[Drawkit] Is it "Touch" time?

[Dick Applebaum]

Thanks Brad,

I'll have a look at core plot.

Dick


All the Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas
      Layin' in the sun,
Talkin' 'bout the things
      They woulda coulda shoulda done...
But those Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas
      All ran away and hid
 From one little Did.

-Shel Silverstein-


On Jul 27, 2009, at 4:35 PM, Brad Larson <larson at sonoplot.com> wrote:

> What Graham was referring to is the fact that DrawKit is built on  
> AppKit, with the base drawing elements and the like being  
> descendants of NSView.  NSView and UIView (the iPhone UIKit's base  
> UI element) are completely different in terms of design, so porting  
> the framework across to the iPhone would require almost a complete  
> rewrite.  It would also effectively split the framework into two  
> incompatible versions, one AppKit-based, and one UIKit-based.
>
> A first step towards a cross-platform framework might be to  
> restructure it in terms of Core Animation layers.  CALayer and  
> supporting Core Animation classes are pretty much identical between  
> Leopard and iPhone, so it gives an ideal opportunity for cross- 
> platform UI code.  The layers also are very lightweight, and things  
> that currently bog down DrawKit (selection and editing of hundreds  
> of items) would no longer be a problem.
>
> This is the approach we've taken with the Core Plot framework, an  
> open source data plotting / charting library:
>
> http://code.google.com/p/core-plot/
>
> We've abstracted away any platform-dependent drawing code so that  
> Mac and iPhone developers can use the exact same API for placing  
> charts, feeding them data, interacting with them, and customizing  
> their layout.  These same abstractions could be applied here (even  
> by copying the BSD-licensed code we've created to do this).
>
> Again, reshaping DrawKit in this form would be a massive  
> undertaking.  It might be worth it, though, in terms of improved  
> drawing performance and the ability to work on iPhone OS devices.   
> You also would gain the ability to do slick animations for drawing,  
> selection, or editing.
>
> Of course, it would also require abandoning Tiger as a compatibility  
> target, but I don't think that will be that big of a problem going  
> forward.
>
> On Jul 27, 2009, at 5:47 PM, Dick Applebaum wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I joined this list a while back, experimented with the package and  
>> really liked it.  In fact, I used it to prototype several screens  
>> for an iPhone app I was thinking about writing.
>>
>> At that time, I posted a question asking, how difficult it would to  
>> port DrawKit to the iPhone.
>>
>> I was most interested in using the iPhone for manipulating   
>> drawings created elsewhere (on a Mac).  On the iPhone I wanted to  
>> do things such as show/hide layers, zoom/scroll/pan, identify  
>> points, and calculate lengths between  points.
>>
>> AIR, the response I got from Graham was that the iPhone OS did not  
>> contain the necessary APIs/Frameworks to facilitate porting--  
>> making the port effort a major rewrite (and distraction).
>>
>> In the interim several things have happened:
>>
>> -- The iPhone Hardware has been improved, specifically CPU, GPU,  
>> Compass and Camera
>> -- The iPhone OS has been enriched, incorporating more APIs from  
>> Mac OSX and new iPhone APIs and OpenGL ES 2.0
>> -- Apple claims that much of SnowLeopard has been re-implemented in  
>> Cocoa
>> -- Evidence is that Snow Leopard is incorporating some APIs and  
>> frameworks from the iPhone (they share some amount of a common code  
>> base)
>>
>>
>> Now, there are lots of rumors that Apple will soon announce a  
>> MultiTouch 10" Tablet device for delivery this year (lots of  
>> supplier rumors support this).
>>
>> So, given this:
>>
>> Is it practical, and is it time to port DrawKit to the Touch  
>> interface?
>>
>> TIA
>>
>> Dick
>>
>
> ______________________
> Brad Larson, Ph.D.
> SonoPlot, Inc.
> 3030 Laura Lane, Suite 120
> Middleton, WI 53562
>
>
>
>
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