Desktop Application Framework similar to Rails

Question

I'm looking for a desktop application framework similar to Rails:

• Good ORM

• MVC

• Default directory structure

• View Helpers/DSL

• Elegant

• Open Source

• Fun language

• Decently mature

Answer 1

Have you checked out Shoes?

Answer 2

There is also Bowline. It was mentioned in ruby inside blog recently. I haven't tried it. Tried Shoes though. It is very simple.

There is another one called Anvil. Anvil is a MVC framework that wants to be equivalent to rails for GUI development. It is based on wxruby. Which makes me want to try it.

Answer 3

I've personally ended up using Swing/SWT + JRuby. The Java cross-platform GUI libraries are just light-years ahead because they're used for IDEs, which are about the most demanding application you can have for a GUI toolkit. It's nowhere near as elegant as Rails is for the web (and I'm no fan of Rails), but in the long run, it's a much better choice than anything based on wxWidgets or GTK or QT. It also gives you the option to drop into Java if you have a particular piece that's running too slow. I wish there were better options, but that's what we've got.

Answer 4

Monkeybars is the main solution I'm aware of, but it's not ideal from the point of view of your bullet list. Its "MVC" isn't really like any other interpretation of MVC that I've come across; it's more a convenience wrapper around Swing. At least, that's the way I use it.

Answer 5

Check out Griffon, a Grails-like framework for Swing application development that fulfills all your needs.

Answer 6

try Rebol, it's got the simplest gui that is out there. an example of a window with one text field, one button "click me" and a label "hello" :-

view layout [ field label "hello" button "click me" ]

or if you want it in multi line

view layout [
field
label "hello"
button "click me"
]