Nieminen Mika wrote in message <35efc03b.0@news.povray.org>...
>Rik Ling <rli### [at] pipcomcom> wrote:
>: Have you considered (yikes!) Java?
>
>  I think that Java is not an option nowadays, because:
>
>  a) Java is slow.
[snip]
That may be so, under the the circumstances you describe. But the original
poster seriously considers using Tcl/Tk and that is an interpreted language,
not like Java, where precompiled bytecode is running through a virtual
machine...

>  c) Java is hardly portable.

I agree that Java has portability-problems, but an application like the GUI
for POV-Ray would be doable.

>This may sound crazy, but it's true. Usually
>you need a web browser to run java (this adds slowness to the whole thing).
[snip]

And this is where you go wrong. You are speaking about Java applets. But a
GUI for POV-Ray would not be realized as an applet but as a Java
application. This runs directly in the Java virtual machine, not in a
browser. So you only need to get a compatible virtual machine.
My best guess there would be either the Microsoft VM of IE4.0 or Sun's VMs
which exist for many platforms. And if need be you could install just the VM
you need...

Now, back to topic:
I personally don't see a reason for a portable UI at all, and the idea of
having a Tcl/Tk or Java GUI running together with a C raytracer is not what
I am looking for for christmas...

Johannes.

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