Re: wxWindows and GNOME

[Karl Nelson <kenelson ece ucdavis edu>]

[...]
> It is the aim of wxWindows, to make it possible to write programs
> as easy as possible on various platforms, compiling with various
> compilers etc, that it has become out main goal to make wxWindows
> independent of everything else - save the toolkit itself. I even
> had to remove its usage of the stdc++ classes as well as the GNU
> libtool and GNU automake tools for its building system to reach
> that goal. wxWindows also doesn´t use RTTI, exceptions or templates
> internally and we included verbatim versions of zlib, libpng and
> libjpeg to avoid forcing users to download them separately or
> having troubles with wrong versions of either of them.

Removing the use of so many tools for the sake of portablity 
means reducing the level of the interface to the lowest common
denominator.  This means the tool will be the same poor level
on a good platform as it is on the one that placed the restriction.

The other approach is to use the tools that are there and 
subsititute for them if they are missing.  I wrote libsigc++
to work accross almost as many platforms as WxWindows, however,
I did not need to give up STL, autoconf, automake and other tools
that ease development.  The package therefore works well without
having to reinvent too many wheels. 

[...]
> I saw Mr. Elliot´s esoteric post about a "final" GNOME 1.0 release
> and its release date might coincide with the release of wxGTK 2.1,
> both using GTK 1.2 and therefore I am asking for wxGTK to be included
> in this GNOME release.

WxGtk no more deserves to be in GNOME release than Gtk-- or VDK .
All are C++ widget sets.  WxGtk doesn't even try
to access the GNOME features, so if we include it we might as well
include Qt and it is as closely related.


> Why should you do that? Maybe you have read various posts on Slashdot,
> the Borland survey or some comments about toolkits during the LinuxWorld
> circus and it seems that not all people think that the current C and
> GNOME APIs offer solutions to all problems, well, neither does wxGTK, 
> but it does offer what maybe some people are looking for and what GNOME
> still fails to deliver. Up to now, GNOME cannot boast a C++ toolkit as
> versatile and elegant as Qt and I doubt that GTK-- even tries to get
> there - with wxWindows it finally could. And offering a cross-platform
> API won´t drive people away either.

Why go arround belittling a project you know nothing about?  
Gtk-- is making serious strids towards improving out API to
the level of Qt.  In some respects, Gtk-- is already far
superior. (see libsigc++)  Our latest interface is nearing 
release as development series 1.1.x and provides much better
functionality and better memory usage that previous versions.
We do strive to be as good as Qt and better.  If there weren't
such competition between the kits, we would get there much faster.
Have you ever contavted the Gtk-- crew to find out what our
goals and plans are?

Now that Libsigc++ compiles on windows platform (VC++ or cygwin)
Gtk-- will become cross platform as well.  As a language binding
it will be everywhere that Gtk+/GNOME run.    

 
> What I am asking for is to include the wxGTK-RPM along the other GNOME
> libs (and maybe the wxGTK-devel-RPM and docs in similar places) just
> the way (or at least similar to the point of binary compatibility) as
> the are on my homepage, which BTW is at
> 
>   http://wesley.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~wxxt
> 
> including wxWindows´ on-line documentation and an on-line hello world.

It is my opinon that we need to clarify things that are binding
and which are other APIs that just happen to share back ends.  
Gtk-- is a gtk+ language binding which takes the gtk+ interface
into C++ with both its features and its flaws.  WxGtk is 
a seperate API whose backend just happens to be Gtk.  As
such it is not a binding as it does not attempt to provide
Gtk+ features and functions nor use extensions of Gtk+ like
GNOME.  If you are looking for a language binding for Gtk+
in C++ use Gtk--, if you are looking for the cross platform
Wx API use WxGtk.  

WxWindows goals do not seem to match those of GNOME, while
Gtk-- tries to match all of the GNOME functionality.  Therefore,
which is a better chose to include in GNOME?  (I
personally think unless a large number of GNOME applications
(not gnome-like) start using one of the bindings, should
that binding be included.)  Gtk-- is still too immature 
to fit the bill, but it is the only one that tries to wrap
GNOME fully.  And it is the only one that is meant as a binding
and not another API.  (Look at the gtk+ examples translated
into gtk-- if you need to understand this.  It is a very
good correspondence)

--Karl