[Glade-devel] libglade usage

[damon karuna uklinux net (Damon Chaplin)]

On Mon, 2004-01-12 at 20:05, Dragon Master wrote:
> On Sun, 11 Jan 2004, Ishan Chattopadhyaya wrote:

> > Just a thought... did you mean removing *source code generation* in Glade-3
> > by this?
>
> The thought had crossed my mind.  Removing it from the core of the
> application is a good rearchitecting decision, but I don't entirely
> approve of "code generation is evil, don't do it" mantra chanting.  If
> there's something wrong with the code it generates, fix it, don't delete
> the generator.  There's ALWAYS something wrong with the generated code.
> What is gcc besides a giant (machine) code generator?  I don't think you
> can find anybody who will try to claim gcc-generated code is always
> perfect.  The imperfection of machine-generated code is hardly sufficient
> grounds for eradicating it.  I don't consider the development cycle or
> overwrite error arguments sufficient either.  All three arguments apply to
> specific circumstances and none of them apply to all circumstances.

I agree with a lot of this. Currently C code generation and libglade
both have issues, but both could be fixed if people were bothered.


If we had a decent IDE it wouldn't matter if it used code generation or
libglade, as the parts of the code that created the interface should be
kept pretty much out of sight.


But libglade does have 2 important advantages over code generation:

 1) It is easier to write than code generation, especially for the
    complex widgets. (Supporting the GnomeUIInfo stuff was unbearable!)

 2) Once libglade is written, it can easily be used in lots of language
    bindings.

That's why I was one of the people who suggested that code generation
wasn't included in Glade 3.

Damon