I got tired of messing with Phyton, Java or C# or web/cloud apps to make real-time systems, so I finally started on a pure C++ library with high performance desktop graphics. Graphics is only a start, but it is the most important one. Not much have been done in this area the last decades and as everything else uses C++ at core it it unfair that we don’t have a proper C++ library as well. I have worked with MFC, Qt, C#, Delphi and a few PLC solutions and while Qt was close it also is very heavy to work with, hardly C++ anymore and heavy licensed with close to no tools. I abandoned Qt for C# earlier and while C# is great it only exist for real on Windows and it is and will always be an interpreter with performance issues. Even Qt uses JavaScript on theire QML and it is not nice to work with as you spend far to much time in debugging. So, pure C++ here we go. I will deal with Web and Smart Phones later, lets first create a RTFrame that cover Windows and Linux so we can make advanced graphics apps with a mix of 2D and 3D functionality easy.
Below are some images of demoes and applications on their way – see text below pictures:
Some of you have seen BSA written in C#, I am redoing the concept in C++ due to performance issues. And on the way I also create tools/API to make HMI very, very fast. The target is advansed SCADA type applicationr ot PLC, but the framework is generic in nature. That said I expect that C++ will mosltly attract developers facing technical projects where performance do matter.
One of the first tools I needed is PixelArt – a 2D Image editor so I could open, Edit and Save images. This is not finished, but is included in the SDK/Designer.
I have already shown the draft for a 32 channel logic analyzer/oscilloscope in a previous entry. This is an app building on RTFrame that display 32 channels real-time at extreme speed. This is a tool I want myself and I will run it on a RaspberryPI 10″ screen. A key milestone was to achieve 32 channels at 60FPS with very low CPU usage – that is what the GPU gives me.
I have only made one Circular Gauge yet, but they will come in numbers and shapes – this was just a performance test filling a 4K screen with analogue meteres that all move 60FPS – it’s beautifully and my 12 year old laptop is a 9% CPU usage.
This last one is a demo with some controls including a 3D control. I can place the mouse on the triangle and turn it in all directions – presentation graphics 3D control miced with ordinary 2D controls.
And stay tuned because this is coming out fast. This is something I have wanted for years before I finally started it just a few weeks ago. At precent I focus on Windows, Raspberry PI/Linuz, but I will address more platforms later. The objective is high performance, precentation graphics at a minimum of developer cost – meaning minimum of coding time.