
                      WINGs - WINGs Is Not GNUstep

                                   by

                          Alfredo Kengi Kojima

                          kojima@windowmaker.info


   WINGs is a small widget set with the N*XTSTEP look and feel. Its API
is inspired in OpenStep and its implementation borrows some ideas
from Tk. It has a reasonable set of widgets, sufficient for building
small applications (like a CDPlayer or hacking something like rxvt). It
also has other functions that are usefull for applications, like a
User Defaults alike configuration manager and a notification system.

   The library is limited and its design is a little sloppy,
so it's not intended to build large or complex applications, like
anything more complex than a CDPlayer. GNUstep should be used for such
applications.

   Since WINGs is written in C and is sort of low-level it is small
and faster than say, Motif or even Athena. Knowing Xlib will help you to
workaround some of its limitations, although you'll probably be able to
write something like a trivial tic-tac-toe game without knowing much Xlib.

   Some of its functions are designed to support the Window Maker window
manager (see http://windowmaker.info) In fact, its primary role is to
support Window Maker. All other uses of it are just an added bonus.

   It will help you to understand the API if you read the ApplicationKit
reference manual, distributed as a PDF by Apple. The function names,
structs and most of the intrinsics are very close to OpenStep classes.


Internationalization:
---------------------

    Change ~/GNUstep/Defaults/WMGLOBAL to set the desired font set and
set MultiByteText = YES; to enable support for multibyte text.


Widgets provided by WINGs:
--------------------------

- button (command button, radio, switch etc. - all buttons defined in OpenStep)
- label
- textfield
- frame
- window
- popup menu button
- scroller
- selection list
- browser
- slider
- scrollable view
- color well
- split view
- tabbed view
- progress indicator

- selection (make pasteboard like?)
- drag&drop

- input box
- file panel
- color panel
- alert panel
- font panel

If you think you can code the following, please do. They are needed by
WPrefs.app, but the number of other things I have to do is huge.

- input method support (XIM). I have no idea of how to code it. People who use
different characters than ASCII will have trouble editing menus without it...


Wish list: (I don't have the know-how or time to do them)
---------------------------------------------------------

- text (with support for RTF)
- matrix (like NSMatrix)
- font manager (like NSFontManager)
- finish other wigets
- optimize list scrolling (XCopyArea() the area that's already drawn)
- InterfaceMaker?
- use XSetWMName and XSetWMIconName for the window/icon title setting.
  This requires transforming the received text to a text property with
  the proper encoding.

Copyright
---------

WINGs is copyright (c) Alfredo K. Kojima and is licensed through the GNU
Library General Public License (LGPL).

