D Binding to GUI libraries

[Russel Winder]

On Sat, 2018-10-20 at 23:38 +0000, Gregor Mückl via Digitalmars-d
wrote:
> 
[…]
> I don't want to judge, but I need to point out that we have 
> managed to make this discussion progress from outward-facing 
> marketing to technical difficulties and related pull requests. 
> This is not bad, but it is also a perfect example of how 
> inward-facing the community can be and that is a part of what 
> started this thread.

Which is why I changed the Subject on this sub-thread to make it clear
that the content had diverged from the original points.

On the other hand, we seem to be teasing out a point or two relating to
the original message. GUI desktop applications is clearly a place where
D should excel. For those using GtkD (and GStreamerD) it clearly can
and does. However the GTK+ "market" is quite small, and the Qt and
wxWidgets "market" is much bigger. Thus to excel as a GUI programming
tool more widely, D needs a Qt binding and a wxWidgets binding that is
as of good quality as GtkD is.

I know there are a number of other GUI frameworks cf. 

https://wiki.dlang.org/GUI_Libraries

It is not clear what the order signifies, if anything. I believe most
of them to be unmaintained.

DWT as a port of SWT is far behind where Java has gone, which is
JavaFX. JavaFX has a not dissimilar approach to QML. However that is
all very much engine and observables based, which is fine if you like
it. Clearly I did in the past as I worked on GroovyFX, a Groovy wrapper
to JavaFX.

Which of qtD or dqt to choose to progress if either? I have a feeling
that whilst having many can be a good thing, D bindings to GUI
frameworks is a space where having one is a good thing, cf. GtkD. Then
there is dqml or QtE5 as a binding to QML. Should these be separate or
should there be a single framework offering a D binding for the Qt and
QML APIs? wxD is potentially interesting, if it could be progressed.
Personally I ignore Tk as a GUI framework, even with the update from a
decade or so ago.

I am sure DlangUI will get a mention, but is there enough resource
available within the community to create a viable competitor to Qt or
wxWidgets so as to gain traction for D in the desktop GUI application
arena. Currently I believe no.

So to progress getting D used for desktop GUI applications, I would
argue that some (fewest) of qtD, dqt, dqml, and QtE5, and wxD are the
bindings to progress to a good state to show to the world that D is a
strong competitor to C++, Rust, and Python in the field of desktop GUI
applications.

Assuming of course that: a) there is a market for desktop GUI
applications; and b) D wants to compete in this space.

-- 
Russel.
===========================================
Dr Russel Winder      t: +44 20 7585 2200
41 Buckmaster Road    m: +44 7770 465 077
London SW11 1EN, UK   w: www.russel.org.uk

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