EasyGUI wrappers?

[SamuraiCrow]

I see there's a third-party EasyGUI clone for AmigaOS 1.2 on Aminet.net but I was wondering if Jason Hulance ever released the official versions as open-source? I was thinking of trying to make a wrapper for ClassAct/React and MUI using their equivalents in EasyGUI and making more plugins as needed.

[SamuraiCrow]

I found the original version in the AmigaE 3.3a demoversion archive but the 3.3b3 version did not include source.

[dmcoles]

I had some thoughts about this a while ago and I did have a bit of a look at the code with the same idea.

Never actually got any further than that though.

[SamuraiCrow]

It'd be a wonderful addition to the Framework. I don't know if anybody will use it though. It's late to the party.

[SamuraiCrow]

Maybe a GUI.library based on the syntax of EasyGUI might be useful. Including that in the Framework might even open the door to EEC going cross-platform.

[Hypexed]

It is designed to use Gadtools. But it does hide that so using it as a GUI builder for other engines should be quite possible. I can't find any version info in the EasyGUI source I have.

The wrapper for OS1.2 is not stand alone. it relies on an old technique in the early 90's for running new OS2 software on old OS1.3 systems using gadtools13.library to emulate the interface. I first found this library when running a demo Deluxe Music on my A500.

Some limitations or quirks of EGUI could be improved. For example always using a resizable window despite not needed. It also included lots of code you won't need in a simple interface though there is a lite version. Because of this I created my own simple GUI builder called GTK for Gadtoolskit. It's a simple stacker based engine that just stacks a few simple gadgets vertically.

[SamuraiCrow]

The initials GTK normally are associated with GIMP ToolKit on Posix platforms like Linux. Having a wrapper for E to use any GUI would be nice though.

[Hypexed]

Yes, but GIMP isn't normally associated with the Amiga and I'm not aware of any Amiga GIMP port being around in the early 2000s. :-) Plus when I thought up "GTK" I'd never heard of GIMP nor knew about this funny looking OS called Linux. :-D

[SamuraiCrow]

Is the source available? I'm trying not to waste too much time on a development system that won't be used much but I'd like to look at it. (All the same, the name should be spelled out for the sake of disambiguation in the present era.)

[dmcoles]

I found the original version in the AmigaE 3.3a demoversion archive but the 3.3b3 version did not include source.

The easygui source code and binary easygui.m that is in the public Amiga E 3.3a demo version (http://aminet.net/package/dev/e/amigae33a) are dated 09-Oct-1997 and the release package for easygui 3.3b.3 (http://aminet.net/package/dev/e/EasyGUI_v33b3) is dated 10-Jun-1997 so i believe the source code included in the E 3.3a package is probably the final code. The included readme in the easygui folder also refers to the version being 3.3b.3. Compiling the source code using EC REGS=5 produces a binary match for the version included with the amiga e package but it is slightly larger than the one in the easygui 33b3 release package.

[SamuraiCrow]

Thanks for doing the research! This may be useful after all. I've got some ideas brewing but if @Hypexed wants to share his code, that might give us a better starting spot anyway.

[SamuraiCrow]

If I continue this idea, I'll probably break compatibility with EasyGUI and use a more flexible syntax.

[SamuraiCrow]

After looking more carefully at the EasyGUI sources, there seems to be an anti-pattern of enums in a case statement. I think inheritance would be preferred in this case. If nothing else it would be more maintainable.