From: Sergio Masci (sergio@titan.demon.co.uk)
Date: Sat 13 Nov 1999 - 03:11:25 IST
>>>>> Native Linux SVGALIB rapid visual application generator <<<<<
>>>>> (kind of like Visual Basic for SVGALIB and NOT using windows <<<<<
>>>>> or Dos emulator) <<<<<
>>>>> <<<<<
>>>>> Other native Linux SVGALIB apps available from the same site, <<<<<
>>>>> so please visit and have a look at whats available <<<<<
Hi Everyone,
I'm not sure how many of you SVGALIB fans are aware of XEBOT but I'm
betting it's a real small percentage. Below is a copy of the announcement
I recently posted to COLA.
Please let me and others know what you think.
Regards
Sergio
----------------------
XEBOT v0.5.0
Lisence type: commercial but FREE evaluation version available for download
Description
Visual application builder and multiplatform execution environment
Changes since v0.4.02
Added a new interactive debug mode which allows a developer to set break
points, single step XPE source code, view the object context ('this'),
watch variables, manually modify variables (while the code is being
traced), view the execution path to the current break point, and easily
navigate functions and methods in the execution path.
the SVGALIB version is now also available from the same site.
Features
* Extremely powerful visual editing interface that allows easy editing
across files using multiple overlapping windows. The graphics objects
drawn and edited using the interface have built in intelligence and react
to the mouse and each other so as to maximize user productivity and
reduce tedious repetitive setup sequences (see the IPAD sub app
features for more information on the visual edit capabilities available to
the developer).
* The self contained execution environment of the multiplatform
IPAD-Pro core which allows apps built using XEBOT to:
o run directly on systems without GUI support (e.g. MSDOS or
DRDOS)
o replace the native GUI where it is considered bloated or
unpredictable.
o run on all supported platforms without the usual porting
overheads. This lets the developer design the app once and use it
through the same interface on many platforms.
* Fast prototyping of partial designs allows icremental interactive
development of complex specifications between developers and users,
and greatly accelerates time to market.
o The underlying IPAD-Pro core manages many form and dialog
functions which other GUIs normally require the app take
responsibility for.
o The drag and drop capability of the XEBOT interface lets forms
and dialogs be quickly built from templates.
o The control property editor and code editor of the XEBOT
interface lets forms and dialogs be quickly and easily tailored.
o The concise coding model allows functionality to be quickly and
easily added to controls.
* App development and maintenance is greatly simplified by:
o The ability to directly add concise code to controls on a form or
dialog which does not need to intercept and decode GUI event
messages.
o The ability to directly set or inspect context variables belonging to
controls (including forms and dialogs).
o The ability of controls on a form or dialog to directly interact with
each other and the user in response to events without the need to
build and send special messages between the communicating
components.
o The sophisticated API which allows complex data gathering,
validation and mapping between the IPAD-Pro core and the visual
components of the app (such as buttons, text entry fields, check
boxes etc.) There is no need to provide hundreds of API defined
functions and buffers just to collect data and perform validation
from myriad's of points within the code.
o Code module support allowing components to encapsulate data
and functionality.
* Supports hot swap dynamic linking of externally compiled modules
allowing in situ upgrades. This is of particular value when the app is part
of a monitoring or control process since there is no need to reboot the
system or restart the IPAD-Pro core.
* External code (code written in C, C++ and assembler which is linked in
at run time) can access form or dialog controls simply by name if
required, with no need for the external code to be given a list of specific
control IDs by the app or for it to manage such a list (e.g. when
reporting errors the external code can simply ask for the ID of the
message box with the name "error_messages" and write to it). This also
applies to code belonging to other controls or modules.
Examples
xebot_base - XEBOT interface (defined using xebot)
This is part of the standard XEBOT distribution package.
This is the complete XEBOT interface. Modifying this lets you tailor
XEBOT itself. From it you would normally build your customized
xebot_tmpl
xebot_tmpl - XEBOT control templates
This is part of the standard XEBOT distribution package.
This is what you would normally build an app from. It is a sub set of
xebot_base. To use it simply run XEBOT, open a window, load
xebot_tmpl into it, open another window and copy the controls from the
template to your work sheet. For more details look at some of the xebot
demos.
xebot_demo - boiler temperature monitor
This is part of the standard XEBOT distribution package.
calc - fully functional virtual calculator
This is a proper app that runs in the self contained execution
environment of IPAD-Pro
XEBOT is currently available for Linux 2.0.x (Intel), Solaris 2.5
(SPARC), OS/2, MS Windows (NT, 95, 98 and 3.1) and MSDOS.
XEBOT can be obtained from:
http://www.demon.co.uk/titan
Animated demos showing user / GUI interaction, state machine traces
and dialog building can be obtained from:
http://www.demon.co.uk/titan/DEMO
(BEWARE: some demos seem to run slowly when viewed using
some versions of Internet Explorer)
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