[lazarus] Progress

[Jeffrey A. Wormsley]

On 8/31/99, at 7:47 PM, Michael A. Hess wrote: 

>What I am trying to make everyone understand is that the LCL doesn't
>call any primitives to actually draw anything as far as components go.
>You might call some primitives to do some actual drawing within a GTK
>Drawing Widget but you can't CREATE or make an OwnerDrawn component when
>using GTK unless you create it in "C" and add it to the GTK library.
>
>I ask again.    Is this clear???

Is this an absolute requirement?  What I am saying, is that if the GTK
library, as it exists now in C, does not have what is desired, and if
someone is willing to go to the hellishly low levels of implementing it in
FPC, is there any reason not to?  To make a ridiculous example...  If there
were no button in GTK, would that mean that Lazarus could never have a
button?  Or could someone implement a button widget in FPC, calling the
lower level GTK C functions, and make this part of the LCL so that a button
could exist in Lazarus, even though other GTK apps had no concept of one?
While I agree wholeheartedly that if it already exists, use it, I don't see
why we must abandon anything that isn't a part of every single platform,
when it can be created.  What I am getting at is that,  if a GTK developer
in C can create a new widget, why can't a Lazarus developer in FPC develop
one as well, if there isn't already a C version?  Or is it better in your
opinion to develop the widget in C, have it made part of the GTK, then wrap
it into Lazarus?  While this would indeed work, personally, it seems to
hold us at the mercy of each API that we support.  In other words, Lazarus
can't have feature A until everyone else has feature A.  Surely this can't
be your meaning?  What have I missed?

Jeff.