walk Windows Application Library Kit

To reduce the runtime overhead caused by Go calling Win32 API functions in the default message loop, you can use an optional C implementation of the main message loop by using the walk_use_cgo build tag.

go build -tags walk_use_cgo

The preferred way to build GUIs in Walk is using the github.com/lxn/walk/declarative sub package. This allows you to define your UI structure (Windows, Layouts, Widgets) using a declarative syntax.

package main

import (
	"github.com/lxn/walk"
	. "github.com/lxn/walk/declarative"
	"strings"
)

func main() {
	var inTE, outTE *walk.TextEdit
	MainWindow{
		Title:   "SCREAMO",
		MinSize: Size{600, 400},
		Layout:  VBox{},
		Children: []Widget{
			HSplitter{
				Children: []Widget{
					TextEdit{AssignTo: &inTE},
						TextEdit{AssignTo: &outTE, ReadOnly: true},
				},
			},
			PushButton{
				Text: "SCREAM",
				OnClicked: func() {
					outTE.SetText(strings.ToUpper(inTE.Text()))
				},
			},
		},
	}.Run()
}

Walk requires Windows Common Controls 6. You must provide an application manifest file either by embedding it as a resource or placing it next to your executable.

Warning: If you do not embed the manifest, do not launch the executable before the manifest file is in place, or the program will not run properly and Windows may fail to recognize the manifest later. If this happens, rebuild the executable with the manifest already present.

To embed a manifest file (e.g., test.manifest) into your application as a resource, use the rsrc tool.

go get github.com/akavel/rsrc
rsrc -manifest test.manifest -o rsrc.syso

Walk requires Go 1.11.x or later. Install the package using go get.

go get github.com/lxn/walk