Trixul Cross-platform GUI Toolkit / News: Recent posts

Fixes to support Copy/Paste etc. from the menu system (Edit menu typically but could be anywhere) on Gtk+ and Windows have been landed. (Cocoa always worked.)

Trixul supports a class attribute in XUL for specifying cut (class="cut") and so forth, see the menuitem tags for the Edit menu in spacer.xul for examples. The trick for Gtk+ and .NET was to keep track of the focus widget in the enveloping document, and then when the menu item is handled, query for the focus widget and then send it the command to then be performed. In Cocoa, this routing of a command to the current focus widget (the firstResponder) was done automatically. In Trixul, a class named ClipboardHelper holds the pointer to the widget with the focus (the widget implementation will tell it about itself when it gains focus), and also handles the request from the menu item widget to dispatch the clipboard request to the focused widget when a clipboard menu item is selected.... read more

Trixul project is currently looking for developers with C++ experience. If you know .NET forms, Gtk+, or Cocoa, and have experience with toolkit internals or design, or want to learn, we could use your help.

Trixul is featured in the book Developing Cross-platform Applications in C++, Addison Wesley. It was intended as an example of how cross-platform GUI toolkits might be designed. It is hoped that eventually it can be made into much more.... read more

Trixul is in need of someone who can upgrade its build system to use autoconf/automake, and perform other build and release duties. You need to have demonstrated experience already implementing autoconf/automake in a previous project. Or be able to convince me that you understand the issues and will see the task through to completion. Duties include:

-- evaluate and understand Trixul's homebrewed configuration and build system based on Make and sh scripts
-- recommend a solution based on autoconf
-- Trixul currently only supports debug builds. Add support for release builds as well
-- propose and implement a solution for packaging releases for download via sourceforge... read more

Trixul now successfully builds and runs on both Intel and PPC versions of Mac OS X. This was done by adding code to detect the platform in the setup script, and set appropriate compiler flags in the Mac makefiles. The result, then, is not a fat or universal binary, so builds of Trixul for PowerPC will not run on Intel, and vice versa.

Intel versions of NSPR (the Netscape Portable Runtime Library) and expat (the XML parser) were also checked into Trixul's CVS repository to support Intel on Mac.

The upgrade to the latest Mozilla offering of its JavaScript engine, SpiderMonkey, has been completed across all three supported platforms (Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux). Much code was cleaned up as a result of this port.

In porting Trixul to Intel-based Mac OS X, it was convenient to update libmozjs, the Spidermonkey JavaScript engine, to the latest version. I'm in the process of doing this across all platforms.

Trixul welcomes it's first non-founding developer, Prafulla Tekawade (prafulla_t). So far, he has contributed patches for building against the latest .NET version, and a rewrite of the code that dumps a window's widget hierarchy so that it is based on the Visitor design pattern.

Trixul is still in need of a few more developers, especially those with platform GUI toolkit experience (.NET, Cocoa, Gtk+). If you are interested, contact me, and start submitting patches. There are plenty of bugs to fix, and features to implement.... read more

Trixul has a new logo (actually, it never had a logo until now, but still...) Thanks to James Kocsis for his contribution. Visit the homepage, http://www.trixul.com for a look!

Trixul is a cross-platform GUI toolkit currently in development. The "Tri" in Trixul means three, referring to number of platforms it aims to support.

We are in need of GUI toolkit developers to add support for new widgets, and fix bugs. In addition to knowing at least one of Gtk+, .NET Forms, or Cocoa, you should be familiar with Abstract Factory, Bridge, and other Design Patterns as applied to the C++ language. I'm happy to work with bright people who want to learn from me, and this project. There is no major rush to get this work done, it just needs to be done right. If that takes some time to learn some new things, fine. But I do expect you to know C++ one of the toolkits mentioned above well enough to get started without much assistance.... read more

Trixul is a cross-platform GUI toolkit currently in development. The "Tri" in Trixul means three, referring to number of platforms it aims to support.

We are in need of a C++/Python developer. Trixul supports JavaScript engine embedding, we would like to extend that support by adding python. The work requires knowledge of C++ so that you can modify the C++ code so that both JS and Python are supported. You should also be familiar with Abstract Factory, Bridge, and other Design Patterns as applied to the C++ language. I'm happy to work with bright people who want to learn from me, and this project. There is no major rush to get this work done, it just needs to be done right. If that takes some time to learn some new things, fine. But I do expect you to know C++ and Python well enough to get started.... read more

Trixul is a cross-platform GUI toolkit currently in development. The "Tri" in Trixul means three, referring to number of platforms it aims to support.

The Trixul project is in need of a simple logo that can be used on the project's home page. The only logo idea off-limits is the one used on the cover of the book that describes the toolkit. To see that book cover, visit http://www.crossplatformbook.com. To read about the Trixul project, visit the project page, or go to www.trixul.org.... read more

I am starting to re-engage development of Trixul with bug fixes for now. I am still very interested in finding some talented and interested engineers to join me in making Trixul a viable cross-platform toolkit. If you are interested, please contact me.

http://www.trixul.org has a new face. Currently, I am working on a hello world-style tutorial. Already available is a list of supported widgets, and an tutorial for how to build and use Trixul. Just click on the Project Web Site link to go there if you forget the URL.

Instructions for building and running Trixul are now available by clicking on the Documentation link at http://www.trixul.org -- a mirror of this content is pending submission to sourceforge for viewing under the project documentation feature, but for the latest, please visit http://www.trixul.org

syd

A new box layout algorithm has been implemented for Trixul.