[Paraview] It is worth to learn KWWidgets?

[clinton at elemtech.com]

On Monday 18 June 2007 12:12:33 pm Jordi Campos i Miralles wrote:
> First, thanks ;) I follow your advice and I stay away from talking about
> KWWidgets.
>
> Besides, I have "The ParaView Guide" book which in Chapter 17 explains
> how to create new "User Interface" elements BUT I need help about the
> differences among PV2.x and PV3:
>
>       * the GUI/Client/Resources no longer exists.
>               * [1] I cannot find any XML containing "ModuleInterfaces",
>                 I guess is substituted by the *.ui files, isn't it?
>               * I found *.ui files in Applications/Client:
>                       * I tried to see one of them "kdevdesigner
>                         MainWindow.ui" but a lot of messages like "The
>                         widget QMenuBar could not be created" appear,
>                         and the presented form is empty.

GUI/ClientResources in PV 2 was replaced by better formed server manager XML 
and Qt *.ui files.  Most of the time, widgets are automatically created from 
the server manager XML.
See #2 for why you can't open the ui file.

>                       * [2] How can we use kdevdesigner to see the PV
>                         *.ui?

I don't think you can.  kdevdesigner is a wrapper around the Qt 3 designer 
with the addition of Qt 3 based KDE features.
You should use Qt4's designer.  If you want to use KDevelop with Qt4, there's 
instructions in the KDevelop wiki.

>                       * [3] BTW, what is the Applications/DobranoViz?

A data comparision sample application.

>       * [4] it seems Qt/*/Resources/UI/ is the replacement, is it?
>               * if I try to see the *.ui files with kdevdesigner I also
>                 obtain empty forms...

Use the Qt4 designer to open them.

>       * So, I we need to design a new "panel window" (for example and
>         extension to current Transfer Function dialog):
>               * [5] if we describe the required data like
>                
> ParaView3/Examples/Plugins/ParametricSource/ParametricSource.xml, the UI
> for that dialog is automatically created, isn't it? 

The panel is automatically created based on the server manager XML as found in 
the example ParametricSource.xml.
The panels are automatically created for vtkSMSourceProxy's and owned sub 
proxies.
ParaView 3.0
A new transfer function dialog would not have source proxies, so it is 
currently not automatically generated.

> * [6] are some of the 
> existing KWWidgets widgets going to be translated into Qt?

Qt already has basic widgets that are being used as-is in ParaView3.

Some advanced ones like a color choosing button, vcr controls, transfer 
function editor, based on Qt can be found under ParaView3/Qt/* .

There may be some "un-translated" widgets for which there hasn't yet been a 
demand for.

>               * [7] is it possible to combine them, so use them in
>                 PVIII? (I guess no...)

Probably possible, but most likely not worth buying/writing the code to 
integrate Qt and Tk so you can use KWWidgets.  It might be eaiser  to just 
make new Qt4 based ones.

>               * [8] so, if we have to create them as new ones, is there
>                 any tutorial or example?

No formal tutorial has been made.  Of course, there are existing ones you can 
look at in the code.

>               * [9] BTW, where is the current Color Map (Transfer
>                 Function) dialog?

A transfer function dialog is found in 
ParaView3/Qt/Components/pqColorScaleEditor.cxx and it supports volumes.

>       * [10] I used 'cmake -GKDevelop3 ../ParaView3' to generate the
>         *.kdevelop project files; is there any better way? (I didn't
>         find it when configuring with 'ccmake'...)

Search or ask on the CMake list.  I don't know.

Some of your questions seemed to be about extending ParaView3.  There's also a 
new plugin architecture that you might want to read up on if you haven't.
http://www.paraview.org/Wiki/Plugin_HowTo

Clint