FreeTUIT - Codeless GUI Programming

FreeTUIT removes the verbosity, tedium, and confusion from GUI development with a new approach to widget layout and configuration which supports good software design practice without getting in the way of rapid application development.

FreeTUIT is a syntax and runtime for concisely declaring the layout and configuration of GUI widgets (such as forms, toolbars, buttons, and dialogs). The freetuit interpreter drives a unified object layer for more expressive event callbacks. This takes you from a blank page to a static demo of the layout with zero setup and allows desktop applications to be developed and deployed faster than web applications.

The FreeTUIT approach and API are explained in general and demonstrated by example. Attendees should have a general grasp of widgets and event-driven programming but basic forms-based HTML/CGI experience will suffice. This session will briefly review existing approaches to “rapid application development”, the challenges of creating maintainable code, and the snags of binding to C++ toolkits from interpreted languages.

Built on wxWidgets and Perl, FreeTUIT harnesses the power of cross-platform GUI development with an API which is tailored to the expressiveness of an interpreted language. Support for Qt is planned for summer 2009.