RGtk {RGtk2}R Documentation

The RGtk2 package

Description

RGtk2 provides a set of bindings between R and the GTK+ library and several of its dependent libraries. It allows the user to construct full-featured GUI's completely from within R.

Details

RGtk2 binds to the following libraries:

ATK
ATK is the Accessibility Toolkit. It provides a set of generic interfaces allowing accessibility technologies to interact with a graphical user interface. For example, a screen reader uses ATK to discover the text in an interface and read it to blind users. GTK+ widgets have built-in support for accessibility using the ATK framework.
Pango
Pango is a library for internationalized text handling. It centers around the PangoLayout object, representing a paragraph of text. Pango provides the engine for GtkTextView, GtkLabel, GtkEntry, and other widgets that display text.
GDK
GDK is the abstraction layer that allows GTK+ to support multiple windowing systems. GDK provides drawing and window system facilities on X11, Windows, and the Linux framebuffer device.
GTK
The GTK+ library itself contains widgets, that is, GUI components such as GtkButton or GtkTextView.
GDKPixbuf
This is a small library which allows you to create GdkPixbuf ('pixel buffer') objects from image data or image files. Use a GdkPixbuf in combination with GtkImage to display images.
Cairo
Cairo is a 2D graphics library with support for multiple output devices. Currently supported output targets include the X Window System, win32, and image buffers.
Libglade
Libglade loads and parses XML descriptions of user interfaces at runtime. It also provides functions that can be used to connect signal handlers to parts of the interface.

RGtk2 also partially binds some lower-level libraries in order to support the bindings to the others. These include GObject and GMainLoop.

R objects passed between the user and RGtk2 are either primitive types (character, logical, etc) or external objects (externalptr). All R objects wrapping external objects extend the RGtkObject class.

Note

As described above, RGtk2 binds many libraries beyond GTK+ itself. Thus, it can serve many purposes besides GUI construction. For example, GDKPixbuf and Cairo allow the R user to produce arbitary high-quality graphics.

There are also possibilities of integration with other R packages that bind to a GObject-based API, such as Rggobi (to GGobi, http://www.ggobi.org/).

Author(s)

Michael Lawrence, with excerpts from library documentation


[Package RGtk2 version 2.12.5-3 Index]