this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2024
96 points (98.0% liked)

Open Source

30345 readers
2215 users here now

All about open source! Feel free to ask questions, and share news, and interesting stuff!

Useful Links

Rules

Related Communities

Community icon from opensource.org, but we are not affiliated with them.

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
top 16 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (5 children)

Could you explain to me how indeed a desktop reader app for Wikipedia might work better than just, say, opening up Wikipedia in a tab?

Keep in mind that I'm not saying there's no point to it, since the fact that it exists means there is clearly a use case. I'm just wondering what that use case is.

[–] independantiste 9 points 1 month ago

Yeah, 100% of the time I end up on Wikipedia is from clicking a link on google and whatnot, I never actually open Wikipedia then search it with their search thing

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)

AFAIK you can do all of the same things in your browser but I find it simpler, neater and faster to have all my Wikipedia tabs and bookmarks in their own application. It's themed for GNOME too and is easy on the eye which is pleasant.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

That is very fair!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm just wondering what that use case is.

The speed of opening a standalone app instead of opening a browser and searching through bookmarks. Also I think this app is nice to install for someone who's very unfamiliar with computers.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

Fair enough.

For me, I just set up Wikipedia as one of the search engines, with the search shortcut wiki (you can change this to anything you want) and so typing wiki [keyword] in the address bar will do the same thing as searching site:wikipedia.org [keyword].

No need to mess with bookmarks and I don't have to open up the page (or an app) & then search.

Not sure if you can do this with Chromium-based browsers, but I use a Firefox fork and it's pretty damned easy on it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The first use-case that came to mind for me is research. A distraction-free dedicated application for wikipedia could be a great way to keep organized, especially if new features are added and expanded upon over time that go beyond the typical browser experience.

It’s not a workflow for everyone and if wikipedia is something that’s usually just accessed through other search engines then this probably won’t be all that useful to you.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

That seems reasonable. If it's in a browser tab, you could easily get distracted by other, non-work-related tabs.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It could work better because a web browser is the most bloated useless bug ridden insecure creeping horror ever invented.

Although I suspect this is just a web browser with some extra chrome.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I think it might be because of the extra chrome. Lol. xD

Because, for example, I use LibreWolf with uBlock Origin, NoScript, Decentraleyes, and a small number of other privacy-/security-related extensions and mine seems pretty clean.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

I can see this being useful for young children who need access to information but whose parents don't want them in creepy pockets of the internet.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

Sounds like a great tool to have available for school districts looking at using Linux for student laptops.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Just installed it, and my initial impression -

  • Thanks for dark mode :)
  • UI responsiveness is good.
  • Need an option to increase/decrease width of reading pane.
  • Need multiple themes like Wikipedia website.
  • Require smooth scrolling (I'm on 240 Hz monitor but scroll doesn't feel smooth on this app, though apparently uses GPU acceleration)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Definitely think it'd be useful if it could be used as an offline reader like Kiwix

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

While I'd personally never install or use this, it good to know its there for the extremely small percentage of people who'll want or need it....

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

I hate the name, I keep reading it as "Woke".