Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!udel!rochester!pt.cs.cmu.edu!ius3.ius.cs.cmu.edu!thomasf
From: thomasf@ius3.ius.cs.cmu.edu (Thomas Fahringer)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Easy or Hard Problem?
Message-ID: <12357@pt.cs.cmu.edu>
Date: 15 Mar 91 14:25:16 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI
Lines: 50

Here is the PROBLEM:

I have to start building a graphical user interface (GUI) under X windows 
for a huge existing application (parallelzing compiler). 
	======>>>> As I am a beginner I guess I better use some kind of widget toolkit,
		   rather than Xtintrinsic or Xlib? Right?

I will have to program about everything one can imagine: 
command buttons, scrollbars, pop-up dialog boxes, composite windows at the beginning, 
lateron even fancy graphics (like visualizing graphs) in some special purpose 
application window.
	======>>>> means, that I should use some widget set which is complete 
                   and hopefully does not have that many bugs. 
          
I will implement my GUI on a SPARC SLC (using SunOs 4.1 + X11R4 + twm), 
but it SHOULD (not a must) run also on other machines 
liek DEC 3100, IBM RS600, Apollos, etc. 
	======>>>> Thus my GUI should be portable as good as possible.
		   This restriction can be somehow relaxed. I rather implement
		   GUI for only a few different architectures than using Xlib!

QUESTION-1: What should I use to program my GUI???

	Xview?		Someone said: it is simple if the application is reasonable
			well behaved and doesn't use pixrect.
	OPEN LOOK ?
	OLIT ?
	Motif?
	Athena? 	O'Reilly says, it is not complete and propably a lot of bugs.
	X11/NeWs?
	...

QUESTION-2: All the users who want to use the GUI, which I will implement, currently
 	    run X11R4 and twm on their workstations. 
	    If I create my GUI with the widget set you propose,
	    can the user start my GUI on his workstation (under X11R4 and
	    twm) without having to switch to some other window manager or Windowsystem?
	    The users of my GUI will hesitate to give up on X11R4 or twm.
	   
QUESTION-3: this is a general question: 
 	I am kind of confused about: Is Xview == OPEN LOOK == OLIT?
				     Do all the widget sets have a different 
						window manager?

I tried to figure out all the above questions by reading into some X books and 
also the mails of this bboard, but got more and more confused the more I read.

Thanks for the answers in advance.

Tom