If you aren’t aware, there’s a new development tool in town, called TWimp, which makes writing multitasking applications for much easier than ever before. The software, from Graeme Shrimpton, takes care of most of the work involved in handling windows and icons by allowing all of that to be defined separately in a text file. This means the programmer doesn’t have to devote so much time (and code) to dealing with all that, and can instead concentrate on writing their core application.
John Rickman of the Midlands User Group (MUG) has started using TWimp for some of his own programming, and the group will be holding an online meeting on Tuesday, 29th April, at which John intends to demonstrate what he’s been doing with it, and how to use it to develop WIMP-based applications, and to ask the question “Do we need the Toolbox?”
For anyone who isn’t a programmer, in simple terms the ‘Toolbox’ is a set of modules that offer a number of facilities used in RISC OS desktop applications. Their purpose is to take away the effort from the programmer of writing the necessary code to carry out certain common tasks found in many WIMP applications. The Toolbox originated from Acorn, but there have also been solutions offered by third parties, such as WimpBASIC, originally from Clare’s Micro Supplies, which was a BASIC programming language with WIMP programming facilities built in.
The meeting will take place on Tuesday, 29th April, at 7:30pm, and will be held online using Zoom – and it is completely free to attend for anyone who is interested in the subject matter. All you need is a device running the Zoom software, an internet connection, and the meeting credentials. These remain the same as previous MUG Zoom meetings, but if you don’t have them they are available on request.
