GTK+ 2.16 adds new functionality while maintaining source and binary compatibility with GTK+ 2.14. Highlights of new features and improvements in GTK+ 2.16 are:
Noteworthy new APIs
- GtkOrientable is a new interface implemented by all widgets that have horizontal and vertical variants
- GtkActivatable is a new interface that must be implemented by widgets that are used as action proxies
Changes in GtkEntry
- GtkEntry can show icons at either side of the entry, which can be made clickable, drag sources, etc.
- GtkEntry can show progress information behind the text.
- GTK+ picks the best available placeholder character for password entries unless one is explicitly set.
- GTK+ displays a Caps Lock warning in password entries.
- Input methods can now be selected per-widget with the “im-module” property.
Changes in GtkScale
- GtkScale can now display annotated marks for certain values.
Changes in GtkStatusIcon
- GTK+ uses an extension of the tray icon specification to negotiate RGBA support. This is also supported by the GNOME panel.
- GtkStatusIcon now supports scroll events, middle clicks and rich tooltips if the platform allows it.
Changes in file chooser
- The file chooser can optionally show file sizes.
- Volumes are mounted when necessary.
- GTK+ remembers the file chooser’s window size across invocations.
- Non-local uris can be entered in the location entry.
Changes in printing support
- Page rendering can be deferred to a thread.
Internationalization support
- Keyboard shortcut handling has been changed, to help with a longstanding complaint about the way in which GTK+ handles multiple keyboard layouts. GTK+ now only uses keys from groups other than the current group if they are not present in the current group.
GDK changes
- GdkKeymap emits a state-changed signal when the Caps Lock state changes.
- There is a predefined type for blank cursors, GDK_BLANK_CURSOR.
For more details and lists of fixed bugs, see the
announcements for the 2.15.x development releases:
See the original announcement for more info and downloads.