GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Trish Cayetano]

Hi, 

I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 

Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...

Thank you very much.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Mon, 10 Aug 2015 03:24:35 -0700 (PDT), Trish Cayetano wrote:

> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is
> to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 
 
Two major contenders are GTK and Qt.

GTK has the problem that the developer team does everything possible to
keep in backward incompatible and going on removing functionalities without
any replacement. Another problem is that GtkAda is kept well behind, being
released only once in a year. Binary distribution of GTK for Windows is
almost not maintained. Building it from sources under Windows practically
impossible so presently you have to keep it working form 3.8 and 3.10 which
(see above) is not trivial at best. The main advantage is that GtkAda is
AdaCore.

Qt has the problem of multiple Ada bindings of uncertain quality and
maintenance. I didn't use Qt so I cannot say anything regarding Qt itself.

To put things clear:

GPS is an IDE designed in GtkAda. It does not limit you to use any other
GUI framework or same version of GTK (GPS is 3.8.2, I believe) Actual GTK
for GtkAda is 3.8.3. Actual GTK is 3.10 or higher. The latest official
binary GTK for Windows is 3.6.something.

GLADE is a GUI builder for Gtk. There are different opinions on it, mine is
(I am doing a lot of stuff in GtkAda) never touch it if you want to design
something beyond simple input forms.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Maciej Sobczak]

> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 
> 
> Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...

Considering the fact that the functionality is already done and therefore it will *not* be put in the GUI layer, you are free to choose the technology that is optimal for GUI. This need not be the same that you have used to implement the functional parts.

I'm playing the devil's advocate now, but really - different languages have different strengths and while eye-candy-oriented languages are not optimal for implementing critical functionality, Ada is not the sharpest knife in the GUI drawer, either.

Personally, I would limit my choices to HTML vs. C++/Qt, depending on what this GUI is going to do. Both options are known to be portable and offer modern or even spectacular results with a lot of know-how ready to be reused from the web.

-- 
Maciej Sobczak * http://www.inspirel.com

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Stephen Leake]

"Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:

> To put things clear:
>
> GPS is an IDE designed in GtkAda. It does not limit you to use any other
> GUI framework or same version of GTK (GPS is 3.8.2, I believe) Actual GTK
> for GtkAda is 3.8.3. Actual GTK is 3.10 or higher. The latest official
> binary GTK for Windows is 3.6.something.

When you install GtkAda from AdaCore libre.ada.com, it includes a
consistent version of the Gtk binary (at least on Windows).

-- 
-- Stephe

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Tue, 11 Aug 2015 06:15:18 -0500, Stephen Leake wrote:

> "Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:
> 
>> To put things clear:
>>
>> GPS is an IDE designed in GtkAda. It does not limit you to use any other
>> GUI framework or same version of GTK (GPS is 3.8.2, I believe) Actual GTK
>> for GtkAda is 3.8.3. Actual GTK is 3.10 or higher. The latest official
>> binary GTK for Windows is 3.6.something.
> 
> When you install GtkAda from AdaCore libre.ada.com, it includes a
> consistent version of the Gtk binary (at least on Windows).

Yes. It comes with GTK 3.8.3. Which is not an official version, but it
works, except for a few bugs.

P.S. It would be great if AdaCore published the scripts they are using to
compile GTK for Windows. Because 3.8 is fairly outdated. People who would
like to design portable GUI will have issues getting it working on both
Windows and Linux.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[erlo]

On 10-08-2015 16:36, Maciej Sobczak wrote:
>> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 
>>
>> Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...
> 
> Considering the fact that the functionality is already done and therefore it will *not* be put in the GUI layer, you are free to choose the technology that is optimal for GUI. This need not be the same that you have used to implement the functional parts.
> 
> I'm playing the devil's advocate now, but really - different languages have different strengths and while eye-candy-oriented languages are not optimal for implementing critical functionality, Ada is not the sharpest knife in the GUI drawer, either.
> 
> Personally, I would limit my choices to HTML vs. C++/Qt, depending on what this GUI is going to do. Both options are known to be portable and offer modern or even spectacular results with a lot of know-how ready to be reused from the web.
> 
Maybe TCL/TK ?

/Erlo

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Jeffrey R. Carter]

On 08/12/2015 02:00 PM, erlo wrote:
>>> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 
>>>
>>> Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...
>>
> Maybe TCL/TK ?

Someone should mention Gnoga.

-- 
Jeff Carter
"Oh Lord, bless this thy hand grenade, that with it thou
mayst blow thine enemies to tiny bits, in thy mercy."
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
24

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[sjaniska]

On Monday, August 10, 2015 at 4:36:19 PM UTC+2, Maciej Sobczak wrote:

> Personally, I would limit my choices to HTML vs. C++/Qt, depending on what this GUI is going to do. Both options are known to be portable and offer modern or even spectacular results with a lot of know-how ready to be reused from the web.

Does it make sense to write application's "business-logic" (back-end) in higher-level and type-safe language like Ada and then write front-end in e.g. PyQt and call Ada code in the form of Python's extension module?

Is it "best of both worlds" - having logic written in type-safe language and GUI in productive environment like e.g. PyQt or it is actually "the worst of the two" by losing type-safety since extension module should use C convention and possibly one will also lose advantage of using Python?

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Thu, 13 Aug 2015 01:58:56 -0700 (PDT), sjaniska@gmail.com wrote:

> Does it make sense to write application's "business-logic" (back-end) in
> higher-level and type-safe language like Ada and then write front-end in
> e.g. PyQt and call Ada code in the form of Python's extension module?

No. Because GUI code is usually bigger and messier than the application
code. It is more fragile and requires much more maintenance. Furthermore it
is the only thing the customer sees and actually pays attention.
 
> Is it "best of both worlds" - having logic written in type-safe language
> and GUI in productive environment like e.g. PyQt or it is actually "the
> worst of the two" by losing type-safety since extension module should use
> C convention and possibly one will also lose advantage of using Python?

No. Maintenance costs are 10 times of developing costs. For GUI code it is
even more than that, because once deployed, the customer starts requiring
modifications. Whatever mythical productivity it does not matter in the end
anyway.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[sjaniska]

On Thursday, August 13, 2015 at 1:59:37 PM UTC+2, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:

> No. Because GUI code is usually bigger and messier than the application
> code. It is more fragile and requires much more maintenance. 

> No. Maintenance costs are 10 times of developing costs. For GUI code it is
> even more than that, because once deployed, the customer starts requiring
> modifications. Whatever mythical productivity it does not matter in the end
> anyway.

So, what is solution?

Writing everything in Python :-)

Isn't the problem that many type-safe languages at the end use e.g. GTK bindings for the library written in unsafe language like C?

Or, do you suggest writing everything in e.g. C++?

Having, at least, application code written in safe-language, could reduce maintenance cost a bit? 

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Thu, 13 Aug 2015 05:09:36 -0700 (PDT), sjaniska@gmail.com wrote:

> On Thursday, August 13, 2015 at 1:59:37 PM UTC+2, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> 
>> No. Because GUI code is usually bigger and messier than the application
>> code. It is more fragile and requires much more maintenance. 
> 
>> No. Maintenance costs are 10 times of developing costs. For GUI code it is
>> even more than that, because once deployed, the customer starts requiring
>> modifications. Whatever mythical productivity it does not matter in the end
>> anyway.
> 
> So, what is solution?
> 
> Writing everything in Python :-)

Writing nothing in Python!

> Isn't the problem that many type-safe languages at the end use e.g. GTK
> bindings for the library written in unsafe language like C?

It is one of [lack of] education that leads people to develop GTK or Qt in
the languages like C and C++. If you looked at GtkAda and compared it to
the native C API you would immediately see how much safer GtkAda is. E.g.
you could not connect to the "clicked" event of a tree store. That would be
a type error checked statically. [You still could work around that and
proudly get a run-time error from GTK]

> Or, do you suggest writing everything in e.g. C++?

I suggest writing everything in Ada.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[sjaniska]

On Thursday, August 13, 2015 at 2:50:05 PM UTC+2, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> Writing nothing in Python!

:-)

> It is one of [lack of] education that leads people to develop GTK or Qt in
> the languages like C and C++. If you looked at GtkAda and compared it to
> the native C API you would immediately see how much safer GtkAda is. 

So, in general, your advice is to (always) provide (in type-safe language) thick GUI bindings for toolkit like GTk/Qt, right?

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Thu, 13 Aug 2015 05:56:20 -0700 (PDT), sjaniska@gmail.com wrote:

>> It is one of [lack of] education that leads people to develop GTK or Qt in
>> the languages like C and C++. If you looked at GtkAda and compared it to
>> the native C API you would immediately see how much safer GtkAda is. 
> 
> So, in general, your advice is to (always) provide (in type-safe language)
> thick GUI bindings for toolkit like GTk/Qt, right?

Yes, thin bindings are pretty much nuisance. Not only for GUI, when
designing a DB bindings Connection, Statement, Cursor etc are made
controlled, safely closed when out of scope etc.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[erlo]

On 12-08-2015 23:48, Jeffrey R. Carter wrote:
> On 08/12/2015 02:00 PM, erlo wrote:
>>>> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 
>>>>
>>>> Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...
>>>
>> Maybe TCL/TK ?
> 
> Someone should mention Gnoga.
> 
But of course!! Let me mention Gnoga....

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[brbarkstrom]

 > >> It is one of [lack of] education that leads people to develop GTK or Qt in
> >> the languages like C and C++. If you looked at GtkAda and compared it to
> >> the native C API you would immediately see how much safer GtkAda is. 
> > 
> > So, in general, your advice is to (always) provide (in type-safe language)
> > thick GUI bindings for toolkit like GTk/Qt, right?
> 
> Yes, thin bindings are pretty much nuisance. Not only for GUI, when
> designing a DB bindings Connection, Statement, Cursor etc are made
> controlled, safely closed when out of scope etc.
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> Dmitry A. Kazakov

As another thread in this conversation, it might be useful to remember
that one of the difficulties in writing GUI's is that there are so many
versions of OS's.  For Windows, there's NT (for which the Navy is apparently
paying a fair amount of money to have MS maintain code), 7, 8, and 10.
For Linux, a GUI is likely to be related to Motif, with may more
proprietary variants.

I've still got one of Petzold's manuals for "Programming Windows" (as
well as one on "Programming Windows with the Microsoft Foundation Classes").
By the time the manuals get longer than 1,000 pages, you might figure
that maintenance of the code will be unpleasant.

It would probably make more sense to provide the user interface with the
HTML5 and CSS3.3 (or whatever new versions of these crop up).  This kind
of environment is a bit more standardized and less dependent on proprietary
API's.  In this case, maintenance means keeping up with the browser wars.

It sort of depends on which part of the battlefield you want to set up
your quarters.

Bruce B.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Fri, 14 Aug 2015 05:59:04 -0700 (PDT), brbarkstrom@gmail.com wrote:

> As another thread in this conversation, it might be useful to remember
> that one of the difficulties in writing GUI's is that there are so many
> versions of OS's.  For Windows, there's NT (for which the Navy is apparently
> paying a fair amount of money to have MS maintain code), 7, 8, and 10.
> For Linux, a GUI is likely to be related to Motif, with may more
> proprietary variants.

GUI frameworks like GTK and Qt abstract the rendering engine, e.g. Windows
GDI and Linux X11 away.
 
They go further, both are abstracting the OS as well by including file
management, tasking etc.

> It would probably make more sense to provide the user interface with the
> HTML5 and CSS3.3 (or whatever new versions of these crop up).  This kind
> of environment is a bit more standardized and less dependent on proprietary
> API's.

Not much difference. HTML is just another, very inferior and horribly
inefficient, rendering engine. There is a GTK backend for HTML, BTW. People
say it is quite poor, though.

An alternative would be using gnoga.

> In this case, maintenance means keeping up with the browser wars.

And HTML sub-standards.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Trish Cayetano]

Thank you everyone!

I downloaded Glade. Where do I find gtkada.gpr file?

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 02:17:55 -0700 (PDT), Trish Cayetano wrote:

> I downloaded Glade. Where do I find gtkada.gpr file?

You need not to know. gtkada.gpr is in the project path, when GtkAda is
installed. E.g. under Fedora it is /usr/share/gpr.

Simply add

   with "gtkada.gpr";

to your project file, that is.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[ryne rico]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 5:33:01 PM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 02:17:55 -0700 (PDT), Trish Cayetano wrote:
> 
> > I downloaded Glade. Where do I find gtkada.gpr file?
> 
> You need not to know. gtkada.gpr is in the project path, when GtkAda is
> installed. E.g. under Fedora it is /usr/share/gpr.
> 
> Simply add
> 
>    with "gtkada.gpr";
> 
> to your project file, that is.
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> Dmitry A. Kazakov
> http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Hi Dmitry:

I have this codes
with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
with Gtk.Main;
with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;

but I have an error with this: 

file "gtk.ads" not found.

can you please help me? Thanks.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Trish Cayetano]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 6:21:07 PM UTC+8, ryne rico wrote:
> On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 5:33:01 PM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> > On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 02:17:55 -0700 (PDT), Trish Cayetano wrote:
> > 
> > > I downloaded Glade. Where do I find gtkada.gpr file?
> > 
> > You need not to know. gtkada.gpr is in the project path, when GtkAda is
> > installed. E.g. under Fedora it is /usr/share/gpr.
> > 
> > Simply add
> > 
> >    with "gtkada.gpr";
> > 
> > to your project file, that is.
> > 
> > -- 
> > Regards,
> > Dmitry A. Kazakov
> > http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de
> 
> Hi Dmitry:
> 
> I have this codes
> with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> with Gtk.Main;
> with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> 
> but I have an error with this: 
> 
> file "gtk.ads" not found.
> 
> can you please help me? Thanks.

This is the same problem I have Dimitry...

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 03:21:06 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:

> I have this codes
> with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> with Gtk.Main;
> with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> 
> but I have an error with this: 
> 
> file "gtk.ads" not found.
> 
> can you please help me? Thanks.


What OS? What GtkAda version? What project file?

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[ryne rico]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 6:58:47 PM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 03:21:06 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:
> 
> > I have this codes
> > with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> > with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> > with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> > with Gtk.Main;
> > with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> > 
> > but I have an error with this: 
> > 
> > file "gtk.ads" not found.
> > 
> > can you please help me? Thanks.
> 
> 
> What OS? What GtkAda version? What project file?
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> Dmitry A. Kazakov
> http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Windows 7. Gtkada version - 3.8.4 
project file - main.adb

I already created a new project in project template - Gtkada > Simple Window > A simple "Hello world" window. This require Gtkada.

after i create that project and try to build that's the error that im getting. 

file "gtk.ads" not found.

In my C drive I have this folder
C:\GNAT\2015
&
C:\gtkada

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Pascal Obry]

Le samedi 15 août 2015 à 04:47 -0700, ryne rico a écrit :
> Windows 7. Gtkada version - 3.8.4 
> project file - main.adb

So you are not using a project file. Won't work.

See documentation about how to create a project file and then just add:

with "gtkada";

At the start.

-- 
  Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)

  The best way to travel is by means of imagination

  http://v2p.fr.eu.org
  http://www.obry.net

  gpg --keyserver keys.gnupg.net --recv-key F949BD3B

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[ryne rico]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 7:51:33 PM UTC+8, Pascal Obry wrote:
> Le samedi 15 août 2015 à 04:47 -0700, ryne rico a écrit :
> > Windows 7. Gtkada version - 3.8.4 
> > project file - main.adb
> 
> So you are not using a project file. Won't work.
> 
> See documentation about how to create a project file and then just add:
> 
> with "gtkada";
> 
> At the start.
> 
> -- 
>   Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)
> 
>   The best way to travel is by means of imagination
> 
>   http://v2p.fr.eu.org
>   http://www.obry.net
> 
>   gpg --keyserver keys.gnupg.net --recv-key F949BD3B

with "gtkada";
with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
with Gtk.Main;
with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;

error: 
C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\GUI2015\src\main.adb
        1:6 identifier expected

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Pascal Obry]

Le samedi 15 août 2015 à 05:21 -0700, ryne rico a écrit :
> with "gtkada";
> with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> with Gtk.Main;
> with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;

No again. This is NOT a project file it is an Ada file.

Please see:

https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc-4.5.2/gnat_ugn_unw/GNAT-Project-Manager.html#GNAT-Project-Manager

-- 
  Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)

  The best way to travel is by means of imagination

  http://v2p.fr.eu.org
  http://www.obry.net

  gpg --keyserver keys.gnupg.net --recv-key F949BD3B

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 05:21:03 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:

> On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 7:51:33 PM UTC+8, Pascal Obry wrote:
>> Le samedi 15 août 2015 à 04:47 -0700, ryne rico a écrit :
>>> Windows 7. Gtkada version - 3.8.4 
>>> project file - main.adb
>> 
>> So you are not using a project file. Won't work.
>> 
>> See documentation about how to create a project file and then just add:
>> 
>> with "gtkada";
>> 
>> At the start.
>> 
>> -- 
>>   Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)
>>
> 
> with "gtkada";
> with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> with Gtk.Main;
> with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> 
> error: 
> C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\GUI2015\src\main.adb
>         1:6 identifier expected

No, not into main.adb, into the project file named *.gpr. The one you would
open using GPS. Do you use a project file?

It could look like My_Project.gpr:

with "gtkada.gpr";
project My_Project is
   for Main use ("Main.adb");
end My_Project;

To build it from the command prompt do:

   > gprbuild -PMy_Project.gpr

(Better use GPS)

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[ryne rico]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 8:55:06 PM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 05:21:03 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:
> 
> > On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 7:51:33 PM UTC+8, Pascal Obry wrote:
> >> Le samedi 15 août 2015 à 04:47 -0700, ryne rico a écrit :
> >>> Windows 7. Gtkada version - 3.8.4 
> >>> project file - main.adb
> >> 
> >> So you are not using a project file. Won't work.
> >> 
> >> See documentation about how to create a project file and then just add:
> >> 
> >> with "gtkada";
> >> 
> >> At the start.
> >> 
> >> -- 
> >>   Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)
> >>
> > 
> > with "gtkada";
> > with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> > with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> > with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> > with Gtk.Main;
> > with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> > 
> > error: 
> > C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\GUI2015\src\main.adb
> >         1:6 identifier expected
> 
> No, not into main.adb, into the project file named *.gpr. The one you would
> open using GPS. Do you use a project file?
> 
> It could look like My_Project.gpr:
> 
> with "gtkada.gpr";
> project My_Project is
>    for Main use ("Main.adb");
> end My_Project;
> 
> To build it from the command prompt do:
> 
>    > gprbuild -PMy_Project.gpr
> 
> (Better use GPS)
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> Dmitry A. Kazakov
> http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

here is the Default.gpr

with "gtkada.gpr";

project Default is

   for Source_Dirs use ("src");
   for Object_Dir use "obj";
   for Main use ("main.adb");

   --  Enable Ada 2005.
   package Compiler is
      for Default_Switches ("ada") use ("-gnat05");
   end Compiler;

end Default;



but still i have an error in main.adb

with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
with Gtk.Main;
with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;

-Builder results
    C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\Gui2\src\main.adb
        1:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        2:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        3:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        4:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        5:6 file "gtk.ads" not found

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[ryne rico]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 8:55:06 PM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 05:21:03 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:
> 
> > On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 7:51:33 PM UTC+8, Pascal Obry wrote:
> >> Le samedi 15 août 2015 à 04:47 -0700, ryne rico a écrit :
> >>> Windows 7. Gtkada version - 3.8.4 
> >>> project file - main.adb
> >> 
> >> So you are not using a project file. Won't work.
> >> 
> >> See documentation about how to create a project file and then just add:
> >> 
> >> with "gtkada";
> >> 
> >> At the start.
> >> 
> >> -- 
> >>   Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)
> >>
> > 
> > with "gtkada";
> > with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> > with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> > with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> > with Gtk.Main;
> > with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> > 
> > error: 
> > C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\GUI2015\src\main.adb
> >         1:6 identifier expected
> 
> No, not into main.adb, into the project file named *.gpr. The one you would
> open using GPS. Do you use a project file?
> 
> It could look like My_Project.gpr:
> 
> with "gtkada.gpr";
> project My_Project is
>    for Main use ("Main.adb");
> end My_Project;
> 
> To build it from the command prompt do:
> 
>    > gprbuild -PMy_Project.gpr
> 
> (Better use GPS)
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> Dmitry A. Kazakov
> http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de


Here is my Default.gpr

with "gtkada.gpr";

project Default is

   for Source_Dirs use ("src");
   for Object_Dir use "obj";
   for Main use ("main.adb");

   --  Enable Ada 2005.
   package Compiler is
      for Default_Switches ("ada") use ("-gnat05");
   end Compiler;

end Default;


but still in my main.adb there's an error:

with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
with Gtk.Main;
with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;


Builder results
    C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\Gui2\src\main.adb
        1:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        2:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        3:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        4:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
        5:6 file "gtk.ads" not found

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 06:07:16 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:

> Here is my Default.gpr
> 
> with "gtkada.gpr";
> 
> project Default is
> 
>    for Source_Dirs use ("src");
>    for Object_Dir use "obj";
>    for Main use ("main.adb");
> 
>    --  Enable Ada 2005.
>    package Compiler is
>       for Default_Switches ("ada") use ("-gnat05");

  ("-gnato", "-gnatVa", "-gnatf", "-g", "-fstack-check", "-gnat05");

gnato - Integer checks (Ada standard conformity)
gnatVa - fill validity checks
gnatf - full error reports
g - debug information (for exception trace backs)
fstack-check - stack checks (prevents nasty surprises)

>    end Compiler;
> 
> end Default;
> 
> but still in my main.adb there's an error:
> 
> with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> with Gtk.Main;
> with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> 
> 
> Builder results
>     C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\Gui2\src\main.adb
>         1:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
>         2:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
>         3:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
>         4:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
>         5:6 file "gtk.ads" not found

Open

   Control Panel > System > Advanced system settings

Press the button

   Environment Variables

You must have the variable

   ADA_PROJECT_PATH

That variable must include:

   C:\GtkAda\lib\gnat;

assuming that GtkAda installation directory is C:\GtkAda

[ Normally, when you install GtkAda from AdaCore it sets the
ADA_PROJECT_PATH path. So you probably have an installation issue here ]

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Anh Vo]

On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 6:34:27 AM UTC-7, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 06:07:16 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:
> 
> > Here is my Default.gpr
> > 
> > with "gtkada.gpr";
> > 
> > project Default is
> > 
> >    for Source_Dirs use ("src");
> >    for Object_Dir use "obj";
> >    for Main use ("main.adb");
> > 
> >    --  Enable Ada 2005.
> >    package Compiler is
> >       for Default_Switches ("ada") use ("-gnat05");
> 
>   ("-gnato", "-gnatVa", "-gnatf", "-g", "-fstack-check", "-gnat05");
> 
> gnato - Integer checks (Ada standard conformity)
> gnatVa - fill validity checks
> gnatf - full error reports
> g - debug information (for exception trace backs)
> fstack-check - stack checks (prevents nasty surprises)
> 
> >    end Compiler;
> > 
> > end Default;
> > 
> > but still in my main.adb there's an error:
> > 
> > with Gtk.Box;         use Gtk.Box;
> > with Gtk.Label;       use Gtk.Label;
> > with Gtk.Widget;      use Gtk.Widget;
> > with Gtk.Main;
> > with Gtk.Window;      use Gtk.Window;
> > 
> > 
> > Builder results
> >     C:\Users\MyName\Desktop\Ada workspace\Gui2\src\main.adb
> >         1:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
> >         2:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
> >         3:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
> >         4:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
> >         5:6 file "gtk.ads" not found
> 
> Open
> 
>    Control Panel > System > Advanced system settings
> 
> Press the button
> 
>    Environment Variables
> 
> You must have the variable
> 
>    ADA_PROJECT_PATH
> 
> That variable must include:
> 
>    C:\GtkAda\lib\gnat;
> 
> assuming that GtkAda installation directory is C:\GtkAda
> 
> [ Normally, when you install GtkAda from AdaCore it sets the
> ADA_PROJECT_PATH path. So you probably have an installation issue here ]
 
Another option is to use absolute GNAT project path as shown below given that GtkAda is installed at C:\GtkAda

with "C:\GtkAda\lib\gnat\gtkada.gpr";

Anh Vo

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 10:41:37 -0700 (PDT), Anh Vo wrote:

> Another option is to use absolute GNAT project path as shown below given
> that GtkAda is installed at C:\GtkAda
> 
> with "C:\GtkAda\lib\gnat\gtkada.gpr";

That would make the project non-portable. 

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[ryne rico]

On Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 3:27:14 AM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 10:41:37 -0700 (PDT), Anh Vo wrote:
> 
> > Another option is to use absolute GNAT project path as shown below given
> > that GtkAda is installed at C:\GtkAda
> > 
> > with "C:\GtkAda\lib\gnat\gtkada.gpr";
> 
> That would make the project non-portable. 
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> Dmitry A. Kazakov
> http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Hi I'm using Gtkada + Glade and I saw some tutorials in other site.

But there's an error here when I try that tutorial.

Here is the link for the error:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8chLbFlntftekRoelA4MkVIZkU/view?usp=sharing

and here is path of my simple glade:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8chLbFlntftZmVXYlZnaVg0YlE/view?usp=sharing

here is the xml file of simple.glade

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8chLbFlntftaTh4bTl6M195bmM/view?usp=sharing



gtk that I'm using: 3.8.4


Thanks

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 08:37:15 -0700 (PDT), ryne rico wrote:

> On Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 3:27:14 AM UTC+8, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>> On Sat, 15 Aug 2015 10:41:37 -0700 (PDT), Anh Vo wrote:
>> 
>>> Another option is to use absolute GNAT project path as shown below given
>>> that GtkAda is installed at C:\GtkAda
>>> 
>>> with "C:\GtkAda\lib\gnat\gtkada.gpr";
>> 
>> That would make the project non-portable. 
> 
> Hi I'm using Gtkada + Glade and I saw some tutorials in other site.

I cannot help, I don't use Glade. 

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[AdaMagica]

> Here is the link for the error:
> 
> https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8chLbFlntftekRoelA4MkVIZkU/view?usp=sharing

You use a function for Add_from_File which seems to be a procedure with an out-parameter Error.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[isaac1.0]

GUI's with Ada are my biggest complaint with Ada. There seems to be no good, easy to use options.

My preference would be Qt, however, there seems to be 2 solutions out there with nearly the same name, but I could only get one of them to work. (www.qtada.com). Even then it was bound to GNAT 2012 only and very problematic to get things to build on my system, even with the sample programs.

GTKAda is "supported" by the Adacore stuff, but the problem is the GLADE GUI builder (for Windows) is so outdated and the Gtk that comes with GNAT GPL doesn't seem to work right (subtle issues like not all buttons showing up in the GUI builder). The install doesn't even point to the right filename for the GLADE that is installed with Adacore! The GLADE BUI builder itself is buggy and design for user-friendliness is not top of mind. But it does work and I've created an app with it. This is what I recommend for now as it is "workable".

There are several other options that are out there (GNOGA? GNAVI? some others) they seem like much more "demo" than anything else. I could never get it to work properly at all, clearly not polished, at the very least, not documented well enough.

Annoying part is it doesn't have to be this way. Qt is quite decent, Lazarus for FreePascal is very nice, even the JavaFX Scenebuilder is not so annoying and EiffelStudio has its own GUI tool too as does Eclipse Windowbuilder option. This is not even considering the "professional" non-free tools. I guess there are not enough Ada experts out there that care enough to have free GUI tools...
Yes I do embedded work, so I don't always need a GUI. But I create stuff for my colleagues & customers as well and nobody will put up with a CLI application nowadays.

On Monday, August 10, 2015 at 3:24:37 AM UTC-7, Trish Cayetano wrote:
> Hi, 
> 
> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based. 
> 
> Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...
> 
> Thank you very much.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Mon, 17 Aug 2015 17:14:38 -0700 (PDT), isaac1.0@gmail.com wrote:

> GTKAda is "supported" by the Adacore stuff, but the problem is the GLADE
> GUI builder (for Windows) is so outdated and the Gtk that comes with GNAT

The only problem is people thinking they would need GLADE to use GTK. GTK
has a hell of problems, but GLADE is not one to concern.

> There are several other options that are out there (GNOGA? GNAVI? some
> others) they seem like much more "demo" than anything else.

Why not to contribute some efforts to Gnoga? As much as I hate web-based
GUI, Gnoga is 100% Ada, which alone is a huge advantage over Qt and GTK.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Jerry]

On Monday, August 17, 2015 at 5:14:42 PM UTC-7, isaa...@gmail.com wrote:
> GUI's with Ada are my biggest complaint with Ada. There seems to be no good, easy to use options.

<snip>

> Lazarus for FreePascal is very nice

Indeed. As an OS X user and Free Pascal list lurker, it seems to me that the Free Pascal Compiler (FPC) community is sort of a parallel universe to the Ada community, both using a good but modestly popular language. From my perspective as an OS X user (who rarely uses FPC), the FPC folks have managed to do some great things. Lazarus runs natively, there is an extremely good plug-in for TextMate, and they manage to keep a great plug-in for Apple's Xcode even though Xcode doesn't officially support plug-ins and even though Apple keeps the sand shifting beneath FPC's feet.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Norman Worth]

On 8/10/2015 4:24 AM, Trish Cayetano wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am done with the functionality of my Ada program (using GPS) and next is to make it pretty by having a GUI instead of a text based.
>
> Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...
>
> Thank you very much.
>
This is very much a matter of personal choice.  Despite its need to 
interpret XML, the Glade produced code is reasonably efficient.  But I 
have had some real problems with Glade, probably because I don't really 
know how to use it.  (Documentation is horribly scant.)  The Linux 
version seems to work as far as I can understand it, but the Windows 
version is not so easy to work with for some reason.  Coding directly 
using the GTK+ library is reasonably easy, but there are important 
differences from the C version, and the documentation is difficult.  You 
also will have a challenge with program architecture for any non-trivial 
GTK application.  The examples in the GTKAda download package are 
excellent at showing you how, but it takes a while to understand them.

Somebody mentioned using Tcl/Tk for the GUI.  A decent binding does 
exist.  I was at the conference where it was introduced several years 
ago.  The results are nice, and Tk is a nice interface to work with, but 
the code for the Ada/Tk combination is pretty ugly.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[Simon Wright]

Norman Worth <nworth@comcastNOSPAM.net> writes:

> Somebody mentioned using Tcl/Tk for the GUI.  A decent binding does
> exist.  I was at the conference where it was introduced several years
> ago.  The results are nice, and Tk is a nice interface to work with,
> but the code for the Ada/Tk combination is pretty ugly.

See https://sourceforge.net/projects/tcladashell/.

Personally I'd write the HCI in Tcl/Tk and run it from an interpreter
which has been extended to support the application.

Writing Ada code that supports Tcl commands to provide input to the
application is straightforward, as it is for commands to get output from
the application.

For a long time I put up with polling the application to detect changes,
but in January 2014 I wrote Tcl.Async:

   Tcl.Async supports writing Tcl variables from Ada. This is especially
   important if the Ada code isn't running in the same thread as the Tcl
   interpreter.

   You can use the 'trace' facility in Tcl to detect when such a write
   has taken place.

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[David Botton]

> GUI's with Ada are my biggest complaint with Ada. There seems to be no good, easy to use options.

I can only assume you mean GUI builders based on the rest of your post. Ada has (sadly license encumbered of all things on the Ada side...) versions of Gtk and Qt (same for any platform) and has GWindows which is superior to any Windows framework I've used on any platform and Gnoga which is already top notch for web apps and not bad for Desktop UIs but improving daily.


> There are several other options that are out there (GNOGA? GNAVI? some others) they seem like much more "demo" than anything else.

Gnavi the Ada delphi clone sits on top of GWindows, in theory if someone wanted could get Gnavi up and running again, was fully functional but I never packaged it. GWindows has been used for countless professional projects and looks as good as any windows app will and is easier to develop in then other frameworks. So as I said I assume you are thinking GUI dev tools not frameworks.

> I could never get it to work properly at all, clearly not polished, at the very least, not documented well enough.

Not sure which you are talking about, but there is descent community support for GWindows and Gnoga on their lists. If you use the Sourceforge versions of either you will have no issues getting them to work and both are very polished in terms of build and have decent examples and tutorials. Of course you could contribute funds for a pro documentation writer for less than most pay tools cost and get exactly what you ask for :)

> Lazarus for FreePascal is very nice

Sadly, Gnavi was already complete before Lazarus started and could easily be way beyond it today, but there was a long period when there was no real true free Ada compiler and I had already stopped using native Windows as a dev platform.

> I guess there are not enough Ada experts out there that care enough to have free GUI tools...

No just those that did got turned off by licensing issues when it would have made a difference. Of course today FSF GNAT is in good shape and so some like myself have returned and started work on new tools like Gnoga in the hopes that FSF GNAT and more community supported tools will come along since corporate visions are too short sited to value community and its contributions.

> Yes I do embedded work, so I don't always need a GUI. But I create stuff for my colleagues & customers as well and nobody will put up with a CLI application nowadays.

You would find Gnoga ideal in that situation. You can easily use existing HTML layout tools (I've posted some examples using web based ones on the Gnoga list) and in a few lines of code have that up and useful.

> > Please advise what shall I use to build the GUI...

Today I would only recommend Gnoga because of the flexibility for remote GUI use, cross platform completely to desktop, mobile and cloud.

If your app needed intense GUI use on desktop can even combine GTK (for the intense real time graphics) and Gnoga (forms, general use etc). (See the Gtk native doc in the docs dir).

David Botton

Re: GUI for Ada (GPS with GtkAda or GtkGlade GUI Builder)

[gautier_niouzes]

Le mercredi 19 août 2015 16:36:12 UTC+2, David Botton a écrit :

> GWindows has been used for countless professional projects and looks as good as any windows app will and is easier to develop in then other frameworks.

Just an example, the application described there:
http://www.cister.isep.ipp.pt/ae2012/presentations_pdf/wednesday/ua/montmollin.pdf
A company in Germany sells exclusively software made with GWindows, since 10 years or more.
A few open-source software use the framework as well:
http://azip.sf.net
http://texcad.sf.net

With a resource editor + GWenerator you get a decent GUI builder.
G.