Support for gtk4

[arjunmenon]

Hi there, is there a roadmap to support Gtk4 for linux?

[frang75]

Hi @arjunmenon
Still no, but is a good feature. I'll keep this open.

[CodigoCristo]

Implement it to libadwaita

[laoshaw]

gtk4 support will be great

[M0JXD]

I just want to voice an opposite opinion here.
GTK4 apps seem to only look native on GNOME and Pantheon, the only GTK4 DEs.

In other DE's this is not the case. For example:
If I install Pluma (GTK3) on KDE Plasma, it uses breeze-gtk and looks native.
But if I install GNOME Clocks (GTK4), it uses libadwaita and is out of place.

I experience the same problem in GTK3 DEs like Cinnamon - GTK4 apps use libadwaita instead of the system theme and look out of place.

Most Desktop Environments are GTK3 based anyways (Cinnamon, Mate, XFCE, Budgie...).
Thanks to qt5gtk2/qt6gtk2, I can make Qt apps look more native than GTK4 apps on these DEs.

GTK3 apps still look mostly native on GNOME - there's a reason they still support it for bug-fixes etc.

My understanding is that NAppGUI is to be as backwards compatible as possible (working on old Windows and MacOS versions) and to use the native look. Moving to GTK4 would hurt this goal for Linux distros.

Also, thanks for NAppGUI - it's awesome :)

[frang75]

Hi @M0JXD!

Very interesting point of view. Thanks for sharing and enriching the debate. However, GTK4 will never replace GTK3 in NAppGUI, it will only extend the SDK allowing to choose one or the other through the option:

-DCMAKE_TOOLKIT=GTK3
-DCMAKE_TOOLKIT=GTK4

https://nappgui.com/en/guide/win_mac_linux.html#h7
https://nappgui.com/en/guide/win_mac_linux.html#h9

At the moment, only GTK3 is accepted. On the other hand, I have an experimental branch to support GTK2. The reason is to be able to use NAppGUI on very old Linux versions like Ubuntu 10, where GTK3 did not exist yet. I know that this has no "commercial" application today, but it does have an academic purpose.

[M0JXD]

Hi @frang75 🙂️

That's great if it's not intended to replace GTK3, I wasn't sure when reading the thread - can never complain about NAppGUI supporting more backends!

GTK2 is a great edition, I think that given Raspberry Pi OS uses LXDE there's a possible commercial use there.

Thanks for your great work!