CODEWITHSUNDEEP
linuxuser-interfacehta
Idan Arye
Idan Arye

Reputation: 12623

Looking for a "scriptable GUI markup language" for linux(like HTA in windows)

OK, the title is a bit(lot) cryptic, but that's the best one-line-summary I could come up with.

When developing, I prefer to develop CLI utilities, since they are much easier to write and test, and most of the programs I write don't really require a full blown interface.

Using the program is another story. My users don't like to use the shell, and they prefer a GUI with buttons, file pickers, text boxes, radio buttons and checkboxes.

Now, when I worked on windows, my solution was to write the program as a shell utility, and then use HTA to write a GUI. HTA was perfect for this, because creating a nice, simple interface with HTML is very easy, and using vbscript to run a shell command that calls the utility with the right arguments is also very easy.

Now, there is no HTA in linux, and I can't use regular html files because they can't use shell scripts(that would be a security issue). Is there any linux\cross-platform solution for writing quick GUI wrappers like the ones I described?

Upvotes: 4

Views: 1262

Answers (2)

gsiems
gsiems

Reputation: 3790

There's zenity. From the package info: "Zenity lets you display Gtk+ dialog boxes from the command line and through shell scripts. It is similar to gdialog, but is intended to be saner. It comes from the same family as dialog, Xdialog, and cdialog."

Update: If zenity is too simplistic then there is also Gtkdialog.

Update II: There appear to be some youtube videos on GUI interfacing with bash.

Upvotes: 2

Peter
Peter

Reputation: 541

Tk comes to mind for GUIs, hosted in Tcl, Perl, or some other scripting language.

Upvotes: 1

Related Questions