*****                  Announcing wxWindows 1.60                  *****
*****  A Free C++ GUI toolkit for Motif, Open Look, Windows 3.1   *****
*****                       and Windows NT                        *****

>>> wxWindows is a toolkit for developing multi-platform, graphical
    applications from the same body of C++ code.

>>> Uses include:

* development of applications for delivery on several platforms
* single-platform development, as a high-level wrapper around XView,
  Motif or Windows

>>> Included in this release:

* wxBuilder, a Windows and Motif-hosted GUI builder for wxWindows.
* Simple-to-use, object-oriented API
* Graphics calls include splines, polylines, rounded rectangles, etc.
* Simple programmatic panel/dialog item layout
* Support for menu bars and status lines
* Toolbar class
* Pens, brushes, fonts, icons, cursors, bitmaps
* Easy, object-oriented interprocess comms (DDE subset) under
  Windows 3 *and* UNIX
* Encapsulated PostScript generation under UNIX, Windows 3 printing on PC
* Virtually automatic MDI support under Windows
* Support for Windows 3 printer and file selector common dialogs, with
  equivalents for UNIX
* Under Windows 3, support for copying metafiles to the clipboard
* Programmatic form facility for building form-like screens fast,
  with constraints on values
* Applications can access Windows Help or wxHelp hypertext help system
* Optional interface to NASA's CLIPS, for rapid GUI prototyping
  and application extension
* Tex2RTF utility for maintaining online and printed manuals
* Tree and graph layout classes
* All source
* Several examples
* Reference manual in PostScript, wxHelp, and WinHelp form

>>> Requirements:

* On PC, one of Microsoft C/C++, Borland C++ 3.1/4.0, Symantec C++
* On UNIX, XView 3.x or Motif 1.2.x and GCC/G++ (or virtually any C++ compiler)
  wxWindows is compatible with most UNIX platforms, but is most
  tested on the Sun.
* At least 8 MB of disk space.

>>> Weaknesses

To avoid disappointment, it should be pointed out that wxWindows may
not be suitable for everyone. It contains a few bugs and some ugly
code, unlike any commercial equivalent :-), it does not have the
slickness or coverage of a tool like Microsoft's MFC, and you may not
agree with the compromises made for portability. Neither the
Model-View-Controller paradigm nor a document-centric model has been
adopted, although they could both be implemented on top of wxWindows.

Some changes may need to be made for specific platforms, although many
compilers and UNIXes are now catered for. And wxWindows does produce
large executables and increase compilation time, although there are
strategies for minimizing these problems, depending on brand of
compiler and operating system.

>>> Where to get it

wxWindows is currently available from the Artificial Intelligence
Applications Institute by anonymous FTP.
 
> FTP to skye.aiai.ed.ac.uk (192.41.104.6).

> log on as `anonymous', and give your user ID as password

> Change directory into pub/wxwin/1.60, change transmission method to
  binary, and get wx160.tar.Z or wx160.tgz (UNIX) and/or wx160_*.zip (PC).

> Get install.txt.

> For automated installation under UNIX, get wxinstal.

> Both archives contain the source code for both platforms, but only the
  executable demos for the specific platform (UNIX and Windows
  respectively). The demos are available separately as demo.tar.Z and
  demo.zip.

You can view the documentation for wxWindows on the AIAI World Wide Web
server using a viewer such as Mosaic.
 
See http://www.aiai.ed.ac.uk/~jacs/wxwin.html

>>> Installation

See install.txt and the installation script wxinstal.

>>> Bugs, etc.

wxWindows, like most other software, has the occasional buglet
(bugs.txt contains a list of some of them). I would be grateful for
bug reports (even better, fixes) though I can't guarantee to do
anything about them. Future releases of wxWindows are likely to be
more stable and more complete.  Meanwhile, do send me your
enhancements, and I will try to incorporate them in future releases.

>>> wxWindows discussion forum

There is a mailing list for users or potential users of wxWindows. Send
a request to wxwin-users-request@aiai.ed.ac.uk or J.Smart@ed.ac.uk to
subscribe to (or unsubscribe from) the mailing list. Note that these
messages go to me, it's not automated.

General discussions take place on wxwin-users@aiai.ed.ac.uk;
wxwin-announce is for people preferring lower bandwidth, and I will
always send announcements to wxwin-users as well as wxwin-announce. So
there's not usually a need to subscribe to both.

wxwin-users currently contains 289 entries.

>>> In the pipeline

* Text-only CURSES version (user contribution, in alpha testing)
* Better networking support (including WinSock integration).

>>> THANKS, to everyone who has contributed code, suggestions
or moral support.

------------------------------------------------------------------
Julian Smart, 23rd October 1994

Artificial Intelligence Applications Institute
University of Edinburgh
80 South Bridge
Edinburgh
Scotland
EH1 1HN

EMAIL: J.Smart@ed.ac.uk
TEL:   031 650 2746