Jexer - Java Text User Interface library
========================================
-WARNING: THIS IS ALPHA CODE!
+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 public domain
+sources released by Borland.](http://tvision.sourceforge.net/) )
-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
- or linked to. xterm mouse tracking using UTF8 coordinates is
- supported. 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 platforms.
+
+* The same command-line ECMA-48 / ANSI X3.64 type terminal as above,
+ but to any general InputStream/OutputStream. See the file
+ jexer.demos.Demo2 for an example of running the demo over a TCP
+ socket.
-* Java AWT UI. This backend can be selected by setting
- jexer.AWT=true. This is the default backend on Windows platforms.
- AWT is experimental, please consider filing bugs when you encounter
- them. The default window size for AWT is 132x40, which is set in
- jexer.session.AWTSession.
+* 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.
-A demo application showing the existing UI controls is available via
-'java -jar jexer.jar' or 'java -Djexer.AWT=true -jar jexer.jar' .
+Additional backends can be created by subclassing
+jexer.backend.Backend and passing it into the TApplication
+constructor.
License
-------
-This project is licensed LGPL ("GNU Lesser General Public License")
-version 3 or greater. See the file LICENSE for the full license text,
-which includes both the GPL v3 and the LGPL supplemental terms.
+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.
Usage
-----
-Usage patterns are still being worked on, but in general the goal will
-be to build applications somewhat as follows:
+Simply subclass TApplication and then run it in a new thread:
```Java
import jexer.*;
-public class MyApplication extends TApplication {
+class MyApplication extends TApplication {
- public MyApplication() {
- super();
+ public MyApplication() throws Exception {
+ 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) {
- MyApplication app = new MyApplication();
- app.run();
+ 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.
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
- See jexer.tterminal.ECMA48 for more specifics of terminal
emulation limitations.
+ - TTerminalWindow uses cmd.exe on Windows. Output will not be seen
+ until enter is pressed, due to cmd.exe's use of line-oriented
+ input (see the ENABLE_LINE_INPUT flag for GetConsoleMode() and
+ SetConsoleMode()).
+
+ - TTerminalWindow launches 'script -fqe /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 but might not on other Posix-y platforms.
+
+ - 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.
+
+ - 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.
+
+ - 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.
+
+
Roadmap
-------
Many tasks remain before calling this version 1.0:
-0.0.2:
-
-- Making TMenu keyboard accelerators active/inactive
-- AWT:
- - Blinking cursor
- - Handle kbTab (disable focus traversal BS)
- - Block cursor
-- ECMA48Backend running on socket
-- TTreeView
-- TDirectoryList
-- 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
-
-0.0.3:
+0.0.3
+- TListBox
+- TColorPicker
+
+0.0.4
+
+- TStatusBar
- TEditor
+- TWindow
+ - "Smart placement" for new windows
-0.0.4:
+0.0.5: BUG HUNT
-- Bugs
- - TSubMenu keyboard mnemonic not working
- - TDirectoryList cannot be navigated only with keyboard
- - TTreeView cannot be navigated only with keyboard
- - RangeViolation after dragging scrollbar up/down
+- Swing performance. Even with double buffering it isn't great.
-0.1.0:
+0.1.0: BETA RELEASE
-- TWindow
- - "Smart placement" for new windows
+- TSpinner
+- TComboBox
+- TCalendar
Wishlist features (2.0):
- TTerminal
- Handle resize events (pass to child process)
- Screen
- - Allow complex characters in putCharXY() and detect them in putStrXY().
-- TComboBox
-- TListBox
-- TSpinner
-- TCalendar widget
-- TColorPicker widget
+ - Allow complex characters in putCharXY() and detect them in putStringXY().
- Drag and drop
- TEditor
- TField
- TText
- TTerminal
- TComboBox
-
-
-Screenshots
------------
-
-![Several Windows Open Including A Terminal](/screenshots/screenshot1.png?raw=true "Several Windows Open Including A Terminal")
-