Current user interface toolkits provide components that are complex and expensive. Programmers cannot use these components for many kinds of application data because the resulting implementation would be awkward and inefficient. We have defined a set of small, simple components, called glyphs, that programmers can use in large numbers to build user interfaces. To show that glyphs are simple and efficient, we have implemented a WYSIWYG document editor. The editor's performance is comparable to that of similar editors built with current tools, but its implementation is much simpler. We used the editor to create and print this paper.
Paul R. Calder, Mark A. Linton