\section{What is wxWindows?}
wxWindows is a C++ framework providing GUI (Graphical User
-Interface) and other facilities on more than one platform. Version 2.0 currently
-supports subsets MS Windows (16-bit, Windows 95 and Windows NT) and GTK.
+Interface) and other facilities on more than one platform. Version 2 currently
+supports all desktop versions of MS Windows, Unix with GTK+, Unix with Motif,
+and MacOS. An OS/2 port is in progress.
wxWindows was originally developed at the Artificial Intelligence
-Applications Institute, University of Edinburgh, for internal use.
-wxWindows has been released into the public domain in the hope
-that others will also find it useful. Version 2.0 is written and
-maintained by Julian Smart, Robert Roebling and others.
+Applications Institute, University of Edinburgh, for internal use,
+and was first made publicly available in 1992.
+Version 2 is a vastly improved version written and maintained by
+Julian Smart, Robert Roebling, Vadim Zeitlin, Vaclav Slavik and many others.
-This manual discusses wxWindows in the context of multi-platform
-development.\helpignore{For more detail on the wxWindows version 2.0 API
-(Application Programming Interface) please refer to the separate
-wxWindows reference manual.}
+This manual contains a class reference and topic overviews.
+For a selection of wxWindows tutorials, please see the documentation page on the \urlref{wxWindows web site}{http://www.wxwindows.org}.
Please note that in the following, ``MS Windows" often refers to all
platforms related to Microsoft Windows, including 16-bit and 32-bit
wxWindows was developed to provide a cheap and flexible way to maximize
investment in GUI application development. While a number of commercial
-class libraries already exist for cross-platform development,
+class libraries already existed for cross-platform development,
none met all of the following criteria:
\begin{enumerate}\itemsep=0pt
\item support for a wide range of compilers.
\end{enumerate}
-As public domain software and a project open to everyone, wxWindows has
-benefited from comments, ideas, bug fixes, enhancements and the sheer
-enthusiasm of users, especially via the Internet. This gives wxWindows a
-certain advantage over its commercial brothers, and a robustness against
-the transience of one individual or company. This openness and
-availability of source code is especially important when the future of
-thousands of lines of application code may depend upon the longevity of
-the underlying class library.
-
-In writing wxWindows, completeness has sometimes been traded for
-portability and simplicity of programming. Version 2.0 goes much
-further than previous versions in terms of generality and features,
-allowing applications to be produced
-that are often indistinguishable from those produced using single-platform
-toolkits
-such as Motif and MFC.
-
-wxWindows 2.0 currently maps to two native APIs: GTK and
-MS Windows. Motif, Xt and Mac ports are also in preparation.
-
-The importance of using a platform-independent class library cannot be
-overstated, since GUI application development is very time-consuming,
-and sustained popularity of particular GUIs cannot be guaranteed.
-Code can very quickly become obsolete if it addresses the wrong
-platform or audience. wxWindows helps to insulate the programmer from
-these winds of change. Although wxWindows may not be suitable for
-every application, it provides access to most of the functionality a
-GUI program normally requires, plus some extras such as form
-construction, interprocess communication and PostScript output, and
-can of course be extended as needs dictate. As a bonus, it provides
-a cleaner programming interface than the native
-APIs. Programmers may find it worthwhile to use wxWindows even if they
-are developing on only one platform.
+Since wxWindows was started, several other free or almost-free
+GUI frameworks have emerged. However, none has the range of
+features, flexibility, documentation and the well-established
+development team that wxWindows has.
+
+As open source software, wxWindows has benefited from comments,
+ideas, bug fixes, enhancements and the sheer enthusiasm of
+users. This gives wxWindows a certain advantage over its
+commercial competitors (and over free libraries without an
+independent development team), plus a robustness against the
+transience of one individual or company. This openness and
+availability of source code is especially important when the
+future of thousands of lines of application code may depend upon
+the longevity of the underlying class library.
+
+Version 2 goes much further than previous versions in terms of
+generality and features, allowing applications to be produced
+that are often indistinguishable from those produced using
+single-platform toolkits such as Motif, GTK+ and MFC.
+
+The importance of using a platform-independent class library
+cannot be overstated, since GUI application development is very
+time-consuming, and sustained popularity of particular GUIs
+cannot be guaranteed. Code can very quickly become obsolete if
+it addresses the wrong platform or audience. wxWindows helps to
+insulate the programmer from these winds of change. Although
+wxWindows may not be suitable for every application (such as an
+OLE-intensive program), it provides access to most of the
+functionality a GUI program normally requires, plus many extras
+such as network programming, PostScript output, and HTML
+rendering; and it can of course be extended as needs dictate.
+As a bonus, it provides a far cleaner and easier programming
+interface than the native APIs. Programmers may find it
+worthwhile to use wxWindows even if they are developing on only
+one platform.
It is impossible to sum up the functionality of wxWindows in a few paragraphs, but
here are some of the benefits:
\begin{itemize}\itemsep=0pt
\item Low cost (free, in fact!)
\item You get the source.
-\item Several example programs.
-\item Over 700 pages of printable and on-line documentation.
+\item Available on a variety of popular platforms.
+\item Works with almost all popular C++ compilers and Python.
+\item Over 50 example programs.
+\item Over 1000 pages of printable and on-line documentation.
+\item Includes Tex2RTF, to allow you to produce your own documentation
+in Windows Help, HTML and Word RTF formats.
\item Simple-to-use, object-oriented API.
-\item Graphics calls include splines, polylines, rounded rectangles, etc.
-\item Constraint-based layout option.
+\item Flexible event system.
+\item Graphics calls include lines, rounded rectangles, splines, polylines, etc.
+\item Constraint-based and sizer-based layouts.
\item Print/preview and document/view architectures.
-\item Status line facility, toolbar
-\item Easy, object-oriented interprocess comms (DDE subset) under Unix and
-MS Windows.
-\item Encapsulated PostScript generation under Unix, normal MS Windows printing on the
-PC.
-\item MDI support under Windows and GTK.
-\item Can be used to create DLLs under Windows, dynamic libraries on the Sun.
+\item Toolbar, notebook, tree control, advanced list control classes.
+\item PostScript generation under Unix, normal MS Windows printing on the PC.
+\item MDI (Multiple Document Interface) support.
+\item Can be used to create DLLs under Windows, dynamic libraries on Unix.
\item Common dialogs for file browsing, printing, colour selection, etc.
\item Under MS Windows, support for creating metafiles and copying
them to the clipboard.
-\item Hypertext help facility, with an API for invocation from applications.
+\item An API for invoking help from applications.
+\item Ready-to-use HTML window (supporting a subset of HTML).
\item Dialog Editor for building dialogs.
+\item Network support via a family of socket and protocol classes.
+\item Support for platform independent image processing.
+\item Built-in support for many file formats (BMP, PNG, JPEG, GIF, XPM, PNM, PCX).
\end{itemize}
-\section{Changes from version 1.xx}\label{versionchanges}
+\begin{comment}
+\section{Changes from version 2.0}\label{versionchanges20}
-These are a few of the major differences between versions 1.xx and 2.0.
+These are a few of the differences between versions 2.0 and 2.2.
Removals:
\begin{itemize}\itemsep=0pt
-\item XView is no longer supported;
-\item Mac is not yet supported;
-\item all controls (panel items) no longer have labels attached to them;
-\item wxForm removed;
-\item wxCanvasDC, wxPanelDC removed (replaced by wxClientDC, wxWindowDC, wxPaintDC which
-can be used for any window);
-\item wxMultiText, wxTextWindow, wxText removed and replaced by wxTextCtrl;
-\item classes no longer divided into generic and platform-specific parts, for efficiency.
+\item GTK 1.0 no longer supported.
\end{itemize}
Additions and changes:
\begin{itemize}\itemsep=0pt
-\item class hierarchy changed, and restrictions about subwindow nesting lifted;
-\item header files reorganised to conform to normal C++ standards;
-\item classes less dependent on each another, to reduce executable size;
-\item wxString used instead of char* wherever possible;
-\item the number of separate but mandatory utilities reduced;
-\item the event system has been overhauled, with
-virtual functions and callbacks being replaced with MFC-like event tables;
-\item new controls, such as wxTreeCtrl, wxListCtrl, wxSpinButton;
-\item less inconsistency about what events can be handled, so for example
-mouse clicks or key presses on controls can now be intercepted;
-\item the status bar is now a separate class, wxStatusBar, and is
-implemented in generic wxWindows code;
-\item some renaming of controls for greater consistency;
-\item wxBitmap has the notion of bitmap handlers to allow for extension to new formats
-without ifdefing;
-\item new dialogs: wxPageSetupDialog, wxFileDialog, wxDirDialog,
-wxMessageDialog, wxSingleChoiceDialog, wxTextEntryDialog;
-\item GDI objects are reference-counted and are now passed to most functions
-by reference, making memory management far easier;
-\item wxSystemSettings class allows querying for various system-wide properties
-such as dialog font, colours, user interface element sizes, and so on;
-\item better platform look and feel conformance;
-\item toolbar functionality now separated out into a family of classes with the
-same API;
-\item device contexts are no longer accessed using wxWindow::GetDC - they are created
-temporarily with the window as an argument;
-\item events from sliders and scrollbars can be handled more flexibly;
-\item the handling of window close events has been changed in line with the new
-event system, but backward {\bf OnClose} compatibility has been retained;
-\item the concept of {\it validator} has been added to allow much easier coding of
-the relationship between controls and application data;
-\item the documentation has been revised, with more cross-referencing.
-\end{itemize}
-
-Platform-specific changes:
-
-\begin{itemize}\itemsep=0pt
-\item The Windows header file (windows.h) is no longer included by wxWindows headers;
-\item wx.dll supported under Visual C++;
-\item the full range of Windows 95 window decorations are supported, such as modal frame
-borders;
-\item MDI classes brought out of wxFrame into separate classes, and made more flexible.
+\item Corrected many classes to conform better to documented behaviour.
+\item Added handlers for more image formats (Now GIF, JPEG, PCX, BMP, XPM, PNG, PNM).
+\item Improved support for socket and network functions.
+\item Support for different national font encodings.
+\item Sizer based layout system.
+\item HTML widget and help system.
+\item Added some controls (e.g. wxSpinCtrl) and supplemented many.
+\item Many optical improvements to GTK port.
+\item Support for menu accelerators in GTK port.
+\item Enhanced and improved support for scrolling, including child windows.
+\item Complete rewrite of clipboard and drag and drop classes.
+\item Improved support for ODBC databases.
+\item Improved tab traversal in dialogs.
\end{itemize}
+\end{comment}
\section{wxWindows requirements}\label{requirements}
-To make use of wxWindows, you currently need one or both of the
-following setups.
+To make use of wxWindows, you currently need one of the following setups.
-(a) PC:
+(a) MS-Windows:
\begin{enumerate}\itemsep=0pt
\item A 486 or higher PC running MS Windows.
-\item One of Microsoft Visual C++ 4.0 or higher, Borland C++, Gnu-Win32.
+\item A Windows compiler: most are supported, but please see {\tt install.txt} for
+details. Supported compilers include Microsoft Visual C++ 4.0 or higher, Borland C++, Cygwin,
+MinGW, Metrowerks CodeWarrior.
\item At least 60 MB of disk space.
\end{enumerate}
(b) Unix:
\begin{enumerate}\itemsep=0pt
-\item Almost any C++ compiler, including GNU C++.
-\item Almost any Unix workstation, and GTK 1.0 or higher.
+\item Almost any C++ compiler, including GNU C++ (EGCS 1.1.1 or above).
+\item Almost any Unix workstation, and one of: GTK+ 1.2, GTK+ 2.0, Motif 1.2 or higher, Lesstif.
+If using the wxX11 port, no such widget set is required.
+\item At least 60 MB of disk space.
+\end{enumerate}
+
+(c) Mac OS/Mac OS X:
+
+\begin{enumerate}\itemsep=0pt
+\item A PowerPC Mac running Mac OS 8.6/9.x (eg. Classic) or Mac OS X 10.x.
+\item CodeWarrior 5.3, 6 or 7 for Classic Mac OS.
+\item The Apple Developer Tools (eg. GNU C++) or CodeWarrior 7 for Mac OS X.
\item At least 60 MB of disk space.
\end{enumerate}
\section{Availability and location of wxWindows}
-wxWindows is currently available from the Artificial Intelligence
-Applications Institute by anonymous FTP and World Wide Web:
+\winhelponly{wxWindows is available by anonymous FTP and World Wide Web
+from ftp://biolpc22.york.ac.uk/pub and/or http://www.wxwindows.org.}
+\winhelpignore{wxWindows is available by anonymous FTP and World Wide Web
+from \urlref{ftp://biolpc22.york.ac.uk/pub}{ftp://biolpc22.york.ac.uk/pub}
+and/or \urlref{http://www.wxwindows.org}{http://www.wxwindows.org}.}
-\begin{verbatim}
- ftp://ftp.aiai.ed.ac.uk/pub/packages/wxwin
- http://web.ukonline.co.uk/julian.smart/wxwin
-\end{verbatim}
+You can also buy a CD-ROM using the form on the Web site.
-\section{Acknowledgments}
+\section{Acknowledgements}
Thanks are due to AIAI for being willing to release the original version of
-wxWindows into the public domain, and to our patient wives Harriet, Tanja and others.
+wxWindows into the public domain, and to our patient partners.
We would particularly like to thank the following for their contributions to wxWindows, and the many others who have been involved in
the project over the years. Apologies for any unintentional omissions from this list.
Yiorgos Adamopoulos, Jamshid Afshar, Alejandro Aguilar-Sierra, AIAI, Patrick Albert, Karsten Ballueder, Michael Bedward, Kai Bendorf, Yura Bidus, Keith
Gary Boyce, Chris Breeze, Pete Britton, Ian Brown, C. Buckley, Dmitri Chubraev, Robin Corbet, Cecil Coupe, Andrew Davison, Neil Dudman, Robin
Dunn, Hermann Dunkel, Jos van Eijndhoven, Tom Felici, Thomas Fettig, Matthew Flatt, Pasquale Foggia, Josep Fortiana, Todd Fries, Dominic Gallagher,
-Wolfram Gloger, Norbert Grotz, Stefan Gunter, Bill Hale, Patrick Halke, Stefan Hammes, Guillaume Helle, Harco de Hilster, Cord Hockemeyer, Markus
+Guillermo Rodriguez Garcia, Wolfram Gloger, Norbert Grotz, Stefan Gunter, Bill Hale, Patrick Halke, Stefan Hammes, Guillaume Helle, Harco de Hilster, Cord Hockemeyer, Markus
Holzem, Olaf Klein, Leif Jensen, Bart Jourquin, Guilhem Lavaux, Jan Lessner, Nicholas Liebmann, Torsten Liermann, Per Lindqvist, Thomas Runge, Tatu
-M\"{a}nnist\"{o}, Scott Maxwell, Thomas Myers, Oliver Niedung, Hernan Otero, Ian Perrigo, Timothy Peters, Giordano Pezzoli, Harri Pasanen, Thomaso Paoletti,
-Garrett Potts, Marcel Rasche, Robert Roebling, Dino Scaringella, Jobst Schmalenbach, Arthur Seaton, Paul Shirley, Stein Somers, Petr Smilauer, Neil Smith,
-Kari Syst\"{a}, Arthur Tetzlaff-Deas, Jonathan Tonberg, Jyrki Tuomi, Janos Vegh, Andrea Venturoli, Vadim Zeitlin, Xiaokun Zhu, Edward Zimmermann.
+M\"{a}nnist\"{o}, Scott Maxwell, Thomas Myers, Oliver Niedung, Stefan Neis, Hernan Otero, Ian Perrigo, Timothy Peters, Giordano Pezzoli, Harri Pasanen, Thomaso Paoletti,
+Garrett Potts, Marcel Rasche, Robert Roebling, Dino Scaringella, Jobst Schmalenbach, Arthur Seaton, Paul Shirley, Vaclav Slavik, Stein Somers, Petr Smilauer, Neil Smith,
+Kari Syst\"{a}, Arthur Tetzlaff-Deas, Jonathan Tonberg, Jyrki Tuomi, David Webster, Janos Vegh, Andrea Venturoli, Vadim Zeitlin, Xiaokun Zhu, Edward Zimmermann.
`Graphplace', the basis for the wxGraphLayout library, is copyright Dr. Jos
T.J. van Eijndhoven of Eindhoven University of Technology. The code has
\section{Libraries}
-Please the wxGTK documentation for use of the Unix version of wxWindows.
-Under Windows, use the library wx.lib for stand-alone Windows
-applications, or wxdll.lib for creating DLLs.
+Most ports of wxWindows can create either a static library or a shared
+library. wxWindows can also be built in multilib and monolithic variants.
+See the \helpref{libraries list}{librarieslist} for more
+information on these.
\section{Configuration}
-The following lists the options configurable in the file
-\rtfsp{\tt "wx/msw/setup.h"} and {\tt "wx/gtk/setup.h"} Some settings are a matter
-of taste, some help with platform-specific problems, and
-others can be set to minimize the size of the library.
-
-\subsection{General features}
-
-\begin{twocollist}\itemsep=0pt
-\twocolitem{USE\_CLIPBOARD}{If 1, clipboard code is compiled (Windows only).}
-\twocolitem{USE\_CONSTRAINTS}{If 1, the constaint-based window layout system is compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_DOC\_VIEW\_ARCHITECTURE}{If 1, wxDocument, wxView and related classes are compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_DYNAMIC\_CLASSES}{If 1, the run-time class macros and classes are compiled. Recommended,
-and necessary for the document/view framework.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_HELP}{If 1, interface to help system is compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_GAUGE}{If 1, the wxGauge class compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_GLOBAL\_MEMORY\_OPERATORS}{If 1, redefines global new and delete operators to be compatible
-with the extended arguments of the debugging wxObject new and delete operators. If this causes problems
-for your compiler, set to 0.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_IPC}{If 1, interprocess communication code is compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_MEMORY\_TRACING}{If 1, enables debugging versions of wxObject::new and wxObject::delete
-if the value of DEBUG is defined to more than 0.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_METAFILE}{If 1, Windows Metafile code is compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_POSTSCRIPT}{If 1, PostScript code is compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_POSTSCRIPT\_ARCHITECTURE\_IN\_MSW}{Set to 1 to enable the printing architecture
-to make use of either native Windows printing facilities, or the wxPostScriptDC class depending
-on the wxApp::SetPrintMode setting.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_PRINTING\_ARCHITECTURE}{If 1, wxPrinter, wxPrintout and related classes are compiled
-for the print/preview framework.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_RESOURCES}{If 1, win.ini or .Xdefaults-style resource read/write code is compiled.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_WX\_RESOURCES}{If 1, wxWindows resource file (.WXR) code is compiled.}
-\end{twocollist}
-
-\subsection{Windows and NT features}
-
-\begin{twocollist}
-\twocolitem{CTL3D}{CTL3D should only be used for 16-bit Windows programs.
-On Windows 95 and NT, native 3D effects are used. If you want to
-use it and don't already have CTL3D installed, copy the files in
-contrib/ctl3d to appropriate places (ctl3dv2.lib/ctl3d32.lib into your compiler lib
-directory, ctl3d.h into an include directory, and ctl3dv2.dll into
-windows/system). You may need to find a compiler-specific version of ctl3dv2.lib
-or ctl3d32.lib. Define CTL3D to be 1 in wx\_setup.h and link your executables with ctl3dv2.lib
-or ctl3d32.lib.}
-\twocolitem{USE\_ODBC}{If 1, compiles wxDatabase and wxRecordSet classes for ODBC
-access. Requires sql.h, sqlext.h files if set to 1 (see topic on database support).}
-\end{twocollist}
-
-\section{Makefiles}
-
-At the moment there is no attempt to make Unix makefiles and
-PC makefiles compatible, i.e. one makefile is required for
-each environment.
+When using project files and makefiles directly to build wxWindows,
+options are configurable in the file
+\rtfsp{\tt "wx/XXX/setup.h"} where XXX is the required platform (such as msw, motif, gtk, mac). Some
+settings are a matter of taste, some help with platform-specific problems, and
+others can be set to minimize the size of the library. Please see the setup.h file
+and {\tt install.txt} files for details on configuration.
-Sample makefiles for Unix (suffix .UNX), MS C++ (suffix .DOS and .NT), Borland
-C++ (.BCC) and Symantec C++ (.SC) are included for the library, demos
-and utilities. The NT, Borland and Symantec makefiles cannot be
-guaranteed to be up-to-date since the author does not have
-these compilers.
+When using the 'configure' script to configure wxWindows (on Unix and other platforms where
+configure is available), the corresponding setup.h files are generated automatically
+along with suitable makefiles. When using the RPM packages
+for installing wxWindows on Linux, a correct setup.h is shipped in the package and
+this must not be changed.
-The controlling makefile for wxWindows is in the platform-specific
-directory, such as {\tt src/msw} or {\tt src/x}. This makefile will
-recursively execute the makefile in {\tt src/base}.
+\section{Makefiles}
-\subsection{Windows makefiles}
+On Microsoft Windows, wxWindows has a different set of makefiles for each
+compiler, because each compiler's 'make' tool is slightly different.
+Popular Windows compilers that we cater for, and the corresponding makefile
+extensions, include: Microsoft Visual C++ (.vc), Borland C++ (.bcc),
+OpenWatcom C++ (.wat) and MinGW/Cygwin (.gcc). Makefiles are provided
+for the wxWindows library itself, samples, demos, and utilities.
-For Microsoft C++, normally it is only necessary to type {\tt nmake -f
-makefile.dos} (or an alias or batch file which does this). By default,
-binaries are made with debugging information, and no optimization. Use
-FINAL=1 on the command line to remove debugging information (this only
-really necessary at the link stage), and DLL=1 to make a DLL version of
-the library, if building a library.
+On Linux, Mac and OS/2, you use the 'configure' command to
+generate the necessary makefiles. You should also use this method when
+building with MinGW/Cygwin on Windows.
-\subsection{Unix makefiles}
+We also provide project files for some compilers, such as
+Microsoft VC++. However, we recommend using makefiles
+to build the wxWindows library itself, because makefiles
+can be more powerful and less manual intervention is required.
-TODO.
+On Windows using a compiler other than MinGW/Cygwin, you would
+build the wxWindows library from the build/msw directory
+which contains the relevant makefiles.
-Debugging information is included by default; you may add DEBUG= as an
-argument to make to compile without it, or use the Unix {\bf strip}
-command to remove debugging information from an executable.
+On Windows using MinGW/Cygwin, and on Unix, MacOS X and OS/2, you invoke
+'configure' (found in the top-level of the wxWindows source hierarchy),
+from within a suitable empty directory for containing makefiles, object files and
+libraries.
-\normalbox{{\it Important note:} Most compiler flags are kept centrally in
-src/make.env, which is included by all other makefiles. This is the
-file to edit to tailor wxWindows compilation to your environment.}
+For details on using makefiles, configure, and project files,
+please see docs/xxx/install.txt in your distribution, where
+xxx is the platform of interest, such as msw, gtk, x11, mac.
\section{Windows-specific files}
is the following statement:
\begin{verbatim}
-rcinclude "wx/msw/wx.rc"
+#include "wx/msw/wx.rc"
\end{verbatim}
which includes essential internal wxWindows definitions. The resource script
so programs that search your executable for icons (such
as the Program Manager) find your application icon first.}
-\subsection{Module definition file}
-
-A module definition file (extension DEF) is required for 16-bit applications, and
-looks like the following:
-
-\begin{verbatim}
-NAME Hello
-DESCRIPTION 'Hello'
-EXETYPE WINDOWS
-STUB 'WINSTUB.EXE'
-CODE PRELOAD MOVEABLE DISCARDABLE
-DATA PRELOAD MOVEABLE MULTIPLE
-HEAPSIZE 1024
-STACKSIZE 8192
-\end{verbatim}
-
-The only lines which will usually have to be changed per application are
-NAME and DESCRIPTION.
-
-\subsection{Allocating and deleting wxWindows objects}
+\section{Allocating and deleting wxWindows objects}
In general, classes derived from wxWindow must dynamically allocated
with {\it new} and deleted with {\it delete}. If you delete a window,
a drawing object that may be in use. Code that doesn't do this will probably work
fine on some platforms, and then fail under Windows.
+\section{Architecture dependency}
+
+A problem which sometimes arises from writing multi-platform programs is that
+the basic C types are not defined the same on all platforms. This holds true
+for both the length in bits of the standard types (such as int and long) as
+well as their byte order, which might be little endian (typically
+on Intel computers) or big endian (typically on some Unix workstations). wxWindows
+defines types and macros that make it easy to write architecture independent
+code. The types are:
+
+wxInt32, wxInt16, wxInt8, wxUint32, wxUint16 = wxWord, wxUint8 = wxByte
+
+where wxInt32 stands for a 32-bit signed integer type etc. You can also check
+which architecture the program is compiled on using the wxBYTE\_ORDER define
+which is either wxBIG\_ENDIAN or wxLITTLE\_ENDIAN (in the future maybe wxPDP\_ENDIAN
+as well).
+
+The macros handling bit-swapping with respect to the applications endianness
+are described in the \helpref{Byte order macros}{byteordermacros} section.
+
\section{Conditional compilation}
One of the purposes of wxWindows is to reduce the need for conditional
compilation in source code, which can be messy and confusing to follow.
However, sometimes it is necessary to incorporate platform-specific
-features (such as metafile use under MS Windows). The following identifiers
-may be used for this purpose, along with any user-supplied ones:
+features (such as metafile use under MS Windows). The symbols
+listed in the file {\tt symbols.txt} may be used for this purpose,
+along with any user-supplied ones.
-{\bf GUIs:}
+\section{C++ issues}
-\begin{verbatim}
-__X__ any X, but not GTK
-__WXMOTIF__ Motif
-__WXGTK__ GTK
-__WXMSW__ Any Windows
-__MAC__ MacOS
-__UNIX__ any Unix
-__WIN95__ GUI for Windows 95 and above; NT 4.0 and above.
-__WIN32__ WIN32 API
-__NT__ Windows NT
-__CURSES__ CURSES
-\end{verbatim}
+The following documents some miscellaneous C++ issues.
-{\bf OSes:}
+\subsection{Templates}
-\begin{verbatim}
-__HPUX__
-__SVR4__
-__SYSV__
-__LINUX__
-__SGI__
-__ULTRIX__
-__BSD__
-__VMS__
-__SUN__ Any Sun
-__SUNOS__
-__SOLARIS__
-__ALPHA__
-__AIX__
-__DATA_GENERAL__
-__OSF__
-__FREEBSD__
-\end{verbatim}
+wxWindows does not use templates (except for some advanced features that
+are switched off by default) since it is a notoriously unportable feature.
-{\bf Compilers:}
+\subsection{RTTI}
-\begin{verbatim}
-__GNUWIN32__ Gnu-Win32 compiler
-__DJGPP__ DJGPP
-__GNUG__ Gnu C++ on any platform
-__BORLANDC__ Borland C++
-__WATCOMC__ Watcom C++
-__SYMANTECC__ Symantec C++
-__VISUALC__ VC++
-__SUNCC__
-\end{verbatim}
+wxWindows does not use C++ run-time type information since wxWindows provides
+its own run-time type information system, implemented using macros.
-{\bf wxWindows modes:}
+\subsection{Type of NULL}
+Some compilers (e.g. the native IRIX cc) define NULL to be 0L so that
+no conversion to pointers is allowed. Because of that, all these
+occurrences of NULL in the GTK+ port use an explicit conversion such
+as
+
+{\small
\begin{verbatim}
-__WXDEBUG__ usage: #ifdef __DEBUG__ (=> debug mode, else => release)
+ wxWindow *my_window = (wxWindow*) NULL;
\end{verbatim}
+}
-
-\section{C++ issues}
-
-The following documents some miscellaneous C++ issues.
-
-\subsection{Templates}
-
-wxWindows does not use templates since it is a notoriously unportable feature.
+It is recommended to adhere to this in all code using wxWindows as
+this make the code (a bit) more portable.
\subsection{Precompiled headers}
Some compilers, such as Borland C++ and Microsoft C++, support
precompiled headers. This can save a great deal of compiling time. The
-recommended approach is to precompile {\tt ``wx.h''}, using this
+recommended approach is to precompile {\tt "wx.h"}, using this
precompiled header for compiling both wxWindows itself and any
wxWindows applications. For Windows compilers, two dummy source files
are provided (one for normal applications and one for creating DLLs)
is that to take advantage of the facility, you often need to include
more header files than would normally be the case. This means that
changing a header file will cause more recompilations (in the case of
-wxWindows, everything needs to be recompiled since everything includes
-{\tt ``wx.h''}!)
+wxWindows, everything needs to be recompiled since everything includes {\tt "wx.h"}!)
A related problem is that for compilers that don't have precompiled
headers, including a lot of header files slows down compilation
compilation that under Unix, includes a minimal set of headers;
and when using Visual C++, includes {\tt wx.h}. This should help provide
the optimal compilation for each compiler, although it is
-biassed towards the precompiled headers facility available
+biased towards the precompiled headers facility available
in Microsoft C++.
\section{File handling}
information. The application searches through a number of locally
defined directories to find the file. To support this, the class {\bf
wxPathList} makes adding directories and searching for files easy, and
-the global function {\bf FileNameFromPath} allows the application to
+the global function {\bf wxFileNameFromPath} allows the application to
strip off the filename from the path if the filename must be stored.
This has undesirable ramifications for people who have documents of the
same name in different directories.
See also the File Functions section of the reference manual for
descriptions of miscellaneous file handling functions.
-\chapter{Utilities supplied with wxWindows}\label{utilities}
+\chapter{Utilities and libraries supplied with wxWindows}\label{utilities}
\setheader{{\it CHAPTER \thechapter}}{}{}{}{}{{\it CHAPTER \thechapter}}%
\setfooter{\thepage}{}{}{}{}{\thepage}%
-A number of `extras' are supplied with wxWindows, to complement
-the GUI functionality in the main class library. These are found
-below the utils directory and usually have their own source, library
-and documentation directories. For larger user-contributed packages,
-see the directory /pub/packages/wxwin/contrib.
-
-\section{wxHelp}\label{wxhelp}
-
-wxHelp is a stand-alone program, written using wxWindows,
-for displaying hypertext help. It is necessary since not all target
-systems (notably X) supply an adequate
-standard for on-line help. wxHelp is modelled on the MS Windows help
-system, with contents, search and browse buttons, but does not reformat
-text to suit the size of window, as WinHelp does, and its input files
-are uncompressed ASCII with some embedded font commands and an .xlp
-extension. Most wxWindows documentation (user manuals and class
-references) is supplied in wxHelp format, and also in Windows Help
-format. The wxWindows 2.0 project will presently use an HTML widget
-in a new and improved wxHelp implementation, under X.
-
-Note that an application can be programmed to use Windows Help under
-MS Windows, and wxHelp under X. An alternative help viewer under X is
-Mosaic, a World Wide Web viewer that uses HTML as its native hypertext
-format. However, this is not currently integrated with wxWindows
-applications.
-
-wxHelp works in two modes---edit and end-user. In edit mode, an ASCII
-file may be marked up with different fonts and colours, and divided into
-sections. In end-user mode, no editing is possible, and the user browses
-principally by clicking on highlighted blocks.
-
-When an application invokes wxHelp, subsequent sections, blocks or
-files may be viewed using the same instance of wxHelp since the two
-programs are linked using wxWindows interprocess communication
-facilities. When the application exits, that application's instance of
-wxHelp may be made to exit also. See the {\bf wxHelpControllerBase} entry in the
-reference section for how an application controls wxHelp.
-
-\section{Tex2RTF}\label{textortf}
-
-Supplied with wxWindows is a utility called Tex2RTF for converting\rtfsp
-\LaTeX\ manuals to the following formats:
-
-\begin{description}
-\item[wxHelp]
-wxWindows help system format (XLP).
-\item[Linear RTF]
-Rich Text Format suitable for importing into a word processor.
-\item[Windows Help RTF]
-Rich Text Format suitable for compiling into a WinHelp HLP file with the
-help compiler.
-\item[HTML]
-HTML is the native format for Mosaic, the main hypertext viewer for
-the World Wide Web. Since it is freely available it is a good candidate
-for being the wxWindows help system under X, as an alternative to wxHelp.
-\end{description}
-
-Tex2RTF is used for the wxWindows manuals and can be used independently
-by authors wishing to create on-line and printed manuals from the same\rtfsp
-\LaTeX\ source. Please see the separate documentation for Tex2RTF.
-
-\section{wxTreeLayout}
-
-This is a simple class library for drawing trees in a reasonably pretty
-fashion. It provides only minimal default drawing capabilities, since
-the algorithm is meant to be used for implementing custom tree-based
-tools.
-
-Directed graphs may also be drawn using this library, if cycles are
-removed before the nodes and arcs are passed to the algorithm.
-
-Tree displays are used in many applications: directory browsers,
-hypertext systems, class browsers, and decision trees are a few
-possibilities.
+In addition to the core wxWindows library, a number of further
+libraries and utilities are supplied with each distribution.
-See the separate manual and the directory utils/wxtree.
+Some are under the 'contrib' hierarchy which mirrors the
+structure of the main wxWindows hierarchy. See also the 'utils'
+hierarchy. The first place to look for documentation about
+these tools and libraries is under the wxWindows 'docs' hierarchy,
+for example {\tt docs/htmlhelp/fl.chm}.
-\section{wxGraphLayout}
+For other user-contributed packages, please see the Contributions page
+on the \urlref{wxWindows Web site}{http://www.wxwindows.org}.
-The wxGraphLayout class is based on a tool called `graphplace' by Dr.
-Jos T.J. van Eijndhoven of Eindhoven University of Technology. Given a
-(possibly cyclic) directed graph, it does its best to lay out the nodes
-in a sensible manner. There are many applications (such as diagramming)
-where it is required to display a graph with no human intervention. Even
-if manual repositioning is later required, this algorithm can make a good
-first attempt.
-
-See the separate manual and the directory utils/wxgraph.
-
-\section{Colours}\label{coloursampler}
-
-A colour sampler for viewing colours and their names on each
-platform.
+\begin{description}\itemsep=0pt
+\item[{\bf Helpview}]
+Helpview is a program for displaying wxWindows HTML
+Help files. In many cases, you may wish to use the wxWindows HTML
+Help classes from within your application, but this provides a
+handy stand-alone viewer. See \helpref{wxHTML Notes}{wxhtml} for more details.
+You can find it in {\tt samples/html/helpview}.
+\item[{\bf Tex2RTF}]
+Supplied with wxWindows is a utility called Tex2RTF for converting\rtfsp
+\LaTeX\ manuals HTML, MS HTML Help, wxHTML Help, RTF, and Windows
+Help RTF formats. Tex2RTF is used for the wxWindows manuals and can be used independently
+by authors wishing to create on-line and printed manuals from the same\rtfsp
+\LaTeX\ source. Please see the separate documentation for Tex2RTF.
+You can find it under {\tt utils/tex2rtf}.
+
+\item[{\bf Helpgen}]
+Helpgen takes C++ header files and generates a Tex2RTF-compatible
+documentation file for each class it finds, using comments as appropriate.
+This is a good way to start a reference for a set of classes.
+
+%\item[{\bf Dialog Editor}]
+%Dialog Editor allows interactive construction of dialogs using
+%absolute positioning, producing WXR output files. This tool is generally deprecated
+%in favour of sizer-based tools. You can find Dialog Editor
+%in {\tt utils/dialoged}.
%
-\chapter{Tutorial}\label{tutorial}
-\setheader{{\it CHAPTER \thechapter}}{}{}{}{}{{\it CHAPTER \thechapter}}%
-\setfooter{\thepage}{}{}{}{}{\thepage}%
-
-To be written.
+\item[{\bf XRC resource system}]
+This is the sizer-aware resource system, and uses
+XML-based resource specifications that can be generated by tools
+such as \urlref{wxDesigner}{http://www.roebling.de} and XRC's own wxrcedit.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/xrc}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/xrc}, {\tt contrib/samples/xrc}, and {\tt contrib/utils/wxrcedit}.
+For more information, see the \helpref{XML-based resource system overview}{xrcoverview}.
+
+\item[{\bf Object Graphics Library}]
+OGL defines an API for applications that need to display objects connected by lines.
+The objects can be moved around and interacted with.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/ogl}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/ogl}, and {\tt contrib/samples/ogl}.
+
+\item[{\bf Frame Layout library}]
+FL provides sophisticated pane dragging and docking facilities.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/fl}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/fl}, and {\tt contrib/samples/fl}.
+
+\item[{\bf Gizmos library}]
+Gizmos is a collection of useful widgets and other classes. Classes include wxLEDNumberCtrl,
+wxEditableListBox, wxMultiCellCanvas.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/fl}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/fl}, and {\tt contrib/samples/fl}.
+
+\item[{\bf Net library}]
+Net is a collection of very simple mail and web related classes. Currently
+there is only wxEmail, which makes it easy to send email messages via MAPI on Windows or sendmail on Unix.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/net} and {\tt contrib/include/wx/net}.
+
+\item[{\bf Animate library}]
+Animate allows you to load animated GIFs and play them on a window. The library can be extended
+to use other animation formats.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/animate}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/animate}, and {\tt contrib/samples/animate}.
+
+\item[{\bf MMedia library}]
+Mmedia supports a variety of multimedia functionality. The status of this library is currently unclear.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/mmedia}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/mmedia}, and {\tt contrib/samples/mmedia}.
+
+\item[{\bf Styled Text Control library}]
+STC is a wrapper around Scintilla, a syntax-highlighting text editor.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/stc}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/stc}, and {\tt contrib/samples/stc}.
+
+\item[{\bf Plot}]
+Plot is a simple curve plotting library.
+You can find this in {\tt contrib/src/plot}, {\tt contrib/include/wx/plot}, and {\tt contrib/samples/plot}.
+\end{description}
\chapter{Programming strategies}\label{strategies}
\setheader{{\it CHAPTER \thechapter}}{}{}{}{}{{\it CHAPTER \thechapter}}%
\subsection{Use wxString in preference to character arrays}
Using wxString can be much safer and more convenient than using char *.
-Again, I haven't practised what I'm preaching, but I'm now trying to use
+Again, I haven't practiced what I'm preaching, but I'm now trying to use
wxString wherever possible. You can reduce the possibility of memory
-leaks substantially, and it's much more convenient to use the overloaded
+leaks substantially, and it is much more convenient to use the overloaded
operators than functions such as strcmp. wxString won't add a significant
overhead to your program; the overhead is compensated for by easier
manipulation (which means less code).
Don't use absolute panel item positioning if you can avoid it. Different GUIs have
very differently sized panel items. Consider using the constraint system, although this
-can be complex to program. If you needs are simple, the default relative positioning
-behaviour may be adequate (using default position values and wxPanel::NewLine).
+can be complex to program.
Alternatively, you could use alternative .wrc (wxWindows resource files) on different
platforms, with slightly different dimensions in each. Or space your panel items out
\subsection{Use wxWindows resource files}
-Use .wrc (wxWindows resource files) where possible, because they can be easily changed
-independently of source code. Bitmap resources can be set up to load different
-kinds of bitmap depending on platform (see the section on resource files).
+Use .xrc (wxWindows resource files) where possible, because they can be easily changed
+independently of source code.
-\section{Strategies for debugging}
+\section{Strategies for debugging}\label{debugstrategies}
\subsection{Positive thinking}
-It's common to blow up the problem in one's imagination, so that it seems to threaten
+It is common to blow up the problem in one's imagination, so that it seems to threaten
weeks, months or even years of work. The problem you face may seem insurmountable:
but almost never is. Once you have been programming for some time, you will be able
to remember similar incidents that threw you into the depths of despair. But
to the problem. In some cases though, such as memory leaks or wrong
deallocation, this can still give totally spurious results!
-\subsection{Genetic mutation}
-
-If we had sophisticated genetic algorithm tools that could be applied
-to programming, we could use them. Until then, a common -- if rather irrational --
-technique is to just make arbitrary changes to the code until something
-different happens. You may have an intuition why a change will make a difference;
-otherwise, just try altering the order of code, comment lines out, anything
-to get over an impasse. Obviously, this is usually a last resort.
-
\subsection{Use a debugger}
-This sounds like facetious advice, but it's surprising how often people
-don't use a debugger. Often it's an overhead to install or learn how to
+This sounds like facetious advice, but it is surprising how often people
+don't use a debugger. Often it is an overhead to install or learn how to
use a debugger, but it really is essential for anything but the most
-trivial programs. Some platforms don't allow for debugging, such
-as WIN32s under Windows 3.x. In this case, you might be advised to
-debug under 16-bit Windows and when you're confident, compile for
-WIN32s. In fact WIN32s can be very strict about bad memory handling,
-so testing out under WIN32s is a good thing to do even if you're
-not going to distribute this version. (Unless you've got a good memory checking,
-utility, of course!) Tracking bugs under WIN32s can involve a lot of debug message
-insertion and relinking, so make sure your compiler has a fast linker
-(e.g. Watcom, Symantec).
-
-\subsection{Use tracing code}
-
-You can use wxDebugMsg statements (or the wxDebugStreamBuf class) to
-output to a debugging window such as DBWIN under Windows, or standard
-error under X. If compiling in DEBUG mode, you can use TRACE statements
-that will be compiled out of the final build of your application.
+trivial programs.
+
+\subsection{Use logging functions}
+
+There is a variety of logging functions that you can use in your program:
+see \helpref{Logging functions}{logfunctions}.
Using tracing statements may be more convenient than using the debugger
in some circumstances (such as when your debugger doesn't support a lot
of debugging code, or you wish to print a bunch of variables).
-\subsection{Use wxObject::Dump and the wxDebugContext class}
-
-It's good practice to implement the Dump member function for all
-classes derived from wxObject. You can then make use of wxDebugContext
-to dump out information on all objects in the program, if DEBUG is
-defined to be more than zero. You can use wxDebugContext to check for
-memory leaks and corrupt memory. See the debugging topic in the
-reference manual for more information.
-
-\subsection{Check Windows debug messages}
-
-Under Windows, it's worth running your program with DBWIN running or
-some other program that shows Windows-generated debug messages. It's
-possible it'll show invalid handles being used. You may have fun seeing
-what commercial programs cause these normally hidden errors! Microsoft
-recommend using the debugging version of Windows, which shows up even
-more problems. However, I doubt it's worth the hassle for most
-applications. wxWindows is designed to minimize the possibility of such
-errors, but they can still happen occasionally, slipping through unnoticed
-because they are not severe enough to cause a crash.
+\subsection{Use the wxWindows debugging facilities}
+
+You can use wxDebugContext to check for
+memory leaks and corrupt memory: in fact in debugging mode, wxWindows will
+automatically check for memory leaks at the end of the program if wxWindows is suitably
+configured. Depending on the operating system and compiler, more or less
+specific information about the problem will be logged.
+
+You should also use \helpref{debug macros}{debugmacros} as part of a `defensive programming' strategy,
+scattering wxASSERTs liberally to test for problems in your code as early as possible. Forward thinking
+will save a surprising amount of time in the long run.
+
+See the \helpref{debugging overview}{debuggingoverview} for further information.
+
projects / wxWidgets.git / blobdiff