gtk interfaces status

[Jerry DeLisle]

On 02/06/2011 09:51 PM, Paul Richard Thomas wrote:
> Dear jerry,
>
>> I see this as a nitch tool and its use will grow as people learn how easy it
>> is to use.  There is a learning curve of course.
>
> Port some applications into fortran; then, I suspect, you will see
> interest take off.
>
>>
>> Vincent now has a Python script that is taking the gtk+ .h files and
>> generating the Fortran interfaces.  The function count is now up above 4000
>> functions and gives pretty much complete access to all of gtk+ and then
>> some.  It has not been committed to the repository yet, but will soon.
>
> Have you checked that all is well with other compilers, Intel in
> particular.  Which versions of gtk does it work with?
>>
>> Hats off to Vincent Magnin for doing this. I really think we need to
>
> Indeed - chapeau!
>
>> consider adding an intrinsic module to gfortran (4.7) for this stuff. We
>
> Hmmm! I am not convinced about this.  Why gtk, rather than
> iso_varying_string or any other library that you might care to think
> of?
>

Quite a few of the more popular programming languages have bindings for gtk+. 
Along with QT it is one of the leading tool-kits for gnome/kde apps which covers 
most linux windowing tools. gtk+ is mature, well established, easy to use, and 
getting better.

I also think iso_varying_strings should be an intrinsic module for gfortran. 
This will be especially good if we reimplement it using gfortran's automatic 
allocation/reallocation features. Some might argue that iso_varying_strings is 
not needed, but it really has a nice interface and functionality.

By intrinsic module, I mean packaging it somehow with gfortran so that all a 
user does is "use gtk'. I am not sure how we would do that specifically, but 
this would be an extension obviously.

Jerry