Very Computer

Larry

Chris

Quote:> Hi, I'm going to be writing an application that involves GUI, sockets,
> and threads to run on Linux.  I'm debating on whether to use tcl/tk with
> c/c++ or Java for this task (because I don't want to learn X window).  A
> big issue is stability and after that is look-and-feel (the GUI part).
> The program is more i/o than compute intensive so java and its
> interpretive nature (read speed) is not that big a deal (I hope).  Java
> is attractive because it's all encompassing (ie, don't have to deal with
> native threads, a separate language/script for gui,...), and it seems
> like a "hipper" choice.  But this app will be fairly mission critical so
> I want the best candidate for the job.  I'm fairly new to Java and even
> newer to tcl/tk so I'm not aware of some of the nuances, tradeoffs,
> pitfalls involved.  And which one works better with Linux.  Please let
> me know what you think.  Thank you very much!!  BTW, the app doesn't
> involve the web, it will only operate in a closed LAN.

> Larry

        Since it sounds like you plan on deploying an application ( as
opposed to an applet ), you can easily use Swing, which is perhaps the most
OO ( in this case, read easy-to-develop with ) portable windowing system
in existence. If you have any experience in OOP ( specifically with the
MVC design pattern ), you can build a complex, yet easily maintainable
gui in a very short period of time. If you prefer to avoid hand-coding
the gui logic / screens, there exists an entire plethora of highly
acclaimed _free_ commercial ide's available ( for Linux ) to do the
work for you. For example, Borland's JBuilder3, IBM's Visual Age for Java,
and Sun's NetBeans.

        While the latest versions of Java ( 1.2 / the 1.3 beta ) are not
yet well proven, the 1.1 version has an incredible amount of deployment
time behind it ( read well-proven ), and is sufficient to run Swing.

        Of course, you can integrate any critical high-performance native
C code into the mix through JNI, sockets, or Corba.

        Java is much more than just a 'hip' choice for Finance Directors.
Open your favorite EE magazine, for example, and just see how many articles
you'll find about Java ( And I'd be willing to bet you won't find one single
mention of TCL/TK at all, much less as an option over Java ).

        I think you'll find that TCL/TK is much more on the level of Basic
or Rexx ( meaning, a scripting language ). Java bridges the gap between
these scripting languages and C++, by providing a highly flexible and oo api
that is very easy to use without introducing all of the headaches of manual
memory management, multiple inheritance, and extraneous C baggage ( for
example pre-processor directives ) that C++ carries with it.

        God bless,
        -Toby Reyelts
--
Toby Reyelts
331107  Georgia Tech Station Atlanta Georgia 30332-1365

Quote:>         I think you'll find that TCL/TK is much more on the level of Basic
> or Rexx ( meaning, a scripting language ). Java bridges the gap between
> these scripting languages and C++, by providing a highly flexible and oo api
> that is very easy to use without introducing all of the headaches of manual
> memory management, multiple inheritance, and extraneous C baggage ( for
> example pre-processor directives ) that C++ carries with it.

you should really consider itcl too! it closes the same gap by providing
access to both parts: scripting and oop,.. its just so fast to program with it
(scripting) and easy to extend (oop),..

Cheers,
Selim

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Quote:> Hi, I'm going to be writing an application that involves GUI, sockets,
> and threads to run on Linux.  I'm debating on whether to use tcl/tk
with
> c/c++ or Java for this task (because I don't want to learn X
window).  A
> big issue is stability and after that is look-and-feel (the GUI part).
> The program is more i/o than compute intensive so java and its
> interpretive nature (read speed) is not that big a deal (I hope).
Java
> is attractive because it's all encompassing (ie, don't have to deal
with
> native threads, a separate language/script for gui,...), and it seems
> like a "hipper" choice.  But this app will be fairly mission critical
so
> I want the best candidate for the job.  I'm fairly new to Java and
even
> newer to tcl/tk so I'm not aware of some of the nuances, tradeoffs,
> pitfalls involved.  And which one works better with Linux.  Please let
> me know what you think.  Thank you very much!!  BTW, the app doesn't
> involve the web, it will only operate in a closed LAN.

> Larry

For the majority of GUI work, threads are only ever a gain on multiple
CPU machines.  Which isn't most workstations or desktop systems...

Donal.
--

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It's far more of a "real" programming language than Tcl, and it
can be used with Tk, gtk, Qt, or wxWindows GUI toolkits.  A
couple of those are portable between Unix and Win32.  Python is
object-oriented, and supports threads.  There are tons of
library modules for everything from numerical analysis to HTML
to databases. There's even a version of Python that's
implemented in Java, so you can use the Java GUI classes and
intermingle Java modules and Python modules.

  http://www.python.org/

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Christopher

Python supports modular programming.

Python supports object-oriented programming with multiple
inheritence.

Python has a usable exception handling system.

Quote:>I've gone through some handfuls, and I like Tcl best from the
>potentials/restrictions ratio.

 a) Tcl syntax (particularly quoting) was just too hard for me.
    I always had to actually _try_ things to see what they
    would do.  IMO, that's not an acceptible feature for a
    language.

 b) Tcl lacked useful data types like structures and objects.

Quote:>Matter of taste, maybe ;-)  

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Thanks,
Dan Fabrizio

For more info on combining Tcl/Tk, Java, and C code, check out this URL:

http://www.scriptics.com/java

Mo Dejong
RedHat Software

    <http://www.python.org/doc/current/ext/ext.html>

AFAICT, people generally extend Python with C and C++ to do
what they want rather than embedding Python in a C/C++
application.  

I've done neither, but I get the impression that it's more
common to call modules written in C/C++ from a python "main"
than it is to call the python interpreter from C/C++ "main".
However, the above web page shows how to do both.

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Quote:> Python has a usable exception handling system.

Quote:> >I've gone through some handfuls, and I like Tcl best from the
> >potentials/restrictions ratio.

> I wrote a couple Tcl/Tk apps, and finally gave up and switched
> to Scheme (and later Python) because:

>  a) Tcl syntax (particularly quoting) was just too hard for me.
>     I always had to actually _try_ things to see what they
>     would do.  IMO, that's not an acceptible feature for a lang

Quote:>  b) Tcl lacked useful data types like structures and objects.

Quote:> >Matter of taste, maybe ;-)

> Undoubtedly.

--
   Jeffrey Hobbs                          The Tcl Guy
   jeffrey.hobbs at scriptics.com         Scriptics Corp.