A new release of Read It Later is available on Flathub. The significant changes are the upgrade to GTK 4, some fixed bugs, and new translations.
I have been using Wallabag for a year as my read-it-later application. Whenever I find an interesting web article, I add it to my Wallabag account. Then when I have a few minutes to spare, I open the Wallabag app on my Android phone to read them. I love the workflow and don’t have to doomscroll any social media.
Meanwhile, I have an interest in Linux on mobile phones. I own a Librem 5 and a PineTab, which run mobile Linux with Phosh. In the app store, I found a great app called Read It Later, which allows me to read my articles from my Wallabag account.
A few months after discovering the app, it started complaining about an old runtime version. As a good open-source citizen, I wanted to report this issue. In that process, I found a similar issue: Port to GTK 4. The creator of the app, Bilal Elmoussaoui, is looking for someone to do this work. Then I saw that the app is written in Rust, my favorite programming language! I found a new hobby project 😎
I followed the migration guides for GTK 4 and libadwaita. I implemented some of the best practices found in the gtk-rs book. I fixed some bugs along the way. And (where it all started) I updated to the latest GNOME runtime.
I really like the tech stack for this application. GTK and libadwaita provide great UI widgets. Rust provides high-quality libraries and a lot of compile-time checks. gtk-rs provides bindings from Rust to GTK. Flatpak provides a stable build and runtime environment. The VSCode Flatpak plugin provides the editor integration.
Thanks to Bilal for mentoring me and thanks to the translators for the constant stream of contributions.
