Cocoa is probably the best GUI toolkit (open-source or otherwise) that I've seen. However it ties your app to the Mac (and the iPhone). And I don't believe there is a mature Haskell bridge.
Cross-platform GUI's like GTK don't look as nice but functions pretty well for what they do. Unfortunately they are written in C/C++/. Integration to Haskell is pretty nice but it seems like a bear to install on Windows or Mac and hence there are deployment issues. Until a cross-platform Haskell GUI toolkit is sufficiently mature, that doesn't leave many options and all of them require spending time coding in another language. If natively running code was a major requirement, I'd use a Java Swing app as a client connecting to Haskell server - if not I'd go with a web frontend as previously described. And Javascript [1] is really not _that_ bad! -deech [1] http://www.amazon.com/dp/0596517742 On 4/3/10, Heinrich Apfelmus <apfel...@quantentunnel.de> wrote: > Michael Vanier wrote: >> aditya siram wrote: >>> Yes Haskell is not strong on the GUI end of things but have you >>> considered turning your desktop app into a web app? I've done this >>> for a few things and really enjoyed the process. Haskell's STM is >>> what makes this so nice. >> >> This is a great idea! IMO this is also one of the main ways that >> GUI-based apps are likely to evolve into in the future. Cross-platform >> GUIs are a pain in the butt in _any_ language (possibly excluding full >> language platforms like Java/.NET, and I'll bet even those were a >> nightmare for the original implementors). > > This is a bad idea! :) As a long term Mac user, I have a strong dislike > for web applications that try to be desktop applications. Sagemath is > probably an example in point. Not only are the well-designed standard > GUI elements thrown out of the window (the menu bar, it belongs at the > top), it's also sluggish to navigate between pages, doesn't support drag > & drop from other applications and most importantly, doesn't play nice > with local files. > > >From the programmers point of view, I don't want to code my GUI in > Javascript either, I want to do it in Haskell. > > > Regards, > Heinrich Apfelmus > > -- > http://apfelmus.nfshost.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Haskell-Cafe mailing list > Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org > http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe > _______________________________________________ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe