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From: David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: 'Graphics' of libwy
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2024 17:30:18 +0100
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On 17/12/2024 17:02, Muttley@DastardlyHQ.org wrote:
> On Tue, 17 Dec 2024 16:38:49 +0200
> Paavo Helde <eesnimi@osa.pri.ee> wibbled:
>> On 17.12.2024 02:41, Lynn McGuire wrote:
>>> On 12/15/2024 4:04 AM, wij wrote:
>>>> I had headache whenevr I think about graphics in C++. Why C++ does not
>>>> provide
>>>> a graphics library (lots complaint about this), not even a simplest
>>>> one for
>>>> demonstrating its 'power' of C++ itself? Then, I suddenly realized
>>>> that the
>>>> minimal answer is already there because the resolution of modern text
>>>> screen
>>>> (emulator) is barely enough (width can be >320).
>>> ...
>>>
>>> I totally agree that C++ should have a graphics library and a user
>>> interface library both.
>>>
>>> Have you looked at
>>>      https://wxwidgets.org/
>>>
>>> "wxWidgets is a C++ library that lets developers create applications for
>>> Windows, macOS, Linux and other platforms with a single code base. It
>>> has popular language bindings for Python, Ruby, Lua, Perl and several
>>> other languages, and unlike other cross-platform toolkits, wxWidgets
>>> gives applications a truly native look and feel because it uses the
>>> platform's native API rather than emulating the GUI. It's also
>>> extensive, free, open-source and mature."
>>
>> wxWidgets does work and is better than MFC, but not extremely so. Also,
>> it is not exactly light-weight, a git checkout is 803 MB. Good luck for
>> the standards committee to standardize anything like that.
>>
>> Also, wxWidgets would be only part of the solution, it would still need
>> a graphics back-end for actually drawing anything, plus some fonts for
>> rendering texts. On some platforms the graphics back-end is built into
>> the OS, on others it is not.
> 
> Does wx do 3D stuff? If not you'd need yet another library to do that too.
> 
> Personally I'd go with Qt. Its mature and cross platform and does what 99%
> of most people need.
> 

No, it doesn't come close to that.  It's a solid gui library with lots 
of extra tools, and is useful to many people - but it's nothing remotely 
like you suggest.

It has a license that is totally unsuitable for standardisation.  I'm 
not complaining about the license - the people that wrote the library 
get to pick the license.  But a standard C++ gui library, if such a 
thing is ever made, has to have a very liberal license - BSD/MIT at most.

And Qt is hardly a lightweight choice either.

The other big issue I see with wx and Qt are that they are /old/ - very 
old.  Maturity is not a benefit if there is to be a standard C++ gui 
library - it needs to be something that makes use of modern features of 
C++, not something that is grounded in C++98 and an API that is barely 
above a C-style library, with home-made classes for strings, lists, 
threads, and just about everything else.

I think if there is ever going to be a standard gui library for C++, it 
will be written specially for the purpose.  That has some big advantages 
- if the designers decide they need extra language features for signals 
and slots, for example, then those can be added to the language rather 
than using an external tool.