In order to make life easier for the user, G5G has developed several methods for using PHIGURE in a Motif context. The following example is used to present the problems involved in using a graphic functions library in the context of a Motif interface. PHIGURE applications are normally organized as follows :
1) initialize user variables
2) initialize PHIGURE
3) build CSS
4) Animation
edit CSS
display
5) close
An application written with a toolkit (e.g.Motif) is organized as follows :
1) initialize toolkit
2) create widgets
3) manage events
handler
callback
4) activate widgets
5) main processing loop
If the 2 types of program are compared with a view to merging them, the following problems arise :
1. How is it possible to integrate the CSS building into the program and display it when the graphics window is open without waiting for a user interaction (e.g. pressing a button) ?
2. How can the graphics window be associated with a widget ?
3. How is it possible to manage graphics events (e.g. locator and pick) ?
4. How is it possible to generate animation which does not interfere with main loop processing ?