Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bbn!mit-eddie!bloom-beacon!ATHENA.MIT.EDU!swick
From: swick@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Ralph R. Swick)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: X docs needed
Message-ID: <8805171313.AA19538@LYRE.MIT.EDU>
Date: 17 May 88 13:13:25 GMT
References: <5600@chinet.UUCP>
Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU
Organization: DEC/MIT Project Athena
Lines: 34


     Date:  16 May 88 22:59:48 GMT
     From:  att!chinet!odesta@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU  (Odesta Corp.)

     My problem is that I don't really have a feel for when to use the toolkit,
     when to use Xlib, how to use Xlib to create widgets for use with the
     toolkit, etc.

You should use whichever layer you understand and will get your
particular job done the fastest.  Xt is designed to allow you to
use most of Xlib directly if/when you need to do so.

                Should my goals be to make EVERYTHING a widget?

Probably.  In the long run, the application will be easier to maintain
this way and there's much greater opportunity for your code to be
shared by other applications.

                                             Is it "cool" to call XtMainLoop,
     and then still do traditional event processing in other parts of my code?

If you mean 'call XNextEvent myself', then you're very likely to get into
trouble.  If you merely want to register an event handler, that is
definitely supported, though you currently need a widget wrapper under
which to do so.  If you want block-for-input style interfaces, then
you'll have to write some widgets that simulate this behavior and that
export blocking style procedural interfaces.

     More generally, how can I make sure I have the latest and greatest docs?
     (I don't have access to ftp, unfortunately).  Also, is there any
     example code out there I might be able to get my hands on?

If you have Release 2, you have the latest and greatest public docs and
most of the available example code.