# GtkReactive vs Gtk

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714>\
**Category:** General Usage\
**Tags:** question\
**Created:** [December 12, 2017, 4:40pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714 "2017-12-12T16:40:20Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 12\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![louisponet](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/louisponet/32/2070_2.png) [@louisponet](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/louisponet)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2017, 4:40pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/1 "2017-12-12T16:40:20Z")

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Is there any direct benefit aside from cleanliness, by using `GtkReactive.jl` over `Gtk.jl`? I’m only using Signals to do the gui elements, the rest of my code does not use `Reactive`.

For example, I made some scripting tools to work with input files, I now want to display last made changes to a `Gtk.TextView` window. I implemented it so that I use a `Signal` to accept and accumulate print statements, but I could just as well use an `IOBuffer` and do the same thing, without using `Reactive.Signal`s.

Is there anything I can do with `GtkReactive` that can’t be done using only `Gtk`?

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**Author:** ![tobias.knopp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tobias.knopp/32/7551_2.png) [@tobias.knopp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/tobias.knopp)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2017, 9:03pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/2 "2017-12-12T21:03:42Z")

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> [@louisponet](#):
>
> Is there anything I can do with GtkReactive that can’t be done using only Gtk?

no. GtkReactive just is a different API to achieve the same thing.

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**Author:** ![yakir12](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/yakir12/32/297_2.png) [@yakir12](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/yakir12)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2017, 11:43pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/3 "2017-12-12T23:43:49Z")

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I find that you can connect the back and front ends in a much more “organic” way with GtkReactive than with just Gtk. But I can admit that there were times where it was just simpler to just use Gtk. Every application and its own needs.

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**Author:** ![tobias.knopp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tobias.knopp/32/7551_2.png) [@tobias.knopp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/tobias.knopp)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 7:45am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/4 "2017-12-13T07:45:14Z")

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@yakir12: Do you have some larger application (Open Source) where one can see how you use it?

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**Author:** ![yakir12](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/yakir12/32/297_2.png) [@yakir12](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/yakir12)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 8:24am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/5 "2017-12-13T08:24:11Z")

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Sheesh, nothing I’m proud of right now, and it’s kind of hard to see my point here, but here’s where I use GtkReactive a lot:  
[https://github.com/yakir12/BeetleWay.jl/blob/master/src/log/gui.jl](https://github.com/yakir12/BeetleWay.jl/blob/master/src/log/gui.jl)

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**Author:** ![Liso](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/898d66/32.png) [@Liso](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Liso)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 4:21pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/6 "2017-12-13T16:21:03Z")

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You have one but not open source, right?

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**Author:** ![tobias.knopp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tobias.knopp/32/7551_2.png) [@tobias.knopp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/tobias.knopp)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 4:23pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/7 "2017-12-13T16:23:14Z")

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yes, its pretty large and I am facing some general performance issue (with Julia not Gtk itself). I am thus very interested in discussing the scalability of Gtk.jl applications.

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**Author:** ![jonathanBieler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/82dd89/32.png) [@jonathanBieler](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/jonathanBieler)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 5:21pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/8 "2017-12-13T17:21:06Z")

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The largest I know of is my [editor](https://github.com/jonathanBieler/GtkIDE.jl), I haven’t had too much performance issues (besides precompilation and starting time) but I don’t have much interaction between the widgets, it’s mainly “press a key =\> do something” type of things. That said the windows version doesn’t really work (because of Gtk.jl issues afaik).

I guess being able to statically compile our applications would be ideal, but that will probably require some rewrite of Gtk.jl and a lot of work (see [Compiling and building binaries from your julia code - #47 by sdanisch](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/compiling-and-building-binaries-from-your-julia-code/5687/47)).

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![louisponet](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/louisponet/32/2070_2.png) [@louisponet](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/louisponet)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 5:42pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/9 "2017-12-13T17:42:07Z")

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Your editor is actually a really great place for me to get ideas / see how to do things, since largely what I’m looking for is exactly what you describe: type, enter =\> see…

You didn’t use reactive signals I believe, is this because the GtkReactive package wasn’t there yet? If so, would you use it if you were to start GtkIDE.jl today?

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**Author:** ![tobias.knopp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tobias.knopp/32/7551_2.png) [@tobias.knopp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/tobias.knopp)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 6:00pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/10 "2017-12-13T18:00:57Z")

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> [@jonathanBieler](#):
>
> besides precompilation and starting time

this is a major issue for me right now. I integrated several smaller components into a larger application and now I have up to two minutes startup time. I have the feeling that this may be some fundamental issue since working with `GtkBuilder` leads (by definition) to type unstable code. Most of the time is spend in `signal_connect` and I have no idea how I can fix that.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![jonathanBieler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/82dd89/32.png) [@jonathanBieler](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/jonathanBieler)\
**Post date:** [December 14, 2017, 12:36pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/11 "2017-12-14T12:36:46Z")

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GtkReactive wasn’t around yes, but I’m also not familiar with reactive programming techniques, so I would probably still use the basic Gtk signals.

@tobias.knopp can’t you do something like that to shield the type instability?

```julia
w = GAccessor.object(form_builder,"DialogCreateFile")
init!(w)

function init!(w::Gtk.GtkDialogLeaf)
    signal_connect(...
end

```

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![tobias.knopp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tobias.knopp/32/7551_2.png) [@tobias.knopp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/tobias.knopp)\
**Post date:** [December 14, 2017, 1:17pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/gtkreactive-vs-gtk/7714/12 "2017-12-14T13:17:16Z")

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I have not yet tried that since my application has quite some widgets and signal\_connects. It thus is quite some effort to restructure things. The builder thing might not be the actual issue since I use a Dict for storing config parameters. Thus my widgets are grouped in a type unstable composite type (together with the Dict) and I pass this to all callbacks. I have not yet a plan how I can structure this better. Thats why I am asking if you have a better pattern.

To give you an idea here is the pattern I use:

```julia

type DataViewerWidget <: Gtk.GtkBox
  handle::Ptr{Gtk.GObject}
  builder
  ... # data Dicts, whatsoever
end

getindex(m::DataViewerWidget, w::AbstractString) = G_.object(m.builder, w)

function DataViewerWidget()

  uifile = joinpath(Pkg.dir("Packagename"),"src","UI","builder","dataviewer.xml")

  b = Builder(filename=uifile)
  mainBox = G_.object(b, "boxDataViewer")
  m = DataViewerWidget( mainBox.handle, b, ...)
  Gtk.gobject_move_ref(m, mainBox)

  signal_connect(onMySliderChanged, , "changed")

  signal_connect(m["mySlider"], "toggled") do widget
     onMySliderChanged(m)
  end
  ...

  return m
end

function onMySliderChanged(m:: DataViewerWidget)

... # do stuff

end

```

I have quite some flexibility, the code is IMHO quite readable, but on a large scale this is super slow to load.