I am very biased as well, but rlevy does bring up some great points. Indeed, you should pick the framework you will be using based on what you want it to do, but frameworks like openFrameworks and Qt are so versatile you can do anything with them. I do not doubt that that is what WPF sets out to do, but I cannot see it doing anything openGl or Qt could or do not do. Given this, both openGl and Qt run on any platform, and are slightly(ok, a lot) more time proven and hardened. Most importantly, OpenGl and Qt(to a certain extent) are free(as in freedom), which makes the possibilities literally endless. About striking balances, this may be true with proprietary frameworks where you only have one team developing them, which only has one goal. With free(as in freedom) frameworks such as openFrameworks or OpenGl pretty much all the bases get covered. They are incredibly easy to use, provide interfaces to many languages, are fully cross platform, and are very fast. From what I understand WPF only works with VB and C#, and is not cross platform. In my opinion one of the first goals should be cross platform, giving people the freedom to use whatever OS they want. We(the Linux community, not NUI) then recommend they run GNU/Linux and take there freedoms even further, but we do not force it. It is apparent that if I wanted to code WPF or XNA I would be required to run windows, which is not something I am particularly fond of doing.
Best Regards,
Alex
DISCLAIMER: I am a Free/Open Source Software activist and contributor, with very strong opinions.
I’m pleased to announce the initial release of the Bespoke Multi-Touch Framework. You can download the release at http://www.bespokesoftware.org/multi-touch. There are a two packages available: source+pre-compiled-binaries; and source-only.
6 sample apps are included:
- HelloWorld (the canonical intro app—an almost one-liner for interacting with the API—outputs to a text console)
- CalibrationDemo
- InkDemo (Pen-style interaction with the library—e.g. TabletPC meets Multi-Touch)
- ParticleTrails (presents smoke-like particle effects at each interaction point)
- SurfaceSimon (2D XNA version of the classic 80s memory game—demonstrates multi-touch hit testing)
- SurfaceCommand (3D XNA application demonstrating a simple real-time strategy (RTS) style multi-touch interface)
The samples (except for HelloWorld) employ the XNA presentation layer and share a common set of key-commands, such as:
V - Toggle display modes (there are 5 display modes, 4 debug + 1 normal)
C - Calibrate
Esc - Exit the app
This release is admittedly light on the documentation. I’m actively working on the doc and will be updating it soon. I’ve also left out WinForms and WPF sample applications, but these presentation layers should work without issue. The release is labeled 4.0 (instead of 1.0 for a typical intro release) because I’ve been working on this for awhile and have done a few internal releases. Aside from these few disclaimers, the code should at least compile cleanly and hook to a DirectShow capable video camera. Be certain to configure the Bespoke.MultiTouch.Framework.config file to match your multi-touch surface.
I hope you find the framework useful. If you have any questions please let me know.
From what I understand WPF only works with VB and C#, and is not cross platform.
....
It is apparent that if I wanted to code WPF or XNA I would be required to run windows, which is not something I am particularly fond of doing.
I’m afraid both assumptions are wrong. WPF can be programmed using any language the .NET framework supports, including IronPython
Also there is a library for running WPF/C# applications on Linux, its called Mono
Helza, I know you can code C# in Linux, but I do not think WPF would work. I think rlevy hinted at that in his post.
So, lets say WPF Can run in Linux. I will acknowledge that I was wrong, but I have still been given no technical reasons for switching to it. I kinda doubt M$ went to the trouble to port XNA to the X Window System/Linux API’s for Graphics. This would have been a major waste of time because most Linux people use OpenGl anyway, and it is very unlike M$ to give users choice In my opinion _THE_ most important thing to any library, program or module is that it is Free(as in freedom). I do not think WPF/XNA are Free, and I would be very surprised to find out they were. With this thought, I don’t really want to code something that I can only see the outside of. Would you buy a house if all you could see was the siding and yard?
EDIT: Looking around I find that neither XNA or WPF are free, or run on Linux. Also, I find that M$ Lacked creativity when Naming XNA. “XNA’s Not Acronymed” That does not mean anything, and is a little _too_ similar to “GNU’s Not Unix” to be original. Also, as of 2008 Acronymed is not a word defined in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. You can tell waiting for TouchLib to compile is a very boring moment for me
EDIT2: I was looking at IronPython: They make it look like Java!
from BookService import BookDictionary
booksWrittenByBookerPrizeWinners = [book.Title for book in BookDictionary.GetAllBooks if "Booker Prize" in book.Author.MajorAwards] booksWrittenByBookerPrizeWinners
Oh, sorry. For 90% of programs(exceptions being developed for private use, or something specific to an os, for instance, GNU.Linux don’t need no anti-virus!) you want it to be cross platform because you can target a larger number of people, and that makes everyone happy. Its not _usually_ a good idea to write a program that the Free(as in Freedom) and Open Source Software community wants, ut will only run on Windows or Mac operating systems. We will generally, 99% of the time write a better, faster, more stable, more featureful(apparently that’s not a word, oh well) alternative that is cross platform and Free(as in Freedom). If you say that you don’t care about other people that might want to run your software, go work for a Microsoft usability team(You have no idea how long I spent just trying to get WMP running, just so I could watch a stupid NetFlix movie online, I gave up after about 20 minutes). But seriously, you should care about other people that might want to run your software because above all its the right thing to do and your being a good neighbor. Though that really is a matter of personal opinion because I can’t just say it allows faster parsing of X, Y or Q.
Helza, I know you can code C# in Linux, but I do not think WPF would work.
I think Moonlight, (the mono equiv to Silverlight), attempts to bridge the cap and bring WPF capabilities to linux.
Thanks for pointing that out, I was wrong then. I doubt the level of integration could compare to something like Qt or OpenGl, but nonetheless, it is there. Still though, would you buy a house if you couldn’t look inside?
I think this discussion is meaningless. You have already shown that you know nothing about WPF, C#, XNA and Windows. And I don’t think that any author of .NET Multitouch framework will change his mind and makes something cross platform.
And if you want to target the most people you still have to support Windows.
p.s: you can look inside any .net program event if you don’t have source code!
I agree, this is a meaningless discussion. I am sorry for arguing with no understanding of other viewpoints, though I still have not been given a technical reason other then “personal preference”. Maybe it is easier to use, I don’t know. Everyone has there own opinion, and we(read: I) should not try and impose peoples beliefs upon other people. As for the buying a house thing. I am referring to the fact that you cannot look inside the framework code and make sure they are not doing malicious things within it.
Lets not argue though, lets write good code, and that means in whatever environment we want!
There is no technical reason. No one (read: I) said this. As you are saying, this is only “personal preference”. And we have to respect each others preference
And you can actually look inside .net framework. Using “Reflector” or direct download source code from Microsoft. You can even debug this code.
“Lets not argue though, lets write good code, and that means in whatever environment we want! “ <- totally agree
Also, sorry for urging we don’t use the framework. With a little more growth(adding a few more widgets and maybe improving speed, though that’s probably projector latency) this could be an easy way for people to make Multi-Touch apps on windows. I(and many other GNU/Linux and Mac OS Users) don’t want to be left out of the fun, so GNU/Linux and Mac OS versions would be great.
