Re: Advice / Tutorials on Glib programming

[Gus Koppel <gtk spamkiller bytechase cx>]

Ryan McDougall wrote:

>       I am designing a non-gui app using Glib, but there is no similar
> tutorial on the GTK website so explain what the API means and does.
> Reading through the entire source code should never be required, and I
> am perfectly willing to write tutorials and API docs for GTK et al.,
> but I need to learn the stuff first.
>
>       Basically, can anyone point me to some good resources, or
>       willing to sit on IRC and be asked some stupid questions? Ive
>       got Christmas break to get some work in before next semester, so
>       please let me know if your interested in helping me out. 

To me, mentioning "reading through the entire source code" sounds a bit
like you might not have seen documentations like
http://developer.gnome.org/doc/API/2.0/glib/glib-utilities.html or
http://developer.gnome.org/doc/API/2.0/glib/glib-core.html before? I
believe these *are* rather good resources (not always complete though).

I think, at first you should know what you want to program, i.e. what
your application should accomplish. You should have (at least) basic
ideas about what functionality you will need for it. Then you should
have a look to see whether GLib provides functions to assist you in
that. You can (should) do that before starting to write your program.
Without doubt, GLib can be helpful on many issues but still you will
have to write most of your application by yourself.

Just starting with the goal "I write a program using GLib" but maybe not
understanding GLib's fundamentals or what GLib offers and what not
likely isn't a useful approach.

However, if you don't understand terms like "memory allocation", "I/O
channels", "date and time funtions" or "file utilities" mentioned at the
pages given above, or if you don't know how to deal with the issues
behind them, then you should probably (re?)start with *very* fundamental
tutorials about programming in general. Issues like these are not
GLib-/GTK-specific. Explaining these likely isn't the objective of the
GLib docs, just like explaining the traffic rules isn't the objective of
your cars' technical manual.