Generic Graphical User Interfaces

Abstract

It is important to be able to program GUI applications in a fast and easy manner. Current GUI tools for creating visually attractive applications offer limited functionality. In this paper we introduce a new, easy to use method to program GUI applications in a pure functional language such as Clean or Generic Haskell. The method we use is a refined version of the model-view paradigm.

The basic component in our approach is the Graphical Editor Component (GEC(t)) that can contain any value of any flat data type t and that can be freely used to display and edit its value. GEC(t)s can depend on others, but also on themselves. They can even be mutually dependent. With these components we can construct a flexible, reusable and customizable editor. For the realization of the components we had to invent a new generic implementation technique for interactive applications.