Where can I find documents about node-gir please?

[tiye]

As I discovered that GNOME's docs are really unfriendly to JS-only developers. And after a long time I didn't find a document about seed or gjs as friendly as Node APIs. That's why I want to try node-gir. Please is there any document I can refer to in writing GTK applications with node-gir? I mean is there a plain description about gir when you implement node-gir?

Thanks.

[piotras]

Current "plain description" is let's make it work and cover all fundamental operations with tests. Depending on expectation I would place node-gir between alfa na beta. GIR itself is not mature enough (though it's stable enough) to describe every single detail. GTK itself has been designed for C developers and docs are friendly for such. Node-gir provides runtime dynamic bindings so if you expect API docs, one should provide special routines to generate Node ones. The more feedback we have the node-gir design is more strict and clear.

[tiye]

@piotras You mean node-gir is now alpha version. No wonder loading "Gtk" module is slower than that in Seed. By now only Gjs is mature enough then?

[piotras]

@jiyinyiyong I would say it's between alpha and beta. Check tests: https://travis-ci.org/piotras/node-gir/builds/2897206. They pass for most fundamental types and options. Still there's a lack of in&out arguments, but I find them only C level friendly. Wrt module loading speed. Do you have some real numbers? What about runtime performance? I can take a look and check module loading time, but I would like to know whether I need to fix 5% or 65% for example.

[tiye]

Test two files here: load.js

// Generated by CoffeeScript 1.4.0
var Gtk, gir;

if (typeof console !== "undefined" && console !== null) {
  gir = require('gir');
  gir.load('Gtk', '3.0');
} else if (typeof print !== "undefined" && print !== null) {
  Gtk = imports.gi.Gtk;
}

log.js

// Generated by CoffeeScript 1.4.0

if (typeof console !== "undefined" && console !== null) {
  console.log('node');
} else if (typeof print !== "undefined" && print !== null) {
  print('seed');
}

Run in terminal

➤➤ time node load.js 

real    0m1.482s
user    0m1.367s
sys 0m0.123s
➤➤ time seed load.js 

real    0m0.112s
user    0m0.083s
sys 0m0.027s
➤➤ time node log.js 
node

real    0m0.057s
user    0m0.050s
sys 0m0.003s
➤➤ time seed log.js 
seed

real    0m0.039s
user    0m0.023s
sys 0m0.013s
➤➤ uname -a
Linux up 3.6.8-1-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Mon Nov 26 22:10:40 CET 2012 x86_64 GNU/Linux
➤➤ node -v
v0.8.15
➤➤ seed --version
Seed 3.2.0

---

I found a problem... and I made it work(however I dont't know why is that)

➤➤ node load.js 

module.js:340
    throw err;
          ^
Error: Cannot find module './build/Release/lib.target/girepository.node'
    at Function.Module._resolveFilename (module.js:338:15)
    at Function.Module._load (module.js:280:25)
    at Module.require (module.js:362:17)
    at require (module.js:378:17)
    at Object.<anonymous> (/home/chen/code/tmp/node_modules/gir/gir.js:8:28)
    at Module._compile (module.js:449:26)
    at Object.Module._extensions..js (module.js:467:10)
    at Module.load (module.js:356:32)
    at Function.Module._load (module.js:312:12)
    at Module.require (module.js:362:17)
➤➤ c node_modules/gir/build/Release/lib.target/
girepository.so
➤➤ cp girepository.so girepository.node
➤➤ c -
load.coffee  load.js  log.coffee  log.js  node_modules/
➤➤ time node load

real    0m1.614s
user    0m1.400s
sys 0m0.120s