Version: 3.1.0
Platform Details

Table of Contents

wxWidgets defines a common API across platforms, but uses the native graphical user interface (GUI) on each platform, so your program will take on the native look and feel that users are familiar with.

Unfortunately native toolkits and hardware do not always support the functionality that the wxWidgets API requires. This chapter collects notes about differences among supported platforms and ports.

wxGTK

wxGTK is a port of wxWidgets using the GTK+ library. It makes use of GTK+'s native widgets wherever possible and uses wxWidgets' generic controls when needed. GTK+ itself has been ported to a number of systems, but so far only the original X11 version is supported. Support for other GTK+ backends is planned, such as the new DirectFB backend.

All work is being done on GTK+ version 2.0 and above. Support for GTK+ 1.2 will be deprecated in a later release.

You will need GTK+ 2.6 or higher which is available from:

http://www.gtk.org

The newer version of GTK+ you use, the more native widgets and features will be utilized. We have gone to great lengths to allow compiling wxWidgets applications with the latest version of GTK+, with the resulting binary working on systems even with a much earlier version of GTK+. You will have to ensure that the application is launched with lazy symbol binding for that.

In order to configure wxWidgets to compile wxGTK you will need use the –with-gtk argument to the configure script. This is the default for many systems.

GTK+ 1.2 can still be used, albeit discouraged. For that you can pass –with-gtk=1 to the configure script.

Support for GTK+ 3 is available starting with wxWidgets 2.9.4, use configure option –with-gtk=3 to enable it.

For further information, please see the files in docs/gtk in the distribution.

wxOSX/Cocoa

wxOSX/Cocoa is the port of wxWidgets for the OS X platform. It requires OS X 10.7 or later and fully supports 64 bit builds.

For further information, please see the files in docs/osx in the distribution.

wxX11

wxX11 is a port of wxWidgets using X11 (The X Window System) as the underlying graphics backend. wxX11 draws its widgets using the wxUniversal widget set which is now part of wxWidgets. wxX11 is well-suited for a number of special applications such as those running on systems with few resources (PDAs) or for applications which need to use a special themed look.

In order to configure wxWidgets to compile wxX11 you will need to type:

configure --with-x11 --with-universal

For further information, please see the files in docs/x11 in the distribution. There is also a page on the use of wxWidgets for embedded applications on the wxWidgets web site.

wxMotif

wxMotif is a port of wxWidgets for X11 systems using Motif libraries. Motif libraries provide a clean and fast user interface at the expense of the beauty and candy of newer interfaces like GTK.

For further information, please see the files in docs/motif in the distribution.

wxMSW

wxMSW is a port of wxWidgets for the Windows platforms (Windows XP and later are supported). wxMSW provides native look and feel for each Windows version. This port can be compiled with several compilers including Microsoft Studio VC++ 2003 or later, Borland 5.5, MinGW32, Cygwin as well as cross-compilation with a Linux-hosted MinGW32 tool chain.

For further information, please see the files in docs/msw in the distribution.

Resources and Application Icon

All applications using wxMSW should have a Windows resource file (.rc extension) and this file should include include/wx/msw/wx.rc file which defines resources used by wxWidgets itself.

Among other things, wx.rc defines some standard icons, all of which have names starting with the "wx" prefix. This normally ensures that any icons defined in the application's own resource file come before them in alphabetical order which is important because Explorer (Windows shell) selects the first icon in alphabetical order to use as the application icon which is displayed when viewing its file in the file manager. So if all the icons defined in your application start with "x", "y" or "z", they won't be used by Explorer. To avoid this, ensure that the icon which is meant to be used as the main application icon has a name preceding "wxICON" in alphabetical order.

Themed Borders

Starting with wxWidgets 2.8.5, you can specify the wxBORDER_THEME style to have wxWidgets use a themed border. Using the default XP theme, this is a thin 1-pixel blue border, with an extra 1-pixel border in the window client background colour (usually white) to separate the client area's scrollbars from the border.

If you don't specify a border style for a wxTextCtrl in rich edit mode, wxWidgets now gives the control themed borders automatically, where previously they would take the sunken border style. Other native controls such as wxTextCtrl in non-rich edit mode, and wxComboBox already paint themed borders where appropriate. To use themed borders on other windows, such as wxPanel, pass the wxBORDER_THEME style, or (apart from wxPanel) pass no border style.

In general, specifying wxBORDER_THEME will cause a border of some kind to be used, chosen by the platform and control class. To leave the border decision entirely to wxWidgets, pass wxBORDER_DEFAULT. This is not to be confused with specifying wxBORDER_NONE, which says that there should definitely be no border.

Internal Border Implementation

The way that wxMSW decides whether to apply a themed border is as follows. The theming code calls wxWindow::GetBorder() to obtain a border. If no border style has been passed to the window constructor, GetBorder() calls GetDefaultBorder() for this window. If wxBORDER_THEME was passed to the window constructor, GetBorder() calls GetDefaultBorderForControl().

The implementation of wxWindow::GetDefaultBorder() on wxMSW calls wxWindow::CanApplyThemeBorder() which is a virtual function that tells wxWidgets whether a control can have a theme applied explicitly (some native controls already paint a theme in which case we should not apply it ourselves). Note that wxPanel is an exception to this rule because in many cases we wish to create a window with no border (for example, notebook pages). So wxPanel overrides GetDefaultBorder() in order to call the generic wxWindowBase::GetDefaultBorder(), returning wxBORDER_NONE.

wxQt

wxQt is a port of wxWidgets using Qt libraries. It requires Qt 5 or later.

For further information, please see the files in docs/qt in the distribution.

wxiOS

wxiOS is a port of wxWidgets using Cocoa touch libraries for iOS. It is very basic in it current form, but is included for further improvements and very simple applications.

For further information, please see the files in docs/ios in the distribution.

Native Toolkit Documentation

It's sometimes useful to interface directly with the underlying toolkit used by wxWidgets to e.g. use toolkit-specific features. In such case (or when you want to e.g. write a port-specific patch) it can be necessary to use the underlying toolkit API directly:

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