Just wanted to see if you guys knew of any IDEs or Extensions for any languages that make GUI programming a little easier, like Visual Basic.
See: Image
Since you said any language, you have Free Pascal and its gui editor Lazarus.
För wxWidgets and C++ you have wxFormBuilder.
The Glade editor for gtk3 programs (C, C++, or whatever language one might use). (edit: just a gui editor that is used separately from whatever IDE or editor you write your code in)
Eclipse and WindowBuilder for Java.
You are missing the best one. If you want to make great GUIs there really is no substitute for Qt with Qt Creator. Nice GUI editor as you are used to in VS, C++ with the best documentation I’ve seen in anything open source. Qt was the GUI toolkit that got me hooked on C++ back in the day. (https://www.qt.io/download) Be aware there is a commercial and an open source version but you can relatively easily get the open source one from the online installer.
It was already mentioned by @RHOPKINS13 so I didn’t bother.
As for Qt itself, I wasn’t thrilled with their path regarding licensing back in the day, like only allowing GPL (not LGPL) on Unix like systems and attempting their own special licenses, and only offering a paid commercial license for Windows development. These days I can’t say I find the $300+/month subscription option for commercial usage very appealing either. They can of course do whatever they want, just as I look at what is at my disposal and what’s out there and choose according to my needs and preferences (which may be very different from other individuals). Essentially, their decisions early on soured my opinion of Qt (regardless of any technical merits), and since those days I have always had other options that have worked well enough for me. It may also have played a role in my relative lack of interest in KDE,
I’m just expressing my feelings, and it is not a statement whether anyone else should make any specific choices. :)
Awesome, thank you!
Don’t forget Gambas: https://gambas.sourceforge.net/en/main.html. A language that is very close to Visual Basic and an IDE that closely resembles the old VB6 editor. It only runs on Linux, but I also got it working on WSL in Windows 11.
Is that not just an ancient version/ancestor of visual studio with the Winforms GUI Framework?
Well, not the same thing but almost in the same general category these days could be WordPress. There are plugins that you can configure for just about any type of common application without having to do “actual programming”. Including drag-and-drop GUI builders. It’s not aimed at programmers but you can customize the plugins.
Also it has a similar stigma for programmers as VB.
You’re basically looking for some form of a WYSIWYG editor. Check out Qt Creator, I think you’ll like it.
Also, you haven’t told us which programming language you’re trying to use. Every language has it’s own set of tools.
QT Creator looks great, I just hate the subscription based model for products. Let me just buy the product once at it’s current version!
Just a general conversation about GUI development for any languages. Maybe someone is looking for something similar with their language!
You can try RealBasic or TCL/TK, though I haven’t used either of them in over a decade.
