I recently got a project to write a standalone GUI program, a SGML-Editor to be precise (for an internal SGML-like format).

Since i had a lot of back-end code already worked out for the SGML parsing part and i have experience in Perl with Tk, i decided to write the application in Perl.

I experienced that for a larger Tk application, Tk/Perl can cause a quite heavy load on a 'light' workstation (like PI and PII systems <300 Mhz)

Though so far it's working fine, fast and everybody is happy, i was wondering if anyone thinks there is a limit to what you should use Perl/Tk for.

I mean, is Perl/Tk suitable for a complete GUI application (like Games, Editor's or spreadsheets) or is it more suitable for light script-front-ends and configuration-GUI's ?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
wxPerl (Re: GUI applications in Perl)
by Arguile (Hermit) on Sep 02, 2002 at 16:57 UTC

    You might also want to try wxPerl.

    wxWindows attempts to create a consistant interface to GUI programming across platforms. Most simplistically it can be thought of as a wrapper for native widget sets. This allows the look and, more importantly, the feel of the application to be native to that platform.

    wxPerl is the Perl interface to wxWindows.

    Having applications work on win32, *nix, MacOSX (still some problems with wxPerl and OSX last time I tried to compile about 6mo. ago) and feel like native applications is nice.

    Links

[reply]
      Thank you for the suggestion.

      Would you personally consider wxPerl as a Beta release stable/complete enough to put in a production environment ?

[reply]
        By Windows standards for what a beta is, certainly yes. :-) It's been around long enough and then some to be considered mature.

        Makeshifts last the longest.

[reply]
        If you can find documentation, it's great.
[reply]
Re: GUI applications in Perl
by andreychek (Parson) on Sep 02, 2002 at 22:24 UTC
    Back in May, there was a discussion on Perl desktop applications. A variety of toolkits are discussed, along with sampling of desktop applications which are created in Perl.

    Perhaps seeing how some of those existing Perl desktop applications function might help in your quest for a toolkit to use. Good luck,

    -Eric

    --
    Lucy: "What happens if you practice the piano for 20 years and then end up not being rich and famous?"
    Schroeder: "The joy is in the playing."
[reply]
Re: GUI applications in Perl
by stefan k (Curate) on Sep 02, 2002 at 16:44 UTC
    Hi,
    as has been said you might want to look at Gtk-Perl (search for it here - there should be links to the good tutorial). I once wrote an application with it and was quite happy. Take a look at CSCMail which is a full blown EMail program with Gtk and Perl, so it should be possible to create larger applications with it (I think it is closely related to Pronto!, please look at freshmeat).

    Regards... Stefan
    you begin bashing the string with a +42 regexp of confusion

[reply]
      I couldn't find any Gtkperl support for win32, since i further didn't find any comparisons between the two, having Tk already installed on my system, Gtk kind went out of sight.

      Beside the (lack of?) support for win32, can you tell me, or refer me to a site telling me, the main differences between Gtk and Tk ?
      - Is Gtk that much faster ?
      - Does Gtk offer less/same/more extensions ?

      Also i read that the Gtk for win32 seems to have some instability problems (btw. the referenceto the instability of other win32 software is a weak excuse on their own problems).

[reply]
Re: GUI applications in Perl
by zentara (Cardinal) on Sep 02, 2002 at 15:47 UTC
    Have you looked at Gtk-Perl ? It's probably a step up from Tk.
[reply]

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