Introducing Vala Programming

A Language and Techniques to Boost Productivity

verfasst von: Dr. Michael Lauer

Verlag: Apress

Enthalten in: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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Über dieses Buch

Get an introduction into the Vala programming language and learn about its syntax, semantics, and idioms. Do you want to boost your productivity? Are you interested in a programming language that combines the efficiency of a scripting language with the performance of a compiled language? Did you always want to write GTK+ or GNOME programs, but hate C with a passion? Read this book and learn Vala!
Introducing Vala Programming starts from Hello World and goes up to graphical user interfaces using GTK+, covering DBus interprocess communication, network programming, Linux specifics, and more. You’ll learn how to leverage external libraries and enhance Vala by writing bindings to new libraries.

What You Will LearnDiscover the Vala programming language and how to use it to boost your productivityUse Vala syntax and semanticsWrite object-oriented code with ValaWork with DBusImplement networking with ValaIntegrate and use external libraries with bindings and libgusb
Who This Book Is For
People with basic programming experience in any imperative programming language.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter

Chapter 1. Introduction

Abstract

This chapter explains why Vala is a good idea and how you could benefit from a massively increased productivity, if you use it. It talks a bit about the history of Vala and mentions the author’s personal involvement. Structure, audience, and typographic conventions are presented.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 2. Getting Started

Abstract

In the sense of the tradition founded by Kernighan and Ritchie, we start with the obligatory “Hello World” program—a minimal example that not only provides a first look at the syntax but also discusses the Vala way from the source code to the executable binary. We also take a glance behind the curtain to see how Vala operates in the background and translates your program into C.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 3. Syntax and Semantics

Abstract

This chapter provides more information about the basic Vala programming rules, including syntax and semantics of most language constructs. We will also cover some of the more common idioms. If you’re coming from another language, this is the chapter that will get you up to speed. Since it might not be the most exciting chapter in this book, feel free to only glance through and come back whenever you need more information about a certain construct.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 4. Object-Oriented Programming

Abstract

This chapter goes into the details of object-oriented programming, which is the central programming paradigm of Vala, including classes, interfaces, polymorphism, and the signal mechanism for the loose binding of components.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 5. Networking

Abstract

This chapter covers network programming with Vala. We’re introducing the low-level way using POSIX sockets first and then advance to using GIO. Since most web services these days are talking JSON, we’re also going to introducing this. Last but not least, we will present the GNOME HTTP networking library libsoup.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 6. UI Programming with GTK+

Abstract

This chapter discusses UI programming with Vala using GTK+ 3.0. After introducing the basic principles of event-driven systems (with UI programming being one of the major applications), we will present an application combining several aspects learned in the previous chapters, for example, network transfers and JSON parsing.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 7. DBus

Abstract

This chapter covers DBus programming with Vala. After a brief overview about the core DBus concepts, we will show how to develop both a DBus client and a DBus server.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 8. Linux

Abstract

This chapter shows how to use Vala for writing code that accesses platform-specific Linux low-level features.

Michael Lauer

Chapter 9. External Libraries

Abstract

This chapter shows how to use the functionality provided by external libraries from Vala programs, that is, how to write binding files for C APIs.

Michael Lauer

Backmatter

Titel: Introducing Vala Programming
verfasst von: Dr. Michael Lauer
Verlag: Apress
Electronic ISBN: 978-1-4842-5380-9
Print ISBN: 978-1-4842-5379-3
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-5380-9