An Introduction to C and GUI Programming

https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/an-introduction-to-c-gui-programming-the-new-book-from-raspberry-pi-press/

by AlexeyBrin • 7 years ago

137 71 7 years ago

rjammala• 7 years ago

Download link: https://www.raspberrypi.org/magpi-issues/C_GUI_Programming.p...

jononor6• 7 years ago

C for GUI programming? GTK2 for starting a new project today? I think new learners would be much better off with Python 3 and GTK3 (or Qt5)...

jvanderbot• 7 years ago

Or any other arbitrary |L|x|F|x|P| combinations of languages, frameworks, and platforms. But, this one didn't have a book yet.

spectramax2• 7 years ago

I disagree. There is always value in learning something simple and master it than learning something complex and barely scratching the surface.

It teaches you fundamentals, especially on an embedded system such as R-Pi.

The first language I learned was C on an ARM processor. Learning about registers, bit manipulation, seeing how compiler optimizes the code based on GCC flags, understanding pointers, memory management, the whole thing is difficult for a beginner but to me, it was immensely helpful. I also love Python/Julia/Java/JavaScript but man it makes you appreciate neat things higher languages offer.

One day I want to build my own 8-bit computer from discrete gates. I’m sure it won’t be a waste of time.

sdegutis3• 7 years ago

The embedded environment is what makes this setup make sense. But in the general case, C is less than ideal for GUI programming compared to what's available in other languages, because of lack of first class closures and more complex data types (or at least classes). Otherwise you are basically in the 80s doing Win32 GUI programming all over again.

kbumsik• 7 years ago

I agree with you if you are talking about Python vs C.

But a new GTK2 book sounds like teaching Python 2 for beginners.

wrycoder• 7 years ago

https://www.nand2tetris.org/copy-of-cool-stuff

This is definitely not a waste of time. But though building a physical ALU from TTL is feasible, constructing a reasonable amount of memory would be a waste of time and money.

Once you have written the nand2tetris HDL for the hardware, you could translate it to Verilog and burn an FPGA quite easily.

mayankkaizen2• 7 years ago

This is exactly what I wanted to learn. I really wanted to 'see' C in action at lowest level. This aspect of programming is what I am curious about.

But I never found a decent beginner friendly resources.

Anyone reading this comment, please chime in with your suggestions.

samt430• 7 years ago

Its possible you may have come across this but if you havent already it speaks to what you just said https://www.evanmiller.org/you-cant-dig-upwards.html

teddyh• 7 years ago

Hasn’t it always been the case that the current generation skips learning about useless lower layers used by older generations? How could it be that the layers you grew up with and learned are the special ones which are still useful, when all the layers which came before, which people at the time thought essential, have turned out not to be so?

I.e. why is it that C and assembler is “fundamental”, but electronics is not?

(I have written about this before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19106922#19113359 )

jononor6• 7 years ago

I'm an electronics engineer who started to learn programming Assembler on PIC16 micro-controllers. My arguments is not against learning the fundamentals. I just know from teaching that the primary problem people have when learning is that they get stuck and stop. Making GUIs in Python (given good educational resources, like a book) will give results much faster, and more quickly become a practical skillset for GUI programming and other useful tasks.

For learning C and starting to poke at low-level embedded stuff I would recommend starting with Arduino (and then into plain AVR) - and not go anywhere near a GUI toolkit.

There is a reason we don't actually throw kids into the deep end when teaching them to swim. Most of them would just drown...

PorterDuff• 7 years ago

I think if I were wanting to bang out a simple embedded design with a GUI, this is exactly the direction I'd go. It isn't like you usually need super complex behaviors and I'd hate to add in extra toolkits or a big framework just to get a few buttons on a screen.

I've never dealt with Raspberry Pi world, but I can see the value of stripping the software world on one to the bare minimum. I wonder if someone has put together a FreeRTOS tool chain for it.

zemo• 7 years ago

you're ignoring the audience and the platform. The audience is people whose only computing device is the Raspberry Pi. Compiling a Qt app on most of the rpi models would take forever. The lower-end models are pretty resource constrained. Most of the rpi software is written in GTK, so it's a primer on using the desktop software toolkit that is used to make the applications that the user is using.

vortico4• 7 years ago

jononor should have recommended Gtk for Python via https://pygobject.readthedocs.io/en/latest/. Not sure why PyQt was suggested instead.

jononor6• 7 years ago

I did not suggest compiling Qt apps (or doing C++). You can build Qt apps in pure Python using the libraries installed via the package manager.

ChrisRR3• 7 years ago

As a low level developer, i thoroughly disagree. I think it's disappointing that we're given absolutely insane amounts of processing power where intel keep pushing the limits of physics, then developers keep wasting that on inefficient languages like javascript, python, java, etc. They have their uses, but using them to develop every piece of software would be an inefficient waste of resources.

For fast, efficient software there will always be low level languages such as C, C++, etc. and I would always urge more people to learn them, even if just to learn to appreciate how much is managed by their high level language and understand the trade-offs they're making with those languages.

vortico4• 7 years ago

Rendering a GUI is much more overhead than the business logic to set up the GUI and make it interactive. A GUI is only "slow" if there is a user-triggered operation that takes more than 10ms. Interpreting a Python callback is many orders of magnitude smaller than this, and complex algorithms can be outsourced to other languages if needed. Focus on your bottlenecks first. Don't pre-optimize.

nikofeyn2• 7 years ago

developers keep wasting that on inefficient languages like javascript, python, java, etc
For fast, efficient software there will always be low level languages such as C, C++, etc.

this sounds like every "low level developer" ever, in that the opinions are completely removed from reality. it isn't 19<whatever>. if by inefficient, you mean slow, then java isn't anywhere near comparable to javascript or python. beyond being a completely different type of language, java is fast. so is c# and f#. so is chez scheme and sml. so are plenty of much higher-level languages than c and safer languages than c++ that are just as fast (if not faster in some cases dependent upon development time and application and developer) than c and c++.

also, c++ is low-level? it is an insanely complex high-level language.

weberc22• 7 years ago

I think it's disappointing that we're given absolutely insane amounts of processing power where intel keep pushing the limits of physics, then developers keep wasting that on inefficient languages like javascript, python, java, etc.

It's called "economics". C and C++ are simply too cumbersome for most applications; most applications don't benefit from that speed (either because the deadlines aren't that critical or because the bottleneck is I/O) and their project deadlines can't afford the velocity tax they impose. Especially when many of those languages allow you to opt out of "slow" features (or FFI into C/C++/etc) for your hot path. Lastly, higher-level languages are improving: Go is probably the easiest language out there and it's almost as fast as C (in the same ballpark, but still slower) and Rust is far, far friendlier than C or C++ but it performs on par.

bollockitis2• 7 years ago

Not disagreeing but it's interesting that you'd lump Java in with Javascript and Python. Java certainly has its problems but it's considerably faster and more efficient than both.

droithomme• 7 years ago

He explains his reasoning both on page 76 of the free to download book and in the parallel complaint thread on the linked article.

His reasoning is that GTK2 is stable and GTK3 changes with each iteration.

VMG• 7 years ago

It is impossible to use the GTK3 or GTK2 bindings for any language without understanding the C interface. Usually there is no real documentation on the bindings.

buzzert• 7 years ago

I would actually pick Vala over anything else for GTK3 applications. It’s really pleasant to work with and compiles to optimized C code, so you get serious performance wins over Python (and type safety to boot)

axaxs• 7 years ago

Vala is nice, but is really niche at the time being. I think people would be better served using Python 3 and QT for maximum ease, documentation/help, and cross-platform abilities.

bollockitis2• 7 years ago

Vala really is a remarkable engineering achievement that is highly underrated. I can only imagine what could be possible if Vala had mindshare similar to Python.

weberc22• 7 years ago

I'm not sure either make sense. So much of GUI programming is learning a particular toolkit. Especially in the case of Qt where it's an entire _runtime_--memory management, string types, threading, async/signaling, etc etc. This isn't even mentioning the hoops you have to jump through to compile a Qt program (if you're using C/C++).

These toolkits are inevitably on their way out. The future is the browser stack, loathe though I am to accept it.

As a tangent, it wouldn't be horrible if something like a browser was used as a window manager and UI runtime a la ChromeOS except with apps running in containers (and no bastardized Linux kernel and the restrictions that come with). This would have lots of benefits--the whole frontend benefits from all of the investment going into the web (including wasm) and the whole backend benefits from the investment in containers. Notably, packaging / dependency management, process management, log management, etc would all be much simpler/easier.

billsix2• 7 years ago

Immediate mode gui frameworks make for a pleasant programming experience

https://github.com/vurtun/nuklear

plopz• 7 years ago

Whats the benefit of immediate mode libs? I haven't had the opportunity to use one before. I'm hopeful for libui in the future, but maybe I should consider immediate mode libraries?

https://github.com/andlabs/libui

billsix2• 7 years ago

No callbacks, so no forced heap allocation nor lifetime management . "oh you want to use FooGUI? First let me tell you about the object hierarchy and object lifecycle". No mvc. No custom, required data structures.

The programmer just copies and pastes from the demos, makes small modifications, and it just works.

(No offense intended towards your framework, I've used gtk, qt, and swing and have never understood them like I understand nuklear and dearimgui)

cozzyd• 7 years ago

For a raspberry pi which is unlikely to be plugged into a monitor it seems like a better gui for most usecases would be a simple webserver.

badsectoracula7• 7 years ago

Raspberry Pi was made from the beginning to be used as a cheap desktop computer that people can play around with and students can buy with their own money, pretty much like the BBC micros and ZX Spectrums in the 80s. From day one it came with a full Linux desktop system and was meant to be used by itself as a proper computer.

soneil• 7 years ago

It's worth remembering the core mission for the Pi was to be an affordable educational computer. In that context, this publication is entirely on-point for the foundation.

There's an almost symbiotic relationship going on where the foundation doesn't exactly ignore the hobbyist or industrial communities - far from it - but they are still holding to their core mission, and these notable, but ultimately ancillary communities provide the budget for it.

ingve• 7 years ago

The author speaks highly of the book "C for Yourself". An electronic version of the book from the Microsoft Programmer’s Library 1.3 CD-ROM has been posted [0] on the truly excellent PCjs Machines [1] website, where a lot of other older programming information can also be read [2].

[0] https://www.pcjs.org/pubs/pc/reference/microsoft/mspl13/c/c4...

[1] https://www.pcjs.org/

[2] https://www.pcjs.org/pubs/

chewyland• 7 years ago

Whoa, this little book just arrived in my mailbox in my Bulgarian village apartment. Can't wait to crack it open.

An Introduction to C and GUI Programming

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