[companion project] HTML-like format for writing Node-Gtk UIs

[binyamin]

Would anyone use this?

Problem: I have a lot more trouble writing Gtk UIs than writing webpages. It's tedious to write a GtkBuilder UI definition in XML, and many developers seem to use a GUI app like Glade.

Proposal: Create a file-format similar to HTML, using Gtk widget names and properties. Then, write a library which accepts a file path and returns a GtkBuilder Object.

Example

<window>
    <box orientation="vertical">
        <button onClick="() => doSomething()">Click me</button>
        <label id="label1">Hello World</label>
    </box>
</window>

[romgrk]

I must say glade's format is quite annoying, way too verbose to be comfortable to hand-write. However, creating an alternative HTML-like format seems a bit involved. I'm curious, why would you go with a HTML format rather than using/expanding on react-gtk?

[binyamin]

Honestly, I just don't like using react. It's just another layer of code. Either way, spitting out a GtkBuildable seems much more efficient.

[romgrk]

Sounds fair, I enjoy React a lot but I can understand the reticence to adding layers of code. If the project is well done I'd be happy to link or include it.