[WebKit-devel] KDEWebKit - current situation and future

[Urs Wolfer]

Hi Simon, hi list

I would like to do a short summary of the present state of the QtWebKit 
integration into KDE, and it's future.

Things which have been done so far:
* Split into different libs / parts, namely "kdenetwork" 
(QNetworkAccessManager implementation based on KIO), "kdewebkit" (KDE 
integration of the QtWebKit components) and the KPart itself.
* Basic documentation on TechBase:
http://techbase.kde.org/Projects/WebKit
* Component to report bugs on bugs.kde.org
* This mailing list; currently moderated by me.

In short: the KPart can basically be used for surfing (or testing websites 
with WebKit) in Konqueror.

There are things which do currently not work as they should:
#1: History
Currently history (back, forward,...) does not work reliable. There is some 
API required to manipulate the history from the KPart. I have talked with 
Simon at Akademy about this issue. The idea was basically to create something 
like QWebHistory#restoryHistory(QByteArray) and QByteArray 
QWebHistory#saveHistory(). Would be nice to have it in Qt 4.5.

#2: Flash support
Flash support, which is provided by WebKit trunk, works fine in the Qt demo  
app (and Arora), but not in the KPart. Needs some investigation where / what 
is broken. I assume there is some issue with parents

#3: Broken form element rendering with KStyles (at least Oxygen style)
Short description; works with Qt styles like Plastique, but not with Oxygen. 
Form elements are rendered too small (e.g. margin around text on buttons). 
Would be nice to see it fixed in Qt 4.5.

#4: Form completion
This is probably a harder task. We either need access to the DOM, or some 
hooks which are provieded. We also need to think about security for this 
feature (!). Websites should not be able to "steal" data...

#5: KWebPluginFactory
Michael Howell has done a QWebPluginFactory implementation which should be 
able to load KParts into QtWebKit. Last time I have talked to him, he told me 
that loading (IIRC) is broken in some way... Michael, you better tell us 
details about it.

I think #1, #2 and #3 are currently blockers to announce a working integration 
of KDEWebKit. Are there any plans from side of Qt Software to look in some of 
these issues?

Of course, I'm also interested in any other comments.

From my side there is not much time left to work on it in the next few 
months.. (in general for KDE). Army, which is unfortunately obligatory here in 
Switzerland, is calling. Still, I would not like to completely forget about 
KDE related things in this time ;) I hope to be able to respond at least to 
mails as fast as possible.

Bye
urs
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