Thanks to go-astilectron build cross platform GUI apps with GO and HTML/JS/CSS. It is the official GO bindings of astilectron and is powered by Electron.
WARNING: the code below doesn't handle errors for readibility purposes. However you SHOULD!
To import go-astilectron run:
$ go get -u github.com/asticode/go-astilectron
// Initialize astilectron
var a, _ = astilectron.New(astilectron.Options{
AppName: "<your app name>",
AppIconDefaultPath: "<your .png icon>",
AppIconDarwinPath: "<your .icns icon>",
BaseDirectoryPath: "<where you want the provisioner to install the dependencies>",
})
defer a.Close()
// Start astilectron
a.Start()For everything to work properly we need to fetch 2 dependencies : astilectron and Electron. .Start() takes care of it by downloading the sources and setting them up properly.
In case you want to embed the sources in the binary to keep a unique binary you can use the NewDisembedderProvisioner function to get the proper Provisioner and attach it to go-astilectron with .SetProvisioner(p Provisioner). Check out the example to see how to use it with go-bindata.
Beware when trying to add your own app icon as you'll need 2 icons : one compatible with MacOSX (.icns) and one compatible with the rest (.png for instance).
If no BaseDirectoryPath is provided, it defaults to the user's home directory path.
The majority of methods are synchrone which means that when executing them go-astilectron will block until it receives a specific Electron event or until the overall context is cancelled. This is the case of .Start() which will block until it receives the app.event.ready astilectron event or until the overall context is cancelled.
// Create a new window
var w, _ = a.NewWindow("http://127.0.0.1:4000", &astilectron.WindowOptions{
Center: astilectron.PtrBool(true),
Height: astilectron.PtrInt(600),
Width: astilectron.PtrInt(600),
})
w.Create()When creating a window you need to indicate a URL as well as options such as position, size, etc.
This is pretty straightforward except the astilectron.Ptr* methods so let me explain: GO doesn't do optional fields when json encoding unless you use pointers whereas Electron does handle optional fields. Therefore I added helper methods to convert int, bool and string into pointers and used pointers in structs sent to Electron.
// Add a listener on Astilectron
a.On(astilectron.EventNameAppCrash, func(e astilectron.Event) (deleteListener bool) {
astilog.Error("App has crashed")
return
})
// Add a listener on the window
w.On(astilectron.EventNameWindowEventResize, func(e astilectron.Event) (deleteListener bool) {
astilog.Info("Window resized")
return
})Nothing much to say here either except that you can add listeners to Astilectron as well.
// Play with the window
w.Resize(200, 200)
time.Sleep(time.Second)
w.Maximize()Check out the Window doc for a list of all exported methods
In your webserver add the following javascript to any of the pages you want to interact with:
<script>
// This will wait for the astilectron namespace to be ready
document.addEventListener('astilectron-ready', function() {
// This will listen to messages sent by GO
astilectron.listen(function(message) {
// This will send a message back to GO
astilectron.send("I'm good bro")
});
})
</script>In your GO app add the following:
// Listen to messages sent by webserver
w.On(astilectron.EventNameWindowEventMessage, func(e astilectron.Event) (deleteListener bool) {
var m string
e.Message.Unmarshal(&m)
astilog.Infof("Received message %s", m)
return
})
// Send message to webserver
w.Send("What's up?")And that's it!
NOTE: needless to say that the message can be something other than a string. A custom struct for instance!
// If several displays, move the window to the second display
var displays = a.Displays()
if len(displays) > 1 {
time.Sleep(time.Second)
if err = w.MoveInDisplay(displays[1], 50, 50); err != nil {
astilog.Fatal(errors.Wrap(err, "moving window to second display failed"))
}
}// Set up the logger
var l <your logger type>
astilog.SetLogger(l)
// Start an http server
http.HandleFunc("/", func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) {
w.Write([]byte(`<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Hello world</title>
</head>
<body>
<span id="message">Hello world</span>
<script>
// This will wait for the astilectron namespace to be ready
document.addEventListener('astilectron-ready', function() {
// This will listen to messages sent by GO
astilectron.listen(function(message) {
document.getElementById('message').innerHTML = message
// This will send a message back to GO
astilectron.send("I'm good bro")
});
})
</script>
</body>
</html>`))
})
go http.ListenAndServe("127.0.0.1:4000", nil)
// Initialize astilectron
var a, _ = astilectron.New(astilectron.Options{
AppName: "<your app name>",
AppIconDefaultPath: "<your .png icon>",
AppIconDarwinPath: "<your .icns icon>",
BaseDirectoryPath: "<where you want the provisioner to install the dependencies>",
})
defer a.Close()
// Handle quit
a.HandleSignals()
a.On(astilectron.EventNameAppCrash, func(e astilectron.Event) (deleteListener bool) {
astilog.Error("App has crashed")
return
})
// Start astilectron: this will download and set up the dependencies, and start the Electron app
a.Start()
// Create a new window with a listener on resize
var w, _ = a.NewWindow("http://127.0.0.1:4000", &astilectron.WindowOptions{
Center: astilectron.PtrBool(true),
Height: astilectron.PtrInt(600),
Icon: astilectron.PtrStr(<your icon path>),
Width: astilectron.PtrInt(600),
})
w.On(astilectron.EventNameWindowEventResize, func(e astilectron.Event) (deleteListener bool) {
astilog.Info("Window resized")
return
})
w.On(astilectron.EventNameWindowEventMessage, func(e astilectron.Event) (deleteListener bool) {
var m string
e.Message.Unmarshal(&m)
astilog.Infof("Received message %s", m)
return
})
w.Create()
// Play with the window
w.Resize(200, 200)
time.Sleep(time.Second)
w.Maximize()
// If several displays, move the window to the second display
var displays = a.Displays()
if len(displays) > 1 {
time.Sleep(time.Second)
if err = w.MoveInDisplay(displays[1], 50, 50); err != nil {
astilog.Fatal(errors.Wrap(err, "moving window to second display failed"))
}
}
// Send a message to the server
time.Sleep(time.Second)
w.Send("What's up?")
// Blocking pattern
a.Wait()To make things clearer I've tried to split features in different examples.
To run any of the examples, run the following commands:
$ go run examples/<name of the example>/main.go -v
Here's a list of the examples:
- 1.basic_window creates a basic window that displays a static .html file
- 2.basic_window_events plays with basic window methods and shows you how to set up your own listeners
- 3.webserver_app sets up a basic webserver app
- 4.remote_messaging sends a message to the webserver and listens for any response
- 5.single_binary_distribution shows how to use
go-astilectronin a unique binary. For this example you have to run one of the previous examples (so that the .zip files exist) and run the following commands:
$ go generate examples/5.single_binary_distribution/main.go
$ go run examples/5.single_binary_distribution/main.go examples/5.single_binary_distribution/vendor.go -v
- 6.screens_and_displays plays around with screens and displays
- custom branding (custom app name, app icon, etc.)
- window basic methods (create, show, close, resize, minimize, maximize, ...)
- window basic events (close, blur, focus, unresponsive, crashed, ...)
- remote messaging (messages between GO and the JS in the webserver)
- single binary distribution
- multi screens/displays
- menu methods
- menu events
- session methods
- session events
- window advanced options (add missing ones)
- window advanced methods (add missing ones)
- window advanced events (add missing ones)
- child windows
go-thrust which is awesome but unfortunately not maintained anymore. It inspired this project.
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