TUI (text user interface) library
Back in 2000 when I was working for one local book store we had a legacy backoffice system written in C++ for DOS. The foundation had been written by my boss several years earlier. The code style was messy but the most painful part was the user interface. I couldn't stand the dumb way the UI was programmed (mostly by copy-pasting blocks of existing code) so I decided to do it my way.
I tried using Turbo Vision but it was too heavy for our needs and consumed too much RAM -- and remember, we were using only 640 Kb of conventional memory for running the program itself plus extended memory for the data. Also I was keen to try to develop something similar myself. So I came up with this TUI library, which I used for about a year until I left the company.
The demo program (TUIDEMO.EXE) only uses 69 Kb of memory and demonstrates some of the most useful components: an open file dialog, message box, input box, calendar, different lists, and a progress bar (which we were using A LOT in those days 🙂) Also, please note the "graphic" mouse pointer in text mode, which was rarely seen in UI back then.
The TUIDEMO.EXE is already built and can be run in DOSBox. Please keep the TUINOTE.TXT file besides, it is
loaded at startup.
To build TUI you need to install Borland C++ 3.1 compiler. You may install it anywhere convenient (for example in C:\TOOLS\BC) and then you should create a mapped drive H: using subst command
subst H: C:\TOOLS
so that you have a bcc binary under H:\BC\BIN and standard library in H:\BC\LIB.
Now just run BUILD.BAT with a memory model of your choice. Use large model if in doubt.
BUILD.BAT l
This will build a TUIDEMO.EXE from sources.