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It would be awesome if Okular gets a browserplugin for Firefox. That way you can read PDFs directly from your browser. Other apps like Adobe Reader, Foxit Reader and PDF X-Change Viewer already have a browserplugin for a long, long time.
Also, KOffice2 has a browserplugin for Firefox for documents, so you are able to read documents directly from within Firefox.

So I hope you guys think ths this is a good idea

This already exists... at least for Konqueror or any KPart based browser.

Settings > Configure Konqueror > File Browsing > File Asssociations. Search for "pdf" open its item, switch to "Embedded" tab. Untick "Offer to save the file" and select "Embedded viewer".

Ok, then I'll change it to "browserplugin for Okular (Firefox)", since the KOffice2 browserplugin works also in Firefox and Okular's not.

Lol, a lot of people say "we don't want to have these KParts-Stuff in Konqueror, it should be simplier". This idea shows that KParts are a good feature for a lot of people.

There is mozplugger. It does embed KDE application windows too. You just need to install that and Edit > Preferences > Applications gives you per MIME type configuration.

Against, because I'm generally against integrating all possible applications into web browsers.

Personally I don't see how integrating a pdf reader in firefox is more convenient over auto-launching a separate okular window. Perhaps the original poster could elaborate on why it's so cool.

Of course it is convenient. It groups your work in one place. You fire a search on certain papers and then open them in tabs, no matter if they are HTML, PDF or PS or videos.

Anyway, as I commented before, you can have that with mozplugger not only for PDFs, but pretty much whatever you want to have inside your browser, so I should probably click vote down too.

hen open them in tabs, no matter if they are HTML, PDF or PS or videos.

If browser tabs are somehow inherently better than desktop window/task management, the latter needs to be fixed. Don't make the browser a window manager...

I use virtual desktops and window managers too. They are not better, they are different, at least with my settings:

- browsers order tabs, which is beneficial if you want to review number of things in order and not skip/forget something;
- window managers use switch-back, which helps combining two tasks into one (eg. reading documentation and programming);
- virtual desktops use switch-back too and I use them to group similar long term tasks.

By switch-back I mean something like: 1>>3, 3>1, 1>3, 3>>2, 2>3, 3>>1. Anytime you press switch once it goes back to most recently used window. Anytime you press switch more than once you dig deeper into history and pull the chosen window to the top of the FIFO stack.

And I think it's a proven case, that browser tabs have their place in UI design, they made it even into Exploder.

At least in Konqueror on my system embedding Okular is faster than starting the process.
It shouldn't be important if you browse HTML, Images, PDF or PS. You want to use the browser history, bookmarks and quick access to webbrowsing features.

Do you think it would be good to open HTML-pages in a separate program?

Do you think it would be good to open HTML-pages in a separate program?

Yes, it's called a web browser. I open web pages with that and not say... my file manager.

Anyway, if you're missing document history, bookmarks, an address bar in apps viewing remote files... that can all be fixed by improving the desktop environment, instead of making the browser your desktop environment.

Well, I mean you open the webbrowser, enter the adress.
Then a new process is started and the page is shown in a new window.

@indiva: you seem to have trouble admitting that you might have been wrong in this particular case. You didn't answer directly to any of the arguments I put above, instead you unfairly evaded an easy one.

What is this "desktop environment" thing you are talking about? Hint: KDE started from an email defining it pretty much as "integration".

http://groups.google.com/group/de.comp. ... 67ffc3ffce

I find the integration of file management and browsing a blessing. I used Konqueror for a long time, even with the advent of superior rendering and JavaScript interpreter in Firefox. The reason was: I could open Konqueror and throw at it any address and the app displayed a file view. This included: file, FTP, SSH, WebDAV, audiocd (this was utterly brilliant!), trash, zip, rar, tar etc. I'm missing it in Firefox. I can no longer bookmark FTP/file/SSH and have a read/write drag n' drop here. I will be missing this in the Konqueror/Dolphin duality world.

What finally dragged me to Firefox is the new address bar, which is exactly history and bookmarks integration (to reference a post by The User). The improving desktop environment you are talking about is about this address bar. Where would you rather see it if not in a browser? You cannot put it in Okular, because the addresses come from external providers (search engines mostly), which give you a HTML page as a starting point. You can somehow decouple it from the browser, which I used at some point too by saying "gg:thingy" to krunner in KDE3 series.

Explorer/IE integration in Windows is a brilliant idea. It's a shame that the bad fame of the HTML renderer casted shadow on it and made them abandon it. But we, the KDE world don't have lawyers breathing down our necks and can keep it in Konqueror. I hope Dolphin evolves into better file view for all those protocols and will be integrated back into Konqueror.

I don't think embedding content in tabs is building a monster browser. The embedded application should be able to crash on her own. There's nothing more they share, than the address and an ordered display space. Window managers won't provide that, they must be much more flexible about arrangement.

And note that we are talking about content displaying applications here, not just everything. There is a whole world of: games, calculators, graphic editors, 3D modelers, screen capturers, configuration windows, development environments, messengers, photo managers, VNC viewers, system monitors etc. integration of which would indeed be useless.

And one more argument: PDFs have even got links now and they open nicely in the browser, when you have the app embedded.

And once again: use mozplugger.

Re: dhill

Funny you mention taking the address bar out of the browser and putting it in the desktop environment, because I think it's a pretty interesting idea. It certainly needs a lot of thinking through, but that's the direction I personally would want desktop environments to go.

I'd very much like to have 1 perfect document switching interface instead of separate app switching and tab switching. You say it should happen by putting all document viewers in the web browser, I say to take a step back, put the browser functionality into the desktop shell and make the HTML rendering engine just one of the single-window document viewers.
(I don't think Konqueror qualifies at this point as my mythical desktop shell, it's still a distinct window with its own tabs)

You might have seen one of my other submissions where I advocated making a plasma taskbar mimicking the awesomeness of Firefox's Tree Style Tab extension. It was based on the same sentiment that I'm displaying here.

PS. Games, 3D modellers, dev environments, messengers, photo managers are either being integrated into browsers (QuakeLive, o3d) or written for browsers these days (JS and Flash apps). It also highlights the fact that the web browser these days serves not just documents, but all kinds of applications. Letting these applications live as first class citizens on your desktop and not be confined to a tabbed browser might be an argument in my favor.

@indiva
Use KRunner??

@dhill
Maybe we should improve Konqueror's adressbar. What should be better?