jlothian@castle.ed.ac.uk (J Lothian) writes:
> Date: 20 Feb 93 17:14:29 GMT
> Organization: Edinburgh University Computing Service
>
> In article <1lq7c2INNahu@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu>,
> cs438@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Denis LaFont) writes:
> |>
> |> What are the prolog implementations that ennable the display of
> |> graphics and GUI components (X widget fot instance) ?
> |>
> We have a package called the Gizmo System, which is
> essentially something like a widget set, implemented
> in Prolog (Sicstus variety) on top of Oblog (an internally-
> developed object-oriented extension to Prolog) and a
> heavily-modified version of XWIP, a public-domain
> Prolog/X interface that gives you XLib-level control of X
> from Prolog. .....
> ...
> Other systems you might think about are:
> Sepia Prolog (object-oriented user-interface extension called
> PCE);
> Sicstus Prolog (comes with 'Graphics Manager', which I don't know
> much about, but seems to be similar to PCE).
> Quintus offer a thing called 'ProWindows', which seems to be a
> tidied up version of PCE (though I wouldn't swear to that).
> .....
> James Lothian | "It's life, Jim,
> james@uk.ac.ed.caad | but not as we know it"
There is also a rich interface to X available in the Poplog prolog
system.
Basically Poplog provides facilities for linking in widget sets,
handling call-backs etc. It also comes with some widgets of its
own for managing text and graphics (there's a very easily usable
graphical system based on relative coordinates, which is now being
extended to an object-oriented Graphical Objects package, allowing
graphical objects to be manipulated either by program or by moving
them around on the screen, with automatic updating of either
screen or data-structures, respectively. My MSc students have been
using a test version and found it powerful and robust.) The Poplog
text widget is used in the Poplog X-based editor, XVed.
The lowest level facilities are implemented in C and in the depths
of the Poplog system (e.g. handling callbacks). The higher level
utilities are implemented mainly in Pop-11 libraries (one of the
four Poplog languages -- a language with approximately the power of
Common Lisp, but with a Pascal-like syntax). There are libraries
providing interfaces to Open Look, Motif and the Mit Athena widget
sets, and the library includes the following (copied from the online
documentation file):
-------------------------------------------------------------------
LIB *PROPSHEET is a high-level, general purpose tool for building
dialog boxes.
It is designed to simplify the creation and management of 'Property
Sheets' (popup windows containing settings). However, LIB *PROPSHEET is
very flexible, and can be used to generate almost any kind of dialog box
with a mixture of labels and controls.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The libraries come in source-code form, making it easy to modify
them to suit your own requirements (and there's masses of online
documentation about X and the Poplog interface to it).
There are easy mechanisms for calling Pop-11 from Poplog prolog, and
vice versa, and this can be used to drive the graphics or other X
facilities.
It would be possible to produce a variety of different interfaces to
X from Poplog Prolog, to suit different tastes. A simple example is
in the Poplog $popcontrib library.
Poplog runs on VAX VMS and a variety of Unix platforms (e.g. SPARC,
DECStation, HP 9000 series, Silicon Graphics, MIPS. It is being
ported to Solaris and to HP RISC).
Alas it's not free (as there's no research funding available to pay
for the development, unlike some other Prolog systems), but there
are huge educational discounts.
Contacts:
Everwhere except USA and Canada
Integral Solutions Ltd
Unit 3, Campbell Court
Bramley,
Basingstoke,
Hampshire,
RG26 5EG
Phone +44 (0)256 882028 Fax +44 (0)256 882182
Email: isl@integ.uucp or isl@integ.co.uk.ac
In USA and Canada
Either Integral Solutions, as above, or
Computable Functions Inc.,
35 South Orchard Drive,
Amherst, MA 01002, USA
tel (413) 253-7637
or
Prof Robin Popplestone
Dept. of Computer and Information Science
Lederle Graduate Research Center
University of Massachusetts
Amherst, MA 01003
USA
Email: pop@cs.umass.edu
UK educational sites can get it direct from Sussex University,
at a specially low price. Contact
popsales@cogs.sussex.ac.uk
Aaron
[I've cross-posted to comp.lang.pop in case any of its readers wish
to comment]
---
--
Aaron Sloman,
School of Computer Science, The University of Birmingham, B15 2TT, England
EMAIL A.Sloman@cs.bham.ac.uk OR A.Sloman@bham.ac.uk
Phone: +44-(0)21-414-3711 Fax: +44-(0)21-414-4281
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