Gtk4 WebKitGtk Getting started

TODO have a look at the tutorial.md

0. Checked platforms

This tiny example have been checked on the:

• Ubuntu 22.04
• Ubuntu 24.04

The newer versions allow us to slightly expand the functionality of this application.

Probably, this project will compile without troubles on other unix-like platforms too, but there can be pitfalls.

1. Install prerequisites

sudo apt install libgtk-4-dev libadwaita-1-dev libwebkitgtk-6.0-dev -y

2. Verify that pkg-config can found required packages

> symbol shows the output of the previously executed command, don't type it.

Ubuntu 22.04:

pkg-config gtk4 --modversion
> 4.6.9
pkg-config libadwaita-1 --modversion
> 1.1.7
pkg-config webkitgtk-6.0 --modversion
> 2.48.3

Ubuntu 24.04:

pkg-config gtk4 --modversion
> 4.14.2
pkg-config libadwaita-1 --modversion
> 1.5.0
pkg-config webkitgtk-6.0 --modversion
> 2.48.3

Also you can check your glib-2.0 version. If glib-2.0 version <= 2.74, there will be slightly changes in the main.c:

pkg-config glib-2.0 --modversion
> 2.72.4 # Here is what I get on the Ubuntu 22.04
> 2.80.2 # Ubuntu 24.04

Btw, we could use the latest versions of the gtk4 and libadwaita-1 by compiling everything from the source, but it's a bit hard (there're plenty of things to compile). Currently we will use the available development packages.

3. Build the project

We use the CMake to build this project, however the usual tool for the gtk4 environment is meson. Maybe later I will add the meson.build file.

I use VSCode to make this project and some CMake extension (pick up the most popular one).

You need to change the current working directory to the project root and execute one of the following sequences:

3.1 For Debug build

cmake -B build/debug -S .
cmake --build build/debug --config Debug

3.2 For Release build

cmake -B build/release -S .
cmake --build build/release --config Release