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So the time has come to implement the UI for my ad-blocker application. Never been particularly good with UIs.
I'm searching for ways to make it look modern, like the Windows Settings app or GitHub Desktop. Unfortunately, my UI design skills are limited to line-of-business apps.
So I got a question: Has anyone here any experience with WinUI 3?
Is it worth the learning curve, or will it be abandoned soon? I read conflicting information from Mr. Google.
UPDATE:
So I created my first WinUI project, and it looks intriguing. I'll be working with it over the weekend. Only thing is that WinUI applications are distributed as MSIX packages, and I'm hoping that I'm not restricted to creating crippled applications like on the Universal Windows Platform. I need it to be a full desktop application.
The difficult we do right away...
...the impossible takes slightly longer.
modified 31-Aug-24 19:16pm.
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Richard Andrew x64 wrote: So the time has come to implement the UI for my ad-blocker application.
Noice, the fun stuff.
Richard Andrew x64 wrote: Never been particularly good with UIs.
It's a completely different skill set. And, one that requires you thinking a lot less like an engineer and more like regular person. Unless it's an engineering app, I guess. But, the GIMP is a perfect example of engineers not consulting normal humans.
Richard Andrew x64 wrote: I'm searching for ways to make it look modern, like the Windows Settings app or GitHub Desktop. Unfortunately, my UI design skills are limited to line-of-business apps.
Don't sell yourself short, LOB app users are still users. That being said...
Richard Andrew x64 wrote: Is it worth the learning curve, or will it be abandoned soon? I read conflicting information from Mr. Google.
I wish I could help with that specific tech... me not know.
But, if this is an app you care about and from a general UI perspective to get ideas for a look, this steadfast rule applies.
Always, always, always just hire a professional. Can't begin to tell you how many times my jaw just dropped about how easily and effortlessly they'll cook up something that's like 20 times better than my crap that took forever.  I'm sure the reverse is also true; we make programs few can. But, it's what we do. Pretty is what they do. Teamwork.
Either way, if you hire someone or go solo, you should be checking out sites that offer Software UI templates. I haven't bought a software UI one, but for the web at least, most templates are like $50 USD. But, even if you don't buy a template it help give you ideas as a point of reference for the artist you hire.
Jeremy Falcon
modified 31-Aug-24 19:35pm.
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Also, know the vibe of your app. You want something simple and kinda cutesy like this? Or, do you want something serious and intimidating that pwns n00bs for having the audacity to open it?
Richard Andrew x64 wrote: So I created my first WinUI project
Noice. If it were CSS/web I could say a lot more, but I'm a n00b here. Hope you have a blast exploring it though.
Jeremy Falcon
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Wow, the app you linked to looks awesome. My dream is to be able to create apps that look like that!
(That screenshot is from Mac, right?)
I've got some work to do to convert my classes from my Windows Forms client app to ones that will work in WinUI, but already I can see that the Named Pipe classes I need to communicate between the ad-blocker service and the client are supported. I was really worried that they wouldn't be!
I've become set in my ways over the past few years, and it's exciting to start learning a new framework, especially one that can create awesome UIs.
The difficult we do right away...
...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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Richard Andrew x64 wrote: My dream is to be able to create apps that look like that!
Yeah man, there's a whole other side to software dev... the human side. IMO the quickest way to get you closer to that dream is ya know... hiring peeps.  Or go find a graphic artist buddy and con him/her with a cup of coffee.
Richard Andrew x64 wrote: (That screenshot is from Mac, right?)
Maybe, it's just a random one I pulled off the Internet. Looks like it though.
Richard Andrew x64 wrote: I've become set in my ways over the past few years, and it's exciting to start learning a new framework, especially one that can create awesome UIs.
Nice. Totally get it. It's the same way I'm feeling about Zig. There's no reason tech can't be fun like it was when we were kids slamming down the jolt cola .
Jeremy Falcon
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Richard Andrew x64 wrote: (That screenshot is from Mac, right?)
I'm not a Mac user, but a couple of things give it away:
- The red/yellow/green buttons in the top-right corner
- The rounded corners
- The skeuomorphism used, like that big knob control, and the shadow that is cast underneath it (which a coworker of mine would insist makes things look like they're dirty)
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Gary and George Harrison were neighbours in Esher in the UK ( near where I live ) and George said he was one of the best guitarists he'd ever known
In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught. In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity. - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
modified 1-Sep-24 16:18pm.
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No problem
In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught. In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity. - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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For most things, the default keybindings have always been a enough... Ctrl+Shift+B for default build task, etc. I was happy, content, swapping over to the terminal for other crap. But, recently decided to make a few of my own and now I wonder what took me so long to embrace the awesome.
Here's my current one. It's just two key bindings that run tests in the current file and runs all tests. Given the fact I do this a lot, it's huge time saver. I can't go back to switching screens now.
[
{
"key": "ctrl+shift+meta+space",
"command": "workbench.action.tasks.runTask",
"args": "Test All"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+shift+space",
"command": "workbench.action.tasks.runTask",
"args": "Test File"
}
]
Anyone have any good shortcuts too in their keybindings?
Jeremy Falcon
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I _might_ still have a copy of an old EDT macro file ...
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I gave up on figuring out an algorithm to shift bits of an arbitrarily long buffer so I asked Perplexity. Its' answer was not correct but it got me started. The reworked code almost works. All that remains is getting the byte order correct. I will finish it after watching a movie.
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BernardIE5317 wrote: Its' answer was not correct but it got me started
There's been numerous times where I couldn't figure out how to invoke some obscure API with little or no documentation, and some AI got me started. I never take for granted anything it comes up with will work, so I review and test everything carefully instead of blindly cutting and pasting into my code, so it does have its uses (and clearly, its limitations).
Obscure APIs, or writing boilerplate code that I've written a million times before, but can't be bothered to remember at that particular instant (or to refactor once and for all into something reusable, but that's a separate matter) 
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A woman drove me to drink and I didn't even have the decency to thank her.
W. C. Fields
A home without books is a body without soul. Marcus Tullius Cicero
PartsBin an Electronics Part Organizer - Release Version 1.4.0 (Many new features) JaxCoder.com
Latest Article: EventAggregator
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Mr Fields your house is on fire - I always like to come to a warm home
In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught. In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity. - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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"If your parents never had children, chances are... neither will you." Dick Cavett
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Mine had seven - I had none ?
In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught. In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity. - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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Today I found a vector graphics library in C that can potentially run on little devices (at least after I'm done with it)
GitHub - sammycage/plutovg: Tiny 2D vector graphics library in C[^]
1. It supports text and it uses the same "STB" truetype engine as my library does in order to do so. What a happy coincidence! I've made some mods to my fork, but it's not a problem.
2. Someone else wrote an SVG engine that works on top of it, meaning I think it's feature complete enough for that that I can too.
3. It appears on first blush that it creates contours and edges upon document creation rather than upon render, which is a boon for performance compared to what I had been forced to do before.
4. It uses tables to do a lot of trigonometry required.
So now not only do I have my anti-aliased, alpha blended vector graphics additions to GFX, I can finally hopefully sidestep my crashing issue (The waterbed post from the other day) because my strong suspicion is the crash was coming from the SVG end of things. Since I'm replacing that entire mess with this, that will hopefully tie that in a bow as well.
Once finished GFX will be the premier embedded graphics library for doing vector graphics.
At that point I'll feel it's a worthy alternative to LVGL depending on the project needs.
Man, what a find.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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I just use an 8-point font to save code space. 
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I take it it's open source ?
In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught. In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity. - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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Yeah - MIT license, like my lib.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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That open source project appears to be unattributed and based off FreeType[^], make sure to add that to your tertiary licence chain after you refactor it to be unrecognizable. After you get it working on your MCU it should be easy to compare to the improvements over the LVGL offering[^]. Looks like FreeType on LVGL requires 24KB of stack.
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It uses some code from Freetype, and my license documentation will reflect that.
I'm actually pouring over all the code to convert it to C++ and do things like integrate it such that it uses my bitmap class instead of its own - that sort of thing, so I'm pretty familiar with where the codebase comes from.
And I've worked with FreeType before and am familiar with it, which is why I made TinyTTF - and contributed that to LVGL as it runs in more places.
That said, the freetype bits used in pluto isn't very heavy - just typedefs and rasterization algorithms.
Check out my IoT graphics library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx
And my IoT UI/User Experience library here:
https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
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