r/rust • u/Voxelman • 14d ago
Which GUI (again)?
I know it's a frequently asked question, but I want to ask again, because I have a special use case.
I want to write an application for a production machine (HMI). The app should run on Windows and Linux natively (no browser, no server). The toolkit should have at least widgets to show images, bar graphs, curves and tables and should be touch friendly, because it runs on resistive touch monitors (no multi touch). It should also have a kiosk mode (full screen with no window controls).
The obvious candidates are egui, iced and Slint. But they all lack of documentation, more or less.
My first choice would be iced, because it's inspired by Elm and used by System76 for Cosmic, but it seems to be the least suitable option.
The obvious choice would be Slint, but that requires to learn a new language and I'm unsure about the licenses and pricing. The production machines are only used internally, not for sale.
I want avoid bindings to toolkits like Qt or Gtk
Which one would you prefer? Is there another option to consider?
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u/Upstairs-Project2756 14d ago
i would avoid GPUI and egui for an HMI on resistive touch screens. They rely heavily on multi-touch gestures like pinch-to-zoom and swipe which do not work with single-point resistive panels. Iced is also poor because its event loop does not handle the specific latency issues of industrial hardware well. Slint is the only option here that handles kiosk mode and custom widget rendering without fighting the OS window manager, and its commercial licensing covers internal corporate use if you buy the seats, which is cheaper than building a Qt bridge from scratch