The team behind the free web browser Ladybird is expanding its target group and is now officially calling the browser the “Cross-Platform browser project”. Originally, the underlying browser engine was only developed for the free operating system SerenityOS. At the beginning of July, SerenityOS initiator Andreas Kling presented a graphical interface for Linux systems for his LibWeb engine for the first time. He christened the result Ladybird.
Ladybird already runs on Linux
Since the start of the project, he has been using Ladybird himself very regularly for his browser developments, writes Kling in a newly published blog post. That’s why he and his team no longer just want to develop a Linux web browser, but even a cross-platform web browser. They want to “build something that could one day be of use to many more people.” According to an FAQ at the end of the post, Ladybird already runs on Linux, macOS, Windows and Android.
However, we are still a long way from having software that can be used in everyday life. Many of the features used on modern web platforms either do not work in Ladybird at all or only with errors. It could therefore take “a few years of development time” until Ladybird is completely finished. Nevertheless, Ladybird has already passed the Acid3 standards test of the Web Standards Project with the maximum number of points. The test checks browsers against a number of established web standards.
All parts developed in-house
Ladybird is based on the LibWeb browser engine, launched in 2019 as LibHTML, and the LibJS JavaScript engine. Both of them developed Kling and the open source project team, like all parts of the Ladybird stack, as part of SerenityOS itself. Both the browser and the libraries are written in C++ and are free under the 2-clause BSD license. Nobody can buy into the project, but volunteers are always welcome. After all, SerenityOS is not a one-man show. The work is only possible with the support of the SerenityOS community, which has grown to several hundred contributors and is helping to develop both the operating system and the browser.
Ladybird has been available for Linux operating systems since the beginning of July. At that time, skeptical statements about the further course of the new project were repeatedly made in several places on the Internet. Kling also responds to these voices in the FAQ:
Why bother? You can’t build a new browser engine without billions of dollars and hundreds of employees.
Of course you can. Don’t listen to the wannabe pessimists who’ve never worked on a browser.
