README.md

Simple-Conrod

A simple, user-friendly and multi-threading enabled gui-framework in Rust based on Conrod.

Examples can be found by executing example() or example2() from the library.

heavy WIP!

Already implemented:

• Button
• Label
• Containers:
  • List (horizontal, vertical)
  • Pad (for padding an element and positioning inside a cell)
  • Layers (for layering elements on top of each other, like in a graphics application)
  • Empty
  • Socket (for receiving Actions/Events)
• Animation (like a Container)

Preamble

For now, only a few visible elements like Button and Label are implemented. But the idea is that it should be relatively easy to create new elements which can be immediately included in you gui-design. Check back in future for more stuff :3

Also: There's much more already than what's explained down below! Here you have an overview of the system:

Blue: traits

Green: container

Yellow: concrete end-elements

Follow the arrows and you can see what objects you can nest into each other!

Adding Elements

Before we start, let me say that you can also add and remove Elements dynamically during runtime! For more info, see below.

Creating a new window with title and size:

let mut window = Window::new("Container".to_string(), 800, 800);

All elements implement the trait Element so that they can be arbitrarily nested. There are container elements to help organize the layout, e.g. a List with a vertical arrangement of elements:

let mut list = List::new(ListAlignment::Vertical);

At the end of the chain we want a element to display or interact with - like a Button. Let's add a Button with a Text on it immediately to the list

list.push(
    Button::new().with_label("Hey".to_string())
);

In the end, we want to add the list to the window and let the window run:

window.add_element(list);
window.run();

In case you want to force redraws of the window, you can use window.run_with_fps(fps: f64) or a Timer, which will send Update messages at a given fps rate.

Actions (Events)

We can also use an event-system! This is using the channel-system. So that means, that signals from and to the gui are multi-threading enabled. Eg. you can run the gui in its own thread while your model runs on another thread!

Senders can be added to the elements via .with_sender(...), e.g.

use std::sync::mpsc::{self, Sender, Receiver};

let (sender, receiver): (Sender<ActionMsg>, Receiver<ActionMsg>) = mpsc::channel();
let button = Button::new()
                 .with_id("Button".to_string()) // define id to recognize sender
                 .with_sender(sender);

These channels use the ActionMsg enum as information-carrier. You can also define a custom action-function:

let button = Button::new().with_action_click(Box::new(|| {
    // do something
}));

On the receiver side, the window accepts a receiver

window.add_receiver(receiver);

which will transmit the messages down the chain of Elements. For an Element to receive a message, we need to wrap it in an Socket

let socket = Socket::new(some_element /*Button, Label, List...*/)
    .with_action_receive(Box::new(|element, msg|{
        match (msg.sender_id.as_ref(), msg.msg) {
            /* match messages */
            _ => ()
        }
}));

It is here, where you can now think of adding/removing elements during runtime. If e.g. in the above example element is a List, then you can just push(...) or insert(...) new elements or pop() and remove(...) elements.

In very near future, you'll be able to add an arbitrary number of receivers to any Socket.

Goal and Future

The main goal is

• a simple interface for users, especially for beginners and intermediates
• not necessary performance, but ease of understanding
• fast prototyping and construction

Main inspiration: Java framework.

BEWARE: I'm new to Rust, I'm not a professional programmer, I make mistakes - a lot...

Plans:

• many more Elements
• gui animations
• scientific plotting
• implementing other backends (Gfx, glutin)