is D ncurses-only language?

[Jude Young]

On Wed 23 Nov 2011 04:23:22 AM CST, Gour wrote:
> Hello!
>
> Re-considering to use D for real-world project and must say that
> we're very pleased by seeing all the progress which has happened in a
> recent time...64bit DMD, gdc might be included in gcc, there are more
> bindings available (we're interested abotu sqlite3), Phobos is receiving
> new modules, community is alive @github...
>
> There is still one area which needs, imho, more attention and that is
> the GUI world or language bindings for different toolkits.
>
> New web page says: "D is a lan­guage with C-like syntax and static
> typ­ing. It pragmatically combines effi­ciency, control, and model­ing
> power, with safety and programmer productivity." and I hope that the
> word 'pragmatically' includes writing GUI apps as well (hopefully there
> is still life for non-web apps) :-)
>
> However, the world of GUI bindings is not thrilling...
>
>
> a) DWT was supposed to become THE toolkit for D, maybe (I'm not sure) it
> was still in the D1-era, but from the contact with the main (only) DWT
> developer - "unfortunately DWT is not a project I'm currently focusing
> on" andd, as he told me: "I think it's quite usable on windows and
> linux, the mac port isn't finished yet".
>
> Moreover, DWT is based on SWT-3.4, while SWT-stable is 3.7 with the
> development on 3.8.
>
> So, DWT(2) is not suitable for multi-platform GUI development in D. :-/
>
> b) QtD repo @bitbucket has last commit by David in May. According to
> him: "Qt 4.7 should work, although I haven't tested the latest minor
> release", he and Max "working on it from time to time" and "It does the
> job for me in its current form, and I don't have the time for working on
> it any further".
>
> Qt does not offer native look on supported platforms, although it looks
> quite good.
>
> c) gtkD looks it's in best shape...works with Phobos and Tango, with D
> 1.0 and D 2.0, 64 bits support, wraps GTK+ 2.22.x API.
>
> Quite good, although a bit behind GTK+ schedule. The problem might be
> there is only one developer (Mike) working on it.
>
> There is endeavour to bring GTK+ looks good on Mac OS X, Windows port
> needs, afaik, some more manpower, but GTK, in general, might look a bit
> strange on non-Linux OS.
>
> d) wxD...recently moved to github, the only developer (Anders) recently
> announced he is stepping down from the project (let's hope he'll change
> his mind), although there are some fixes committed and according to
> Andrej "It compiles fine on DMD 2.056, but you need to compile wxWidgets via
> DMD make first. It's described on wxd's website." which looks quite
> good.
>
> Considering that wxWidgets is the only player amongst {gtk,qt,wx}
> providing native look on all supported platforms (2.9/3.0 brings new
> Cocoa port), this looks as great option for true multi-platform
> development of  GUI apps in D.
>
> Now, wx lib is big and I was discussing it with wx folks about the
> possibility to make it easier for language bindings developers.
>
> Here is the comment from one of the main wx devs, Vadim Zeitlin who
> wrote ("help for language bindings developers" thread on wxwidgets
> list):
>
> <quote>
>
>> it seems that there is prominent opionion that providing language
> G> bindings for wxWidgets is not an easy and simple task.  
>
>  This is pretty obvious, yes. I don't know of any library of comparable
> size for which writing bindings would be an easy and simple task. Do you?
>
> G> Otoh, I wonder if there is some general plan to have something like
> G> introspection in GTK+ which could help present and future authors of
> G> language bindings to make it easier to provide & maintain them for
> G> plethora of languages?  
>
>  I am not aware of such a plan. IMHO it's not very realistic and I think
> the best bet to make writing bindings easier in practice would be to have a
> well-maintained and working wxC project. I also think that SWIG is the best
> bet to make it work in practice but there could be other approaches. In any
> case the most important thing would be to find someone motivated enough to
> work on it.
> </quote>
>
> and Robin Dunn, main dev behind wxPython said:
>
> <quote>
> I've decided to switch to SIP for wxPython, but the main goal of the 
> Phoenix project is to auto-generate as much of the wrapper code as 
> possible, so if other language bindings would rather use SWIG, some 
> other tool, or custom C code with Phoenix then it should be possible. 
> It will just take writing the generator class for the target back-end. 
> There is still currently some Python and SIP-specific stuff in the other 
> parts of Phoenix, but it should be possible to either remove that or at 
> least to make it possible for other generators to ignore it.
>
> OTOH, I've also thought of using Phoenix to generate a wxC library as 
> Vadim mentioned, so maybe that would be a good first step for other 
> bindings.
> </quote>
>
> So, one possibility would be to have wxC bindings from where it would
> be, hopefully, easier to provide D bindings.
>
> I'm aware there is no ideal GUI multi-platform toolkit, some look
> better, some are better documented, supported as well.
>
> My main concern is quotes like:
>
> "I do like a lot of things about D. It still seems a bit raw to me for
> "serious" projects though but then I last looked at it more than a year ago
> so perhaps things have changed since then. It would be interesting to hear
> if you run into any problems using it."
>
> "Whether you use GTK or Qt, I see no reason to avoid C++.  I can
> understand reluctance to build in C (there is Vala of course).  Python
> is a good choice.  If you do want to build a project that is open source
> and actually could have some community behind it, D is probably not the
> best language to pick."
>
> so I wonder whether D is meant to be ncurses-only language, or it is
> possible to find some crew to enhance one of the above mentioned
> projects so that it can be said that writing multi-platform deskop app
> using D+X gui toolkit is safe & viable option *today* ?
>
> I may say that considering nativity of wxWidgets it's my choise, I'd be
> glad to know for any toolkit to receive more love.
>
> In the meantime, we'll try to find the answer which toolkit might be
> optimal for our needs (today & tomorrow) by using some non-technical
> methods. ;)
>
>
> Sincerly,
> Gour
>


ncurses needs a few minor fixes I believe, ( one or two minor edits )
and other than that, I cannot say.  But really, what is a language if 
it doesn't have ncurses? =P

I agree that D needs GUI support.
The problem is that what you are suggesting takes time, and it takes 
effort. and it takes people who know and understand these things.

If you are trying to get a small team together to ensure that a 
particular GUI project gets the time and the effort needed to make it 
worthwhile(no offense to any maintainer), then I am on board.

You have my email address.
Pick a project that you are willing to invest time and effort in. (GTK, 
QT, wxWidgets... the list goes on.  Preferable cross-platform support.)
I have no experience with any of them.  I've never used them, I've 
never played with them.
Draw up a roadmap of what needs to be done.

Fork the projects, or get the original maintainers on board.

You've posted about the state of GUI's several times, now lets see you 
put your money where your mouth is, and let's see if we can get an 
up-to-date,
stable, platform-independent GUI for D.  (assuming one doesn't already 
exist. I assume it doesn't)

Are you willing to put the time and effort into a project like this?