Comparison of XVT and wxWidgets
by Leif Jensen (leif@danmos.dk), January 1996
I have been working with XVT for some time now (on and off for the last
1 1/2 years) and I would like to make a comparison between the products. The
comparison will of course be subjective, but I'll try to keep as objective
as possible.
My comparison is only based on things, that I have tried in XVT (but not
always in wxWin, yet!). I am comparing wxWin 1.63 and XVT 4.01. The XVT version
is a *C* based whereas wxWidgets (as you might know) is *C++*. XVT *does*
have a a C++ version, but have been running on a SCO-Unix (UnixWare) system
without support for C++.
In wxWidgets I am having difficulties in getting a overview of the
structure and inheritance of objects. This might be due to the lack of drawings
in the documentation, but also because I have been working a long time with
XVT and only around a month with wxWidgets (although I have *read* most of the
documentation).
The version of XVT that I am comparing is the basic one including simple
PowerObjects, and not any optional packages. (Recently XVT and Orca Software
changed marketing policy, whereas the fancy part of PowerObjects are sold by
Orca and the simple part by XVT). Of course you can *buy* add-on products from
third party vendors.
In the table below, a - means not available, a + available, a (+) means
sort of, a ? means don't know.
Subject XVT wxWin
Items:
Windows + +
Dialogs + +
Push and Toggle Buttons + +
Picture Buttons + +
3D buttons + - (+)
Check buttons + +
Radio buttons + +
Listboxes + +
Group boxes + +
Single-line Text edits + +
Multi-line Text edits + +
Text panels + +
MDI - +(Windows)
Gauge - +
Tree - +
Custom 'controls' + -
Table (+) (+)
Tabbed dialogs - -
Toolbar + +
Status bar + +
Additional data (classes, my XVT is only C):
Lists + +
Strings -(+) +
IO streams + (C++)
Bitmaps + +
Bitmaps (platform independent) + -(+)
Pictures (e.g. GIF) - +
Fonts + +
Pen, Brush, Line style, Fill style + +
Clipboard + +
Standard dialogs:
About box + (wxMessageBox)
Question box + wxMessageBox
Error box (message box) + +
Fatal exit + +
File open + +
File save + +
Font select + (Motif+Windows)
General message + wxMessageBox
Note + wxMessageBox
Page setup (print) + +
String prompt + +
Warning + wxMessageBox
Drawing editor - -
Clipping region + +
Filesystem - independent + (+)
Memory allocation + (C++)
Image handling BMP BMP
XPM XPM
XBM XBM
GIF
?
Palette + -
Rectangle (handling of areas as an object) + -
Timer + +
Tooltips - -
Event handling + +
User definable events + (+)
Constraint system (some bugs in wxWin/xview) - +
Drag and drop - (+)
Context sensitive help + (+)
Nested panels and canvases - (+)
Extended static items - (+)
Sockets - -
IPC - +
ODBC - (+)
RPC - -
OLE-2 - -
Install utility for applications (Windows) - +
Install utility for applications (UNIX)ws) - -
Library installation procedure + (+)
XVT-Design/wxBuilder:
General impression good good (some bugs)
needs a little work
Incl. action code + -
(I have added some
of this myself)
Standard dialogs + -
Platforms:
Windows 3.11 + +
Windows NT + +
Windows 95 (+) +
UNIX (XVT has many supp. UNIX's, but only with Motif)
UNIX, X-windows, Motif + +
UNIX, X-windows, XView - +
UNIX, X-windows - -
OS/2 - PM + (+)
VMS (Open VMS for AXP ??? ) / Motif + (+)
Mac + (+)
General:
Bug level (100 = no bugs :-), 0 = :-( ) 97 88
Speed of appl. 0 = :-(, 100 = :-) 50 70
Cross platform consistency 95 80
'Open' project data (ascii) - +
Level of examples (number and versatility) 60 95
Support responsiveness (0 = :-(, 100 = :-) ) 65 99
Support for (interpreted) languages none wxCLIPS
wxPython
wxScheme
Doc/view framework - +
Printing + +
Runtime type system + +
Ease of use in certain areas ?????
Help system + +
Documentation:
General very good good
(Could be more
explanatory)