[HN Gopher] Kera Desktop: open-source, cross-platform, web-based...
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Kera Desktop: open-source, cross-platform, web-based desktop
environment
Author : mutlucany
Score : 175 points
Date : 2023-06-09 16:52 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (desktop.kerahq.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (desktop.kerahq.com)
| 2h wrote:
| > desktop environment
|
| not really. you literally cannot create a file. if I want to
| create a text file, its not possible. and no, I dont mean a
| Google Doc or some crap.
| anderspitman wrote:
| What does cross platform mean in this context? It appears to be
| Linux only to me.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| schemescape wrote:
| The download page shows options for Windows, macOS, and Linux.
| Edit: and for Chrome (as a plug-in? I couldn't tell).
|
| It looks like there is a separate download for an OS that is
| based on Linux. Is that what you saw?
| anderspitman wrote:
| I only looked at the main page and FAQ and only saw
| references to Linux. I'll have to dig into this later. Very
| curious how it works on Windows.
| asoneth wrote:
| > Grid-styled menus and icon-focused, color-coded items are easy
| to find and remember.
|
| Reminds me a little of radial menus
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_menu). They don't handle
| dynamic context menu contents well but they're amazingly
| efficient.
|
| > Interacting is even faster since Kera Desktop features "press
| and hold, move and release" gestured menus. Saved you a click!
|
| Note that you can also use right-click menus this way on macOS
| and GNOME. That is, you mouse down, drag your cursor to the item,
| and mouse up to select it. The only downside is that if you
| regularly use Windows it's annoying to unlearn this behavior.
| mutlucany wrote:
| Just like having a headphone jack is a feature now. Still,
| combining it with a grid style menu makes it even more
| efficient.
| mbreese wrote:
| _> Note that this is how right-click menus operate on macOS_
|
| Huh? That's not how mine work. Is there a setting for this that
| I forgot about?
|
| Mine are right-mouse-click (external mouse or trackpad), cursor
| to item, and then right or left click to select. You can keep
| your right button clicked, but it's not necessary.
| michaelmior wrote:
| It's not necessary, but you can right-click, hold, move,
| release instead of right-click, release, move, left-click.
| carlosjobim wrote:
| Macs have worked like that since forever. Now you can do it
| both ways. Did you try?
| graypegg wrote:
| Odd, it does work that way for me! If I move the cursor over
| a file in Finder, hold right click, move to the context menu
| option I want, and release the right mouse button, it
| triggers the action.
|
| In windows the release doesn't do anything, the right click
| action just toggles the menu open/not open, so you left click
| the context menu option after it opens.
| atorodius wrote:
| > Note that you can also use right-click menus this way on
| macOS
|
| also top-screen menu
| gangstead wrote:
| I'm trying to understand this, is it kind of like an open source
| Chrome OS? It seems to give you that Chromebook like experience
| on your own machine.
| zvmaz wrote:
| What does "web-based" mean? Does it run in a browser? As a
| standalone application? Is it because it is written in
| Javascript?... Genuinely curious.
| gnull wrote:
| > It is easy to get distracted when you do many different things
| on the same device. Think of rooms as profiles but for the same
| person. You can have different rooms based on what you do and
| arrange them with things for only that purpose. Maybe change the
| wallpaper to something related to set the mood.
|
| This is something I've been looking for in other DEs, but never
| found.
| deanc wrote:
| Seconded. I'd love this in MacOS. A child comment here was
| talking about different docks and menus and such. This would be
| great for work vs home.
| ryanschneider wrote:
| I was just thinking the other day I'd also really like that for
| my terminal history, especially since I've often worked at
| "bring your own device" sized companies.
| EscapeFromNY wrote:
| You might be interested in https://github.com/ellie/atuin
|
| > Atuin replaces your existing shell history with a SQLite
| database, and records additional context for your commands.
| joshSzep wrote:
| Atuin is outstanding. I've barely scratched the surface of
| its features, but it's already made a significant impact on
| my command line usage.
| dllthomas wrote:
| I've been doing that for a decade+ now and it's _marvelous_.
|
| I key everything off a shell variable called SESSION, and
| have a few scripts to set that before spinning up a
| screen/tmux instance if I don't already have one running for
| the context in question.
|
| There's a somewhat dated snapshot of some of my config files
| (relevant and otherwise) at
| https://github.com/dlthomas/config-files
| ddtaylor wrote:
| KDE has "activities"
| Rygian wrote:
| To date, no one has successfully explained to me what is the
| benefit of activities over multiple virtual desktops. Would
| you give it a try?
| c-hendricks wrote:
| Activities will get you things like:
|
| - different task bar layouts for different activities
|
| - different desktop widget layouts for different activities
|
| - you can associate files with activities and Dolphin has a
| `currentactivity://` scheme (tho I do wish this could be
| extended to apps. As of now if you only want an app to be
| in a certain activity you've got some window rules to
| setup)
|
| They live in an awkward place, since virtual desktops are a
| Linux WM thing while activities are just a KDE plasma
| thing.
| Shared404 wrote:
| I am also interested in this. I've also never been able to
| fully grok what 'Activities' are, though I've never gone
| all in on learning them.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| You can use both at the same time. Each activity gets its
| own set of virtual desktops. I use activities to switch
| between low-distraction and high-distraction modes;
| combined with a 2x2 grid of virtual desktops, I have
| certain important things on the north-east virtual desktop
| on all activities, but other things will be only in one or
| the other activity.
| michaelmrose wrote:
| Activities are virtual desktops with per desktop widgets
| and desktop settings.
|
| You either use them instead of standard virtual desktops or
| if you need sets of sets of applications in addition to eg
| both work and home activities have desktops 1..n with
| different windows.
| BenisMaximus wrote:
| How is this different from virtual desktops?
| Dalewyn wrote:
| Virtual desktop is nerdspeak.
|
| Room is normspeak.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| All those faux real world analogies is what keeps normies
| afraid of computers.
| cyberax wrote:
| I _love_ how it looks. It's pretty much what I want from a
| desktop: a simple window manager with a drawer on the right.
|
| Now, if only it supported managing native windows...
| francois_h wrote:
| This is really cool. One day I'd like to see a JS based window
| manager running as the main window manager on a local machine.
| I'm not entirely sure how that would work. Imagine using a JS
| window manager instead of Windows explorer or MacOS' finder or
| even replace KDE or Gnome.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| Is there a way to use menus other than "press and hold, move and
| release"? "click and drag" is consistently one of the harder
| things for people to accomplish correctly.
| PrimeMcFly wrote:
| What is the point of these projects? I really don't get it.
|
| It's a portable DE people can download on whatever computer
| they're on to have consistency?
|
| But then, how often are people away from their preferred
| computers, and when they use other computers would they let them
| just install/run random software?
| [deleted]
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| There is no point, the only use case is what you've mentioned.
| The problem is this can't run programs people actually use, so
| it's just a pretty, useless user shell.
|
| It would make more sense to use some sort of in browser rdp,
| vnc, etc. Then you can run a real opereting system.
| n3v3r3v3r wrote:
| This is a wonderful project! I've been thinking a lot about
| making such a unified desktop stack for a while now; web
| technology has matured to the point where I think it's feasible
| to build a complete environment a la Smalltalk/Symbolics but with
| a modern feature set.
|
| Obviously this has deficiencies but like it or not the web _is_
| computing for the vast majority of people and exploring/pushing
| its limits of user experience is something few at all seem
| interested in.
|
| Projects like Arc[1] and suckless[2] approach browsers in novel
| (albeit divergent) ways, but as a whole it seems to be a very
| unexplored problem space.
|
| The idea of an Engelbart[3] style system built for the modern
| hypermedia-capable platform is an intoxicating one that
| desperately needs more attention.
|
| [1]: https://thebrowser.company/
|
| [2]: https://surf.suckless.org/ with
| https://tools.suckless.org/tabbed/ and
| https://tools.suckless.org/dmenu/
|
| [3]: https://archive.org/details/motherofalldemos_reel1
| p4bl0 wrote:
| > I've been thinking a lot about making such a unified desktop
| stack for a while now; web technology has matured to the point
| where I think it's feasible to build a complete environment a
| la Smalltalk/Symbolics but with a modern feature set.
|
| Kind of a Chrome OS but not so tied with the Google ecosystem?
| rektide wrote:
| No. Chrome is just an app. One that happens to host the most
| amazing living/alive medium mankind has created.
|
| The page is all you need. A web site can be a canvas where
| everything can come together. And it can pull in other sites
| and capabilities.
|
| We do need some new APIs for the web platform to flourish
| fully. Some small local host services might fill in. Or yes
| we could indeed enhance the browser. But the idea is that
| it's the page not the browser creating the experience. The
| page is the hypermedium.
| codedokode wrote:
| Honestly, web platform is an ugly example of bad
| engineering, lot of legacy, weird choices, lots of privacy
| leaks, dangerous crossdomain requests enabled by default,
| etc. Instead of adding new APIs it would be better to
| freeze it and design a better platform.
| rektide wrote:
| I welcome the competition but literally no one is even
| starting to try. HTML is a million times more real as a
| good open standard for computing than anything else.
|
| I don't even disagree per se, i just think the grumbling
| is mostly irrelevant to how incredibly potent excellent &
| interconnected what we have is. And I think the grissly
| grim outlooks all ignore the incredible vectors of
| progress that have been lifting lifting lifting things so
| much higher for so long & show no signs of abating.
|
| Letting the perfectionist neediness get in the way of
| seeing how amazing & competent & remarkable an ecosystem
| is is unfortunate.
| [deleted]
| bionhoward wrote:
| So many links in that nice little nav bar, except GitHub. Who is
| your audience if not devs? Where's the docs? I bounced on the
| site on mobile. Maybe it's better on the desktop version. Could
| the devs of this please add a big "docs" button, code examples,
| GitHub link etc?
| schemescape wrote:
| (Not affiliated with this project) Just to address the GitHub
| comment: there's a link to the source on GitLab (fox icon).
| syx wrote:
| The design is very neatly done especially when the docks
| disappear and you place an app into full screen mode. I really
| like the concept overall, this looks like a cool side project!
| distortedsignal wrote:
| I think these types of projects are super cool, and being someone
| who was BORN IN THE 1980s, I really like the Desktop Analogy. Is
| there somewhere that I can look at several of these web-based
| desktop environments at the same time? Is there a good list of
| open-source web-based desktops that anyone knows of?
| syx wrote:
| As a matter of fact there is [1] I'm personally curating it and
| check up on the links weekly.
|
| [1] https://github.com/syxanash/awesome-web-desktops
| distortedsignal wrote:
| Delightful. Thank you!
| penguin_booze wrote:
| > Kera Desktop is written in vanilla javascript
|
| Personally, I'd be wary of writing anything with a handful of
| functions in vanilla JS. Having done that multiple times (small
| projects, nevertheless), I remind myself to reach for Typescript
| these days.
| nunobrito wrote:
| This was fun. Really enjoyed the attention to connected home
| devices, that is really handy to have around as feature.
|
| Other things: Too much reliance on google-products. Around here
| (Europe) there are concerns about privacy and Google is avoided
| often. Search engines, please consider adding Qwant.
|
| My default browser is Brave, which is based on Chromium. Kind of
| too bad that Kera is not reusing the browser instances used by
| default on disk (when compatible) because they already my login
| details ready over there. It would help for easier transitions.
| ruined wrote:
| i missed this at first glance: the download page does have a
| "chrome app" option at the bottom
|
| https://desktop.kerahq.com/download/
|
| https://gitlab.com/kerahq/releases/-/raw/main/Kera%20Desktop...
|
| edit: looks like this can't run on a Mac
| dreadlordbone wrote:
| "Old" Chrome Apps were disabled, it doesn't run on any new
| versions of Chrome.
| mutlucany wrote:
| Until the latest update, it was possible to run it anyway.
| Very bad timing.
| simonmysun wrote:
| I wonder if we could implement renderers of the X Window System
| core protocol or Wayland protocol in the browser. Is there any
| particular reason not to?
| zilti wrote:
| Because it is stupid?
| wkat4242 wrote:
| Looks cool though I think most regular users will be confused by
| the double panels.
|
| I wonder what makes it web based? I thought it would run in the
| browser but apparently not.
| chrisweekly wrote:
| Well done! Thanks for sharing!
| samsquire wrote:
| I once bought a 32 core ThreadRipper and tried to get along with
| using a cheap PS200 Windows 10 laptop to remote into the
| threadripper while in coffee shops and use the ThreadRipper to do
| my work.
|
| The PS200 Windows 10 laptop wasn't powerful enough, it was too
| laggy. Even on Wifi.
|
| I love the idea of the X11 protocol. And I still love the idea of
| a web desktop. Something that is supremely well integrated and
| allows me to move workloads between client and server seamlessly.
| This idea I really like. The ability to outsource computation and
| storage seamlessly. A process can be moved between machines
| seamlessly.
|
| This could be modelled in Javascript and promises that can be
| sent around. Microservices in the desktop environment.
|
| I looked at tools that would bring up tmux sessions with
| everything preloaded. (https://github.com/tmuxinator/tmuxinator)
|
| ScrapScript has very good ideas in this area of distributing
| dependencies and storage. (https://scrapscript.org/) There is
| also val town.
|
| I never use KDE Plasma widgets or the sidebar widgets that Mac
| provided.
|
| There is so many exciting ideas that could be tried out but I
| worry they're all too big ideas to be implemented.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| >The PS200 Windows 10 laptop wasn't powerful enough, it was too
| laggy. Even on Wifi.
|
| _Any_ x86 computer in that price range is going to be hot
| garbage. You get what you pay for, and wifi has nothing to do
| with it.
| mxuribe wrote:
| I agree with you that a *NEW* machine at that price point
| running Windows will not be a great experience...but, I've
| purchased older, refurbished machines at that price point,
| and then loaded a lightweight linux distro and a lightweight
| desktop environment, and it works wonderfully! Of course,
| that's not for everyone i suppose.
| rektide wrote:
| There's Greenfield, a web based Wayland compositor. It has a
| shim on your machines that uses webrtc or websockets to stream
| Wayland to the browser. Awesome fricking project. Been around
| for a while & author @zubnix keeps slowly honing it.
| https://github.com/udevbe/greenfield
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29239781
|
| It so has a local wasm mode, so you can build Wayland apps that
| live & run on the web. Examples in webgl & wgpu. Sick.
| schoolornot wrote:
| X11 and VNC are still too inefficient for today's internet
| cafes. Take a look at: https://kasmweb.com/kasmvnc
| carlosjobim wrote:
| I've tested the bulit-in VNC between two MacBooks, and it was
| an extremely high quality image, extremely fast and extremely
| responsive. To me the performance was completely unexpected.
| In what uses is VNC lacking?
| phatfish wrote:
| Interesting. Linux desktop really suffers from not having
| something slick as RDP on Windows. VNC isn't performant
| enough, I've found the open source RDP servers to be buggy
| and reattaching to a session sometimes doesn't work and can
| cause crashes (at least on my Fedora install). VNC can do the
| same sometimes attaching to an existing session.
|
| At the moment I use Windows as a jump box to do remote
| sessions to my Linux development VM, which is on the same
| local network.
|
| Something that works well over a decent internet connection
| and can reliably re-connect to an existing session would be
| great.
| jeppester wrote:
| I have been using a remote workflow for more than three years.
|
| I don't use remote desktop. I just SSH into the machine and use
| tmux sessions for terminal stuff and the vscode remote package
| for editing. To help the workflow I have some nice aliases for
| easily opening projects, forwarding ports, sleeping/waking the
| server etc.
|
| I'm aware that this workflow cannot work for everyone - for
| instance it won't work for developing desktop apps, but for web
| and app development it's really nice to have a powerful machine
| doing all the hard work.
|
| I think many would be surprised by how much faster desktop
| hardware is. Especially when you put price into the equation.
| rektide wrote:
| A decade ago I was complaining about only having so many GB
| of memory on my machine while developing our Java terror tech
| stack.
|
| An ops type person overheard & mentioned we had some mostly
| unused beefy as heck remote desktop machines running
| NoMachine, which was a nice slick fast proxying X vdi thing I
| already loved. I was so happy.
|
| It really let me work anywhere. At crazy speeds. Loved it.
|
| These days I definitely am almost all ssh based. Back then
| though I basically needed Eclipse(+eclim).
| mutlucany wrote:
| Kera Desktop presents an new look and feel to your desktop
| workflow regardless of what OS you're using.
| laeri wrote:
| Congratulation on your launch. I haven't tried it out yet but it
| seems polished and huge respect for working for so long on a
| project!
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(page generated 2023-06-09 23:00 UTC)