From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,92c39a3be0a7f17d X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-12-18 23:37:03 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!arclight.uoregon.edu!fr.usenet-edu.net!usenet-edu.net!enst!enst.fr!not-for-mail From: "Robert C. Leif, Ph.D." Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: RE: Portable GUI (was Re: Future with Ada) Date: Tue, 18 Dec 2001 23:36:11 -0800 Organization: ENST, France Sender: comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org Message-ID: Reply-To: comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org NNTP-Posting-Host: marvin.enst.fr Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: avanie.enst.fr 1008747422 9477 137.194.161.2 (19 Dec 2001 07:37:02 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@enst.fr NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 19 Dec 2001 07:37:02 +0000 (UTC) To: Return-Path: X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2911.0) In-Reply-To: Importance: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Errors-To: comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org X-BeenThere: comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.0.6 Precedence: bulk List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: comp.lang.ada mail<->news gateway List-Unsubscribe: , Errors-To: comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org X-BeenThere: comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:18081 Date: 2001-12-18T23:36:11-08:00 From: Bob Leif To: Mark Lundquist If you base the entire GUI on the parts of XML that use XML syntax, you probably would have a chance at becoming very rich. It would employ the hot buzz word, XML, and be backed by solid technology, Ada. One of the major reasons for Microsoft's success is the technical incompetence of its competitors. First they were dumb enough to try to beat Microsoft by employing Microsoft's own products; and after that, they adopted Java as a panacea. Reliability and simplicity are really major selling points. We should have both of them by combining XML with Ada. Ada has a very great advantage for commercial development in that a tool based on ASIS could be used to divide up the royalties. If anyone is serious about making Ada number one and attempting to make money doing it, we can take this discussion off-line. -----Original Message----- From: comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org [mailto:comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org]On Behalf Of Mark Lundquist Sent: Tuesday, December 18, 2001 4:12 PM To: comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org Subject: Portable GUI (was Re: Future with Ada) "Marin David Condic" wrote in message news:9vdo2a$9h3$1@nh.pace.co.uk... > > I mentioned elsewhere the notion that if there were some flavor of an XML > doohickie out there for Ada that it might be possible to use that as the > basis for a portable, standard GUI > Not sure exactly what you mean by an "XML doohickie" :-), but I'd be thinkin' something along these lines: 1) First, you write your native Ada GUI library. This is the hard part. Make it the very best thing you can make. Also let it be configurable with traits that allow it to emulate Windows-like or Motif-like LAF. 2) Next, write an XML schema to define GUI layout in terms of the primitives that map to those of your portable GUI. It wouldn't hurt if (1) were done with a view to (2). Now, you have a way for GUIs to be represented as XML documents, instead of encoded in program source code. 3) Now we need a way for your applications to talk to these GUIs. First step is to define a simple object model to ride on top of some middleware: CORBA and/or SOAP and/or Bonobo... The semantic level of this layer is what is left after abstracting away from all the details of appearance, layout, perhaps even some choices of controls, etc... that are now all loaded into the XML representation. 4) We also need a way to render the GUIs, and so we write an XML browser (in Ada, of course) to interpret the schema. This is trivial, since the schema is just an XML oil-slick over the native portable Ada GUI (1). This component brings together (1), (2), and (3). It's a standalone executable. Start with Windows and Linux. 5) Write/generate the bindings to (3) in every popular language that knows how to talk to the middleware options you support. So now you can offer a platform-independent GUI for C++, Perl, Python, Ada of course, and even Java for those who find compelling advantages in this GUI over Swing (and there would be some advantages, I think). 6) While you're at it, write a GUI-builder. It's target-language independent, because it doesn't have to generate program source code, only XML and IDL (or whatever). 7) Now take what we've done, and hype the living daylights out of it, while preserving our dignity (we might need that later on). Sell it at a modest price to every cross-platform developer in the world. Get written up in all the trendy industry rags (cover stories of course). Win a Jolt award. Get the schema recommended as a W3C standard. Go public. 8) Let it slip that it has "Ada inside". 9) Developers everywhere become interested in the technology behind this wonderful creation, the killer mini-app for Ada. They discover the joy of programming in Ada, the new high-performance language for the '00's (you know... what comes after the '80's and the '90's). Ada takes over the world. 10) In the process, people discover that the XML GUI rendering engine is nothing but a front-end to the standard Ada native GUI library and that 98% of the work to duplicate it would be done for them because it's just plumbing together things from the Ada foundation library. The jig is up. Exercise stock options now. The free knockoffs start to appear, but that's OK because we knew it was coming. Move while you still control mindshare, and release your source code under an open source license, thereby becoming the world's great benefactor. Restructure the business model around support and consulting services. 11) Now we can either (a) spend most of our time sailing in the Caribbean, or (b) take one of the many cushy jobs that await us now that Ada has conquered. Whoops, I left out a step... Step (0), find an investor to $upport us while we do the work... :-) :-) :-) -- mark ------------- Reply by email to: Mark dot Lundquist at ACM dot org Consulting services: http://home.attbi.com/~mlundquist2/consulting