Re: AWT

[Tom Tromey <tromey@cygnus.com>]

I LIKE it.  I HATE it.  I LIKE it.  I HATE it.  I LIKE it.
I HATE it.  I LIKE..  EMOTIONS are SWEEPING over me!!
X-Attribution:  Tom
BCC:  Tom Tromey <tromey@cygnus.com>

>>>>> "Nathan" == Nathan Meyers <nmeyers@teleport.com> writes:

Nathan> So I guess I get to reveal some pitiful ignorance of Windows
Nathan> programming here. I'm under the impression that it's possible
Nathan> in Windows to create a completely plain subwindow within a
Nathan> parent window: no decorations, no menus, no border, no
Nathan> semantics - just a plain window in which the application can
Nathan> own the rendering of every pixel, can own the size, placement,
Nathan> visibility and stacking order within the parent window, and
Nathan> can interact with the input devices.

Yes, you can.
You can do this with X too.

Nathan> With this capability, you could design almost any heavyweight
Nathan> GUI you want (restricted to opaque rectangular windows, which
Nathan> isn't fatal) without using native GUI components. Is my
Nathan> impression incorrect -- is this not possible?

As I understand it this sort of approach is referred to as
"lightweight", since the components require no system overhead, just
the presumably ordinary overhead of your implementation.

Tk's experience is that it is easier to get native look and feel --
and, on Windows, better performance, using a "heavyweight"
implementation.

On X the situation is more confused because X operates at a different
level of abstraction than Windows.  For instance, Tk on X already
implements its own buttons, menus, etc (because X has no such notion
of its own), whereas on Windows the system does provide widgets.

I don't understand how this applies to what we might or might not do.
My own feeling is that, on Unix, it is cooler to leverage Gtk+ even if
it isn't the absolutely ideal approach -- and as far as I know there's
no evidence that it is not.

Tom