Hello PHP-GTK 2

Part I of this PHP-GTK series looked at what PHP-GTK is and why you might want to use it. The next installment, “Hello PHP-GTK 2”, gets down to business with the requisite “Hello World” application. This article attempts to go a little deeper than just showing the code to get it working. Instead the article talks about how each line of the application interacts with the others, giving a better picture of the process of building a PHP-GTK application.

Hopefully, by now, you know what PHP-GTK is and have a pretty good idea what it is you are about to do (if not read “What is PHP-GTK?”). The whole idea of PHP-GTK is to provide a GUI for what would normaly be a PHP CLI script and in the process increase its usability and functionality. But it would be irresponsible at this point to just jump into a complex application such as an address book or text editor. All that would teach you is how to create the same application by copying the code I wrote. A better approach is to take our time and make sure that it is clear what exactly each line is doing.

Note: I want to focus on developing PHP-GTK 2 applications. Therefore, I am not going to cover installation more than the following few lines. Installation is a relatively straight forward process these days. Windows users should see Gnope.org for an easy to use PHP-GTK 2 installer, while Linux users should refer to the PHP-GTK Wiki.

Once, you have defined your application, all that is left is to turn it over to PHP-GTK and the user. At that point, your work is done and the reactions you have coded will be responsible for any changes to data or the application itself. Giving control of your application over to PHP-GTK is done by initiating an infinite loop. This loop, called the main loop, listens for user or system actions and informs the application elements when an action occurs. The application then fires off the reactions that were previously defined. This loop then continues until the user closes the application (as long as your app is set up correctly).

CONTINUED >

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Anatomy of an Application