Re: [gtk-list] Porting a Motif app. to GTK

[Havoc Pennington <hp redhat com>]

On Sun, 15 Aug 1999, Brian J. Murrell wrote:
> I have a Motif app. (well it's not my app, it is a very decent GUI
> mailer called Ishmail - http://www.ishmail.com/ that has gone
> OpenSource) that I want to start converting to GTK.
> 
> So, my first question is, should I?  :-)  

Certainly, this seems like a good idea.

> What I mean is what is the
> feasibility of converting an app from Motif to GTK?  Is there a porting
> guide, or any notes or tools of any kind out there to assist?
> 

GTK was written to port the GIMP from Motif to GTK. So it has a certain
amount of Motif similarity.

> Will it be possible to convert piece by piece such that I can actually
> run this app with a mixture of widgets from both toolkits?  i.e.  If I
> convert the menus to use the GTK menu widget(s) will I be able to run
> the app at that point?  I can't see why not myself.
> 

Your main loops will collide, and container widgets in one kit won't hold
child widgets from the other. So no, I don't think this would work very
well. I'd say you'll have to #if 0 or simply delete all the Motif code
before you can compile the GTK version.

> Oh yes.  This app. is written in C++.  Would that make a difference in
> your opinion as to whether you used gtk+ proper or the gtk-- wrappers?
> 

This is purely a matter of preference; try both, see which you like.

Havoc