4 releases (breaking)
Uses old Rust 2015
0.3.0 | Aug 6, 2023 |
---|---|
0.2.0 | Apr 28, 2023 |
0.1.0 | Mar 29, 2023 |
0.0.0 | Mar 12, 2023 |
#708 in GUI
1.5MB
47K
SLoC
libui
The native cross-platform UI toolkit for Rust
libui
is a simple, small and easy to distribute GUI library. It provides a native UI for your platform by utilising your systems API instead of implementing yet another mismatched looking renderer. Thus all libui
apps are lightweight, have a native look and feel and start from a highly performant base which is well integrated with the ecosystem on each platform. Because it implements only the common subset of these platform APIs, your apps will work on all platforms and won't have significant behavioral inconsistencies, with no additional effort on your part. If you only plan to support one platform however, a specialized crate will
provide a better experience.
Technically, libui
is a "rustification" wrapper over the C library libui-ng
, which actually abstracts the native GUI framework. That is the Win32 API on Windows, Cocoa on Mac OS X, and GTK3 for Linux and others.
Example
Add libui
to your dependency list in cargo.toml
with:
libui = "0.3.0"
or use the latest version from the repository:
libui = { git = "https://github.com/libui-rs/libui" }
Next we suggest to have a look at the example applications or start with the minimal example printed here:
#![cfg_attr(not(test), windows_subsystem = "windows")]
#![cfg_attr(test, windows_subsystem = "console")]
extern crate libui;
use libui::controls::*;
use libui::prelude::*;
fn main() {
let ui = UI::init()
.expect("Couldn't initialize UI library");
let mut win = Window::new(&ui, "Example", 300, 200,
WindowType::NoMenubar);
let layout = VerticalBox::new();
// add controls to your layout here
win.set_child(layout);
win.show();
ui.main();
}
We also have documentation on docs.rs for all released versions.
Screenshots
On the left see a libui
application running on a GNOME desktop with GTK 3. On the right under Windows 10 with its native user interface.
For more screenshots, see here
.
Compatibility
libui
0.2.0 works down to edition 2018 and was successfully tested on:
- Windows 7 SP1
- Windows 10 22H2
- Debian 12 w/ GNOME 43 & GTK 3.24
- macOS Big Sur 11.6
libui
0.3.0 works down to edition 2021 and was successfully tested on:
- Debian 12 w/ GNOME 43 & GTK 3.24
- Windows 10 22H2
Prerequisits & Building
To build the underlying libui-ng
your system must have certain tools installed in addition to your rust toolchain. I am trying to cut down on the inconveniences as far as possible.
Linux:
- libgtk-3-dev (debian package) - for compiling
libui-ng
- libclang (debian package) - for generating the
libui-ng
bindings
Windows:
- MSVC (via Windows SDK or Visual Studio)
- LLVM - for generating the
libui-ng
bindings
Note: MinGW-64 does compile and link, but the application won't start due to MinGW missing TaskDialog()
. Reportedly, with versions >= 5.X, the function is available.
Acknowledgments
Entity | Acknowledgement | Further Information |
---|---|---|
@pcwalton | Initial author. Largely shaped this library. | pcwalton/libui-rs |
@NoraCodes and others | Further development and maintenance. | rust-native-ui/libui-rs |
@tobia | libui::layout! macro for easier UI description. |
tobia/iui-builder |
@andlabs | Author of the C library libui . |
andlabs/libui |
@szanni and @cody271 | Maintainers of libui-ng . The underlying library to this wrapper. |
libui-ng/libui-ng |
Dependencies
~0–3.5MB
~51K SLoC