentoo KDE 4.2 is set for release on January 27th. Eager...
- KDE4 on Gentoo So I bit the bullet and installed KDE 4.0 on...
- KDE 4.2 on Gentoo KDE 4.2 is out officially. The ebuilds for Gentoo have...
February 26th, 2009 at 9:48 pm
Strange how you got 98/100, I got 100/100 somehow.
February 26th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
I’m using Qt 4.5rc1, perhaps you are running qt-copy or a later snapshot?
February 27th, 2009 at 9:43 am
My Qt build must have been stale. I now get 100/100 as well. I also updated the post to show the CSS animation demo, though a screenshot doesn’t really do it justice :-)
February 27th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
There’s also GTK equivalent for Arora called Midori. Both projects look very promising. I tried Midori yesterday, but it felt a bit too unstable for me. Trying to watch Youtube instantly killed the browser. I couldn’t get the flash working for Arora, but I intend to fiddle with it some more when i get the time.
February 27th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
gtk? Sounds like a downgrade ;-). Make sure you have Qt 4.5 to use nsplugins. Flash works for me (at least the native 64bit plugin).
February 27th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
[...] Arora, a refreshing new Qt/WebKit browser The Gentoo Qt maintainers have been doing a fantastic job of getting cutting edge Qt software into shape with the qting-edge overlay. I’ve been running Qt 4.5 since beta1 and am pleased with the direction it is going. Recently the devs bumped the Arora ebuild to version 0.5. Arora is a lightweight browser based on Qt and WebKit. [...]
February 27th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
>All in all it reminds me of Firefox’s early days. Very mean and lean.
You should think back a bit harder. Firefox has -never- been lean; it wasn’t a clean-room implementation, it was born from the bloated carcas of Netscape.
February 28th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
[...] Arora, a refreshing new Qt/WebKit browser | Kev009.com [...]
March 10th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
here i am not able to open https websit and also not able to open rss file please give me the solution .. i am very frustate now plz reply soon…