Greetings! 2D Graphics?

Greetings, my name is M. This is my first time posting to a mailing list so forgive me if I've done something wrong. I just finished "Real World Haskell" and am currently working through "School of Expression". I am new to Haskell but I already love it. My question is this... I am interested in doing graphics work in Haskell, but I am lost trying to pick a library. I've been designing engineering apps in Java for 6 years and I'll admit I've been coddled by its standard library, lol. I am looking for something very lightweight with the basic capabilities of Java's Graphics2D class (antialias, composite, clipping, transformation, simple drawing primitives, gradients). I want something simple and "lightweight" because my interest is to play with building higher level abstractions myself. I use XP and Ubuntu so I'd prefer not to use the Graphics-Win32 library used by "School of Expression" if there is a platform independent library. I've read through http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_libraries/Graphics and the pertinent libraries seem to be Haven, HGL or Cairo via Gtk2Hs right? Which is the most popular/active and appropriate for a beginner to start working with? Thank you!

2009/12/4 M Xyz
Greetings, my name is M. This is my first time posting to a mailing list so forgive me if I've done something wrong. I just finished "Real World Haskell" and am currently working through "School of Expression". I am new to Haskell but I already love it. My question is this...
I am interested in doing graphics work in Haskell, but I am lost trying to pick a library. I've been designing engineering apps in Java for 6 years and I'll admit I've been coddled by its standard library, lol. I am looking for something very lightweight with the basic capabilities of Java's Graphics2D class (antialias, composite, clipping, transformation, simple drawing primitives, gradients). I want something simple and "lightweight" because my interest is to play with building higher level abstractions myself.
I use XP and Ubuntu so I'd prefer not to use the Graphics-Win32 library used by "School of Expression" if there is a platform independent library. I've read through http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_libraries/Graphics and the pertinent libraries seem to be Haven, HGL or Cairo via Gtk2Hs right? Which is the most popular/active and appropriate for a beginner to start working with?
I wrote http://hackage.haskell.org/package/timeplot and somewhat extended http://hackage.haskell.org/package/Chart for that. Chart is based on Cairo and I found it (Cairo) very easy and intuitive to use, yet quite powerful and performant. However, it is not a combinator library although you can make one based on it, if that's what you're looking for. There are quite a few graphics libraries based on Cairo on hackage, which means I'm not alone :)
Thank you!
_______________________________________________ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
-- Eugene Kirpichov Web IR developer, market.yandex.ru

On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 12:13 AM, M Xyz
Greetings, my name is M. This is my first time posting to a mailing list so forgive me if I've done something wrong. I just finished "Real World Haskell" and am currently working through "School of Expression". I am new to Haskell but I already love it. My question is this...
I am interested in doing graphics work in Haskell, but I am lost trying to pick a library. I've been designing engineering apps in Java for 6 years and I'll admit I've been coddled by its standard library, lol. I am looking for something very lightweight with the basic capabilities of Java's Graphics2D class (antialias, composite, clipping, transformation, simple drawing primitives, gradients). I want something simple and "lightweight" because my interest is to play with building higher level abstractions myself.
I use XP and Ubuntu so I'd prefer not to use the Graphics-Win32 library used by "School of Expression" if there is a platform independent library. I've read through http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_libraries/Graphics and the pertinent libraries seem to be Haven, HGL or Cairo via Gtk2Hs right? Which is the most popular/active and appropriate for a beginner to start working with?
I admit author's bias, but I suggest graphics-drawingcombinators. It is a 2D drawing library based on OpenGL with a pure interface (no IO, except to finally render your drawing), and supports all the stuff you want except clipping. It uses the SDL bindings, which I have heard are not easy to install on windows, but go smooth as a baby's bottom on ubuntu. Luke

I admit author's bias, but I suggest graphics-drawingcombinators. It is a 2D drawing library based on OpenGL with a pure interface (no IO, except to finally render your drawing), and supports all the stuff you want except clipping.
It uses the SDL bindings, which I have heard are not easy to install on windows, but go smooth as a baby's bottom on ubuntu.
Luke
I'll second this. I started using graphics-drawingcombinators about a month ago so I could easily convert SDL Surfaces into 2D sprites within OpenGL. The entire haddock synopsis fits on a single browser page, making it extremely easily to start using and build off of. You might also want to take a look at Conrad Barski's picnic tutorial at http://www.lisperati.com/haskell/, where he does some work with 2D graphics by generating .svg files. -- Michael Steele.
participants (4)
-
Eugene Kirpichov
-
Luke Palmer
-
M Xyz
-
Michael Steele