Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!mips!pacbell.com!att!ucbvax!UCBVAX.BERKELEY.EDU!"Dan Karron From: Dan Karron@UCBVAX.BERKELEY.EDU Newsgroups: comp.sys.sgi Subject: Re: Iris UI's: Forms, tk, etc. Message-ID: <9106211703.AA28620@karron.med.nyu.edu> Date: 21 Jun 91 17:03:37 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: karron@cmcl2.nyu.edu Organization: The Internet Lines: 61 >Organization: NAS Program, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA > > >Essentially, we're trying to decide what user interface to use on a number >of future projects, here, and Forms would be a favorite, if it were supported >by SGI. (Nobody wants to mess with supporting Panel-lib any more...) > >Curiously yours, > >Dan Wallach >dwallach@nas.nasa.gov > Well, I have done quite a bit of messing with the Panel-lib, and have used it to build a quite elaborate package. I have reworked the internals in such a way that it is multi-threaded, and can reach into your running application from the GUI thread, lookup the symbol table for the address you want to attach the actuator to, and either read or write values in your application thread (via the /debug/ debugger low lever interface). I have concentrated on making the panel lib a tool to support my applications by reducing the overhead code in the application(how about zero UI code in the application). I use the panel editor daily, and I have panels with 100+ actuators in various threads using sgi brand shared memory (Arenas). I have put in a real time scripting/playback for animation camera and object path tracking, and lots of real neat stuff for my own projects. However, I have been enjoined from releasing ANY code for the panel library, and I am casting around to build on another gui from source. My mods are too extensive to release as diffs on the 9.7 source, and while the panel lib may be dead for the rest of the world, I like using its framework to build and elaborate on. It may be more the case that I have become used to it (and all its bugs, but then I find it easier to fix'em than to get bothered by them.) than have made an informed choice from the broad selection of freeware GUI's avaiable today :-> . My main thrust is my application, not the GUI, but I could not have written my application without the panel library, and being able to mung the source. I like the idea of a c++ rewrite, and I may look into the Forms library when it comes time for my next major re-write. However, I will have to re-engineer my mods into Mark's library, and that will be a challange, unless he is ahead of me. I must say that having a good gui really changes the way I work for the better. I can concentrate on my application, not the GUI. But that only came after spending months and months on the GUI... Cheers! dan. | karron@nyu.edu (e-mail alias ) Dan Karron, Research Associate | | Phone: 212 263 5210 Fax: 212 263 7190 New York University Medical Center | | 560 First Avenue Digital Pager <1> (212) 397 9330 | | New York, New York 10016 <2> 10896 <3> |