Photon Micro GUI

#1

Post by ingve » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 3:47 PM UTC

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#2

Post by torgoguys » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 4:32 PM UTC

Name collision--QNX's gui was/is also named "Photon MicroGUI" and that is what I thought this post was going to be about: http://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/6.5.0/index.jsp?topic=%2F...

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#3

Post by fasterdom » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 4:59 PM UTC

Funny how there are a few domains where the same problem is solved over and over again. Probably an indication that a good solution is truly missing.

A long time ago I wrote a tiny audio synth. And yep, I wrote my own minimal GUI which had stuff like sliders, and most importantly knobs which general GUIs typically don't provide.

Now I'm working on a non-audio webapp, and I have a problem where a knob would be the ideal solution. Searched far and wide for a Vue knob, and what I found was not usable. It worked if you "rotated" it circularly, but it didn't work if you pulled it up/down like a slider. You might say "use a slider then if you want to pull it up/down". True, but a slider takes a lot of UI space which sometimes is very precious. More importantly, the slider resolution is limited to it's height, while a knob could for example use the whole screen height for a full turn.

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#4

Post by yoz-y » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:03 PM UTC

fasterdom wrote: post #3

Funny how there are a few domains where the same problem is solved over and over again. Probably an indication that a good solution is truly missing. A long time ago I wrote a tiny audio synth. And yep, I wrote my own minimal GUI which had stuff like sliders, and most importantly knobs which general GUIs typically don't provide. Now I'm working on a non-audio webapp, and I have a problem where a knob would be the ide…

Is it better to write one own's GUI in this case? I believe most toolkits have a way to add new controls, so it should be less work to add a knob to GtK, Qt or any other toolkit.

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#5

Post by fasterdom » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:09 PM UTC

yoz-y wrote: post #4

fasterdom wrote: post #3

Funny how there are a few domains where the same problem is solved over and over again. Probably an indication that a good solution is truly missing. A long time ago I wrote a tiny audio synth. And yep, I wrote my own minimal GUI which had stuff like sliders, and most importantly knobs which general GUIs typically don't provide. Now I'm working on a non-audio webapp, and I have a problem where a knob would be the ide…

Is it better to write one own's GUI in this case? I believe most toolkits have a way to add new controls, so it should be less work to add a knob to GtK, Qt or any other toolkit.

True, you could write a new Qt control.

Then you hit the second requirement: complete bitmap theming, many times of a skeuomorphic kind. This is extremely difficult to do in something like Gtk/Qt.

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#6

Post by torarnv » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:12 PM UTC

fasterdom wrote: post #5

yoz-y wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it better to write one own's GUI in this case? I believe most toolkits have a way to add new controls, so it should be less work to add a knob to GtK, Qt or any other toolkit.

True, you could write a new Qt control. Then you hit the second requirement: complete bitmap theming, many times of a skeuomorphic kind. This is extremely difficult to do in something like Gtk/Qt.

Behold, in all its skeuomorphic glory, the Qt styles example:

https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qtwidgets-widgets-styles-example.html

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#7

Post by ObscureScience » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:22 PM UTC

torgoguys wrote: post #2

Name collision--QNX's gui was/is also named "Photon MicroGUI" and that is what I thought this post was going to be about: http://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/6.5.0/index.jsp?topic=%2F...

This was what I thought as well. It's really too close. But awesome project nonetheless. I've given FLTK a try and while it's usable it seems a bit old in it's architecture.

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#8

Post by FraKtus » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:38 PM UTC

From the author "Photon has its own HTML5 inspired canvas drawing engine using Cairo underneath".

That means it should render nicely at any resolution, the author says, "resolution independent and allows for HDPI displays".

But using Cairo means it should not have a good performance at high resolutions. I have yet to find a fork of Cairo GPU accelerated that supports all the API. So it may fit the bill if you are coding a simple interface, but it will be too slow to render at 60FPS and at high resolution.

What comes closest for me is Dear ImGui, but I never saw an interface with those nicely rendered buttons in real-time done with Dear ImGui.

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#9

Post by kazinator » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:39 PM UTC

Nice screenshots; but doesn't seem "FFI friendly", unfortunately.

Re: Photon Micro GUI

#10

Post by kazinator » Mon, Jul 08, 2019, 5:41 PM UTC

ObscureScience wrote: post #7

torgoguys wrote: post #2

Name collision--QNX's gui was/is also named "Photon MicroGUI" and that is what I thought this post was going to be about: http://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/6.5.0/index.jsp?topic=%2F...

This was what I thought as well. It's really too close. But awesome project nonetheless. I've given FLTK a try and while it's usable it seems a bit old in it's architecture.

The only difference is the word break: "microgui" versus "micro gui".