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OCaml's long range graphical direction?
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| Date: | -- (:) |
| From: | John Max Skaller <skaller@o...> |
| Subject: | Re: OCaml's long range graphical direction? |
Francois Rouaix wrote: > I actually think that none of CamlTk/LablTK/LabelGTK fit the most common need > in GUI development. In many cases, it still strikes me as utterly boring and > time consuming to write *code* to put up menus, buttons, dialogs and such. Of > course, from time to time, when you need some form of widget that is a bit > original, programming will be useful. But that doesn't happen a lot, unless > you write something that needs complex rendering or interaction. > Back in 1985, Apple started using resources to define interfaces. More > recently, Palm used resources again to define interfaces. More recently, > Mozilla folks used XML based representation (XUL) to define interfaces, with a > GUI level scripting language (JavaScript/ECMAScript). Ah, but the specification of the resources is nothing more than yet another programming language, and a seriously deficient one usually (for example, not Turing complete). Furthermore, it is evident that this second programming language must be _bound_ to the algorithmic one, and that binding is invariably fragile and a serious problem. That is, I think there is a downside to separating functionality and appearance. As any serious game player knows, the two are intimately connected. -- John (Max) Skaller, mailto:skaller@maxtal.com.au 10/1 Toxteth Rd Glebe NSW 2037 Australia voice: 61-2-9660-0850 checkout Vyper http://Vyper.sourceforge.net download Interscript http://Interscript.sourceforge.net