update roadmap

[fanfix.git] / README.md

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index ee5a26543ff6436057ee4784a26be3ef42ec14b4..161b8e6de0dc4043515367e4f22c4cd540a24fb5 100644 (file)
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1,50 +1,49 @@
 Jexer - Java Text User Interface library
 ========================================
 
 Jexer - Java Text User Interface library
 ========================================
 

-WARNING: THIS IS ALPHA CODE!  PLEASE CONSIDER FILING BUGS AS YOU
-ENCOUNTER THEM.
+This library implements a text-based windowing system reminiscient of
+Borland's [Turbo Vision](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbo_Vision)
+system.  (For those wishing to use the actual C++ Turbo Vision
+library, see [Sergio Sigala's C++ version based on the sources
+released by Borland,](http://tvision.sourceforge.net/) or consider
+Free Pascal's [Free Vision
+library.](http://wiki.freepascal.org/Free_Vision))

 
 

-This library is intended to implement a text-based windowing system
-loosely reminiscient of Borland's [Turbo
-Vision](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbo_Vision) library.  For those
-wishing to use the actual C++ Turbo Vision library, see [Sergio
-Sigala's updated version](http://tvision.sourceforge.net/) that runs
-on many more platforms.
-
-Two backends are available:
+Jexer currently supports three backends:

 
 * System.in/out to a command-line ECMA-48 / ANSI X3.64 type terminal
   (tested on Linux + xterm).  I/O is handled through terminal escape
   sequences generated by the library itself: ncurses is not required
 
 * System.in/out to a command-line ECMA-48 / ANSI X3.64 type terminal
   (tested on Linux + xterm).  I/O is handled through terminal escape
   sequences generated by the library itself: ncurses is not required

-  or linked to.  xterm mouse tracking using UTF8 coordinates is
-  supported.  For the demo application, this is the default backend on
-  non-Windows platforms.
+  or linked to.  xterm mouse tracking using UTF8 and SGR coordinates
+  are supported.  For the demo application, this is the default
+  backend on non-Windows/non-Mac platforms.

 
 

-* Java Swing UI.  This backend can be selected by setting
-  jexer.Swing=true.  The default window size for Swing is 132x40,
-  which is set in jexer.session.SwingSession.  For the demo
-  application, this is the default backend on Windows platforms.
+* The same command-line ECMA-48 / ANSI X3.64 type terminal as above,
+  but to any general InputStream/OutputStream or Reader/Writer.  See
+  the file jexer.demos.Demo2 for an example of running the demo over a
+  TCP socket.  jexer.demos.Demo3 demonstrates how one might use a
+  character encoding than the default UTF-8.

 
 

-The demo application showing the existing UI controls is available via
-'java -jar jexer.jar' or 'java -Djexer.Swing=true -jar jexer.jar' .
+* Java Swing UI.  This backend can be selected by setting
+  jexer.Swing=true.  The default window size for Swing is 80x25, which
+  is set in jexer.session.SwingSession.  For the demo application,
+  this is the default backend on Windows and Mac platforms.

 
 Additional backends can be created by subclassing
 jexer.backend.Backend and passing it into the TApplication
 constructor.
 
 
 Additional backends can be created by subclassing
 jexer.backend.Backend and passing it into the TApplication
 constructor.
 

+The Jexer homepage, which includes additional information and binary
+release downloads, is at: https://jexer.sourceforge.io .  The Jexer
+source code is hosted at: https://github.com/klamonte/jexer .
+

 
 
 License
 -------
 
 
 
 License
 -------
 

-This project is licensed LGPL ("GNU Lesser General Public License",
-sometimes called the "Library GPL") version 3 or greater.  You may
-freely use Jexer in both closed source (proprietary) and open source
-applications, however any changes you make to the Jexer code must be
-made available to your users.
-
-See the file LICENSE for the full license text, which includes both
-the GPL v3 and the LGPL supplemental terms.
+This project is licensed under the MIT License.  See the file LICENSE
+for the full license text.

 
 
 
 
 
 


@@ -59,30 +58,123 @@ here](http://files.ax86.net/terminus-ttf/) .
 Usage
 -----
 
 Usage
 -----
 

-Usage patterns are still being worked on, but in general the goal will
-be to build applications as follows:
+Simply subclass TApplication and then run it in a new thread:

 
 ```Java
 import jexer.*;
 
 
 ```Java
 import jexer.*;
 

-public class MyApplication extends TApplication {
+class MyApplication extends TApplication {

 
 

-    public MyApplication() {
+    public MyApplication() throws Exception {

         super(BackendType.SWING); // Could also use BackendType.XTERM
 
         // Create standard menus for File and Window
         addFileMenu();
         addWindowMenu();
         super(BackendType.SWING); // Could also use BackendType.XTERM
 
         // Create standard menus for File and Window
         addFileMenu();
         addWindowMenu();

+
+        // Add a custom window, see below for its code.
+        addWindow(new MyWindow(this));

     }
 
     public static void main(String [] args) {
     }
 
     public static void main(String [] args) {

-        MyApplication app = new MyApplication();
-        (new Thread(app)).start();
+        try {
+            MyApplication app = new MyApplication();
+            (new Thread(app)).start();
+        } catch (Throwable t) {
+            t.printStackTrace();
+        }
+    }
+}
+```
+
+Similarly, subclass TWindow and add some widgets:
+
+```Java
+class MyWindow extends TWindow {
+
+    public MyWindow(TApplication application) {
+        // See TWindow's API for several constructors.  This one uses the
+        // application, title, width, and height.  Note that the window width
+        // and height include the borders.  The widgets inside the window
+        // will see (0, 0) as the top-left corner inside the borders,
+        // i.e. what the window would see as (1, 1).
+        super(application, "My Window", 30, 20);
+
+        // See TWidget's API for convenience methods to add various kinds of
+        // widgets.  Note that ANY widget can be a container for other
+        // widgets: TRadioGroup for example has TRadioButtons as child
+        // widgets.
+
+        // We will add a basic label, text entry field, and button.
+        addLabel("This is a label", 5, 3);
+        addField(5, 5, 20, false, "enter text here");
+        // For the button, we will pop up a message box if the user presses
+        // it.
+        addButton("Press &Me!", 5, 8, new TAction() {
+            public void DO() {
+                MyWindow.this.messageBox("Box Title", "You pressed me, yay!");
+            }
+        } );

     }
 }
 ```
 
     }
 }
 ```
 

-See the file demos/Demo1.java for detailed examples.
+Put these into a file, compile it with jexer.jar in the classpath, run
+it and you'll see an application like this:
+
+![The Example Code Above](/screenshots/readme_application.png?raw=true "The application in the text of README.md")
+
+See the files in jexer.demos for many more detailed examples showing
+all of the existing UI controls.  The demo can be run in three
+different ways:
+
+  * 'java -jar jexer.jar' .  This will use System.in/out with
+    xterm-like sequences on non-Windows platforms.  On Windows it will
+    use a Swing JFrame.
+
+  * 'java -Djexer.Swing=true -jar jexer.jar' .  This will always use
+    Swing on any platform.
+
+  * 'java -cp jexer.jar jexer.demos.Demo2 PORT' (where PORT is a
+    number to run the TCP daemon on).  This will use the telnet
+    protocol to establish an 8-bit clean channel and be aware of
+    screen size changes.
+
+
+
+More Screenshots
+----------------
+
+![Several Windows Open Including A Terminal](/screenshots/screenshot1.png?raw=true "Several Windows Open Including A Terminal")
+
+![Yo Dawg...](/screenshots/yodawg.png?raw=true "Yo Dawg, I heard you like text windowing systems, so I ran a text windowing system inside your text windowing system so you can have a terminal in your terminal.")
+
+
+
+System Properties
+-----------------
+
+The following properties control features of Jexer:
+
+  jexer.Swing
+  -----------
+
+  Used only by jexer.demos.Demo1.  If true, use the Swing interface
+  for the demo application.  Default: true on Windows platforms
+  (os.name starts with "Windows"), false on non-Windows platforms.
+
+  jexer.Swing.cursorStyle
+  -----------------------
+
+  Used by jexer.io.SwingScreen.  Selects the cursor style to draw.
+  Valid values are: underline, block, outline.  Default: underline.
+
+  jexer.Swing.tripleBuffer
+  ------------------------
+
+  Used by jexer.io.SwingScreen.  If false, use naive Swing thread
+  drawing.  This may be faster on slower systems, but will also be
+  more likely to have screen tearing.  Default: true.

 
 
 
 
 
 


@@ -93,15 +185,6 @@ Some arbitrary design decisions had to be made when either the
 obviously expected behavior did not happen or when a specification was
 ambiguous.  This section describes such issues.
 
 obviously expected behavior did not happen or when a specification was
 ambiguous.  This section describes such issues.
 

-  TTerminalWindow
-  ---------------
-
-  - TTerminalWindow will hang on input from the remote if the
-    TApplication is exited before the TTerminalWindow's process has
-    closed on its own.  This is due to a Java limitation/interaction
-    between blocking reads (which is necessary to get UTF8 translation
-    correct) and file streams.
-

   - See jexer.tterminal.ECMA48 for more specifics of terminal
     emulation limitations.
 
   - See jexer.tterminal.ECMA48 for more specifics of terminal
     emulation limitations.
 


@@ -110,89 +193,37 @@ ambiguous.  This section describes such issues.
     input (see the ENABLE_LINE_INPUT flag for GetConsoleMode() and
     SetConsoleMode()).
 
     input (see the ENABLE_LINE_INPUT flag for GetConsoleMode() and
     SetConsoleMode()).
 

-  ECMA48 Backend
-  --------------
-  
-  - Mouse support for BackendType.ECMA48/XTERM currently requires UTF-8 
-    coordinates (1005 mode).  Terminals that support UTF-8 mouse coordinates
-    include xterm, rxvt-unicode, gnome-terminal, and konsole.  Due to Java's
-    InputStreamReader requirement of a valid UTF-8 stream, one must assume
-    the terminal will always generate correct UTF-8 bytes.  Mode 1006 (SGR)
-    will be supported in a future release.
+  - TTerminalWindow launches 'script -fqe /dev/null' or 'script -q -F
+    /dev/null' on non-Windows platforms.  This is a workaround for the
+    C library behavior of checking for a tty: script launches $SHELL
+    in a pseudo-tty.  This works on Linux and Mac but might not on
+    other Posix-y platforms.

 
 

+  - Closing a TTerminalWindow without exiting the process inside it
+    may result in a zombie 'script' process.

 
 

+  - Java's InputStreamReader as used by the ECMA48 backend requires a
+    valid UTF-8 stream.  The default X10 encoding for mouse
+    coordinates outside (160,94) can corrupt that stream, at best
+    putting garbage keyboard events in the input queue but at worst
+    causing the backend reader thread to throw an Exception and exit
+    and make the entire UI unusable.  Mouse support therefore requires
+    a terminal that can deliver either UTF-8 coordinates (1005 mode)
+    or SGR coordinates (1006 mode).  Most modern terminals can do
+    this.

 
 

-Roadmap
--------
+  - jexer.session.TTYSession calls 'stty size' once every second to
+    check the current window size, performing the same function as
+    ioctl(TIOCGWINSZ) but without requiring a native library.

 
 

-Many tasks remain before calling this version 1.0:
-
-0.0.2: STABILIZE EXISTING
-
-- TTerminalWindow
-  - Expose shell commands as properties
-- Swing:
-  - Blinking cursor
-  - Block cursor
-- ECMA48Backend running on socket
-- TFileOpen
-- Decide on naming convention: getText, getValue, getLabel: one or all
-  of them?
-- Refactor:
-  - TKeypress:
-    - getCh() --> getChar()
-    - getAlt/getCtrl/getShift --> isAltDown / isCtrlDown / isShiftDown
-  - Other boolean getters --> isSomething
-- Document any properties used
-  - Expose use of 'stty'
-
-0.0.3: FINISH PORTING
-
-- TTreeView
-  - Also add keyboard navigation
-- TDirectoryList
-  - Also add keyboard navigation
-
-0.0.4: NEW STUFF
-
-- Making TMenu keyboard accelerators active/inactive
-- TStatusBar
-- TEditor
-- TWindow
-  - "Smart placement" for new windows
-
-0.0.5: BUG HUNT
-
-- TSubMenu keyboard mnemonic not working
-- ECMA48Terminal
-  - Mode 1006 mouse coordinates
-
-0.1.0: BETA RELEASE
-
-- TSpinner
-- TComboBox
-- TListBox
-- TCalendar
-- TColorPicker
-
-Wishlist features (2.0):
-
-- TTerminal
-  - Handle resize events (pass to child process)
-- Screen
-  - Allow complex characters in putCharXY() and detect them in putStrXY().
-- Drag and drop
-  - TEditor
-  - TField
-  - TText
-  - TTerminal
-  - TComboBox
-
-
-Screenshots
------------
+  - jexer.io.ECMA48Terminal calls 'stty' to perform the equivalent of
+    cfmakeraw() when using System.in/out.  System.out is also
+    (blindly!)  put in 'stty sane cooked' mode when exiting.

 
 

-![Several Windows Open Including A Terminal](/screenshots/screenshot1.png?raw=true "Several Windows Open Including A Terminal")

 
 

-![Yo Dawg...](/screenshots/yodawg.png?raw=true "Yo Dawg, I heard you like text windowing systems, so I ran a text windowing system inside your text windowing system so you can have a terminal in your terminal.")

 
 

+Roadmap
+-------
+
+Many tasks remain before calling this version 1.0.  See docs/TODO.md
+for the complete list of tasks.