[GRASS-dev] GUI toolkits

[Jachym Cepicky]

hallo,

On Fri, May 26, 2006 at 08:44:24AM -0600, twiens wrote:
> One of the questions that Michael had raised in the earlier
> threads concerning toolkits and languages to replace the
> tcl/tk interface was the accessibility of development tools
> on all platforms. Since there has been some interest in
> using Python, I began doing a very cursory examination of
> the different toolkits and their associated development
> environments. I've used Python for scripting statistical
> analyses and database work, but never for GUI work, so it is
> something new to me. I've been using Eric3 for my Python
> editor but it isn't available on all platforms. When looking
> at wxPython I came across PythonCard (and had noticed the
> LWN announcement of the new release this week) so I looked
> at it briefly and it seems pretty decent. As it was a
> toolkit that tries to reduce the complexity of GUI
> development and make it more Python like, it seems like a
> good idea and something we might want to consider. It is
> pure Python so the development tools are available on all
> platforms and uses wxPython. From what I can tell, if there
> is need for more control than is offered with PythonCard,
> wxPython can be coded directly within this environment. In
> an earlier life as a Clipper programmer, I used a tool
> called Zachary, which automated huge portions of the
> application development process but still allowed for the
> hand coding of more advanced modules. I found this extremely
> handy, and was able to be very productive with those tools.
> I realize that a GRASS GUI is an entirely different kind of
> animal than end user desktop database apps, but still the
> idea of using a single tool has advantages.
> 
> I look foward to hearing the opinions of others on the list
> about this idea and their experiences with PythonCard (if
> any).
> 
> Thanks
> 
> T
> --
> Trevor Wiens

I scripted G-ps.map
(http://les-ejk.cz/?cat=gpsmap) with Glade, because I could not find
anything similar to it for wxWindows. Actually, the reason, why I choosed Gtk 
was Glade.

Glade is very nice tool, the configuration files for new gui are stored
in XML, which can be edited directly. I was fearing, how fast will the
new on-the-fly generated gui, but even on my laptop it goes very well. 

I do not say, that we should use Gtk, but I thing, tool similar to Glade
for wxWindows would be *very* importand for fast and simple development. 

I tryed to make some graphical app. using PythonCard right now and I would say,
glade works a little bit other, IMHO better, way. Also the resulting
file is python code and not XML (or somethign "neutral"), 
which means, that the GUI can be created only with python and not from 
other languages. Also generating the graphical forms for modules by
g.parser seems simplier as XML rather than python to me - but this will
be done sometime in the future, if ever.

anyway

+1 for python

I thing, this language will bring more potential developers to GRASS

just my 2 cents

Jachym
-- 
Jachym Cepicky
e-mail: jachym.cepicky at centrum.cz
URL: http://les-ejk.cz
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