Graphical user interface builder

A graphical user interface builder, or GUI builder, also known as GUI designer is a software development tool that simplifies the creation of GUIs by allowing the designer to arrange widgets using a drag-and-drop WYSIWYG editor. Without a GUI builder, a GUI must be built by manually specifying each widget's parameters in code, with no visual feedback until the program is run.

User interfaces are commonly programmed using an event-driven architecture, so GUI builders also simplify creating event-driven code. This supporting code connects widgets with the outgoing and incoming events that trigger the functions providing the application logic.

List of GUI builders

*Cocoa/OpenStep
**Interface Builder
*Fast, Light Toolkit
**FLUID
*GNUstep
**Gorm
*GTK+
**Glade Interface Designer
**Gazpacho
**Gideon Designer
*Windows Presentation Foundation
**Microsoft Expression Blend
*WxWidgets
**WxGlade
**wxFormBuilder
*Intrinsics
**Motif
*** [http://www.ics.com/products/motif/guibuilders/bxpro/index.html Builder Xcessory]
***Easymotif
***ixbuild
*** [http://www.ics.com/products/motif/guibuilders/uimx/index.html UIMX]
***X-Designer
*Qt
** [http://trolltech.com/products/qt/features/tools/designer Qt Designer]
** [http://web.inter.nl.net/users/eavdmeer/ Ebuilder]
** [http://qtarch.sourceforge.net/ Qt Architect]
** [http://projects.uid0.sk/qtez/index.php QtEZ]
* GEM
** Resource construction set
** Interface by Shift Computer
** ORCS (Otto's RCS)
** K-Resource
** Resource Master
** Annabel Junior
** WERCS by HiSoft
* OpenWindows
** guide (GUI builder)
* XForms (toolkit)
** fdesign
* Tk (framework)
** GUI Builder
** Visual Tcl

List of IDEs with GUI builders

* Anjuta
* CodeGear RAD Studio (former Borland Development Studio)
* Clarion
*
* KDevelop
* Lazarus
* Microsoft Visual Studio
* MonoDevelop
* NetBeans
* REALbasic
* SharpDevelop
* wxDev-C++
* Xcode Tools
* Gambas
* [http://www.purebasic.com/index.html PUREbasic]

List of GUI builder plugins for IDEs

*NetBeans GUI design tool, formerly known as "Matisse"
*Visual Editor - A plugin for Eclipse
*Himalia Guilder (for Visual Studio 2005)
*WxSmith ( plug-in)

Further reading

*Uwe Wirth (Ed.): [http://www.stcarchiv.de/stm92/01_interface.php "Interface", ein neues RCS von Shift] . "ST-Magazin" (01/92).
*A. Goukassian (Ed.): [http://www.stcarchiv.de/stc1997/01_aktuelles.php Aktuelles] . "ST-Computer" (01/97). (Mentioning ORCS.)
*A. Goukassian (Ed.): [http://www.stcarchiv.de/stc1998/04_rsm.php3 Resource Master 2.12] . "ST-Computer" (04/98).
*Manfred Neumayer: [http://www.stcarchiv.de/stm91/11_annabel.php Bella Annabel] . "ST-Magazin" (11/91).
* "ST-Computer" (06/90) had an article comparing GEM RCS, GEM RCS 2, K-Resource 2 and WERCS [http://www.stcarchiv.de/stc2000/06_news.php] .

See also

* User interface markup language
* User Interface Modeling