Hey Kotlin community! :wave: I've resurrected kotlin-libui and updated it to Kotlin 2.2.0! This pro...

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[אליהו הדס]

Hey Kotlin community! 👋

I've resurrected kotlin-libui and updated it to Kotlin 2.2.0! This project provides Kotlin bindings to the libui C library for building native GUI applications across platforms.

Perfect for lightweight applications
This toolkit is ideal for:
- Applications requiring minimal, native-looking UIs
- Programs that need to consume very little RAM
- Utilities where executable size matters (binaries are extremely small!)
- Cross-platform tools that need to maintain native performance

Current status:
- ✅ Updated to Kotlin 2.2.0
- ✅ Working on Windows and Linux
- ⚠️ macOS has some issues to resolve

I've also started experimenting with a Compose implementation for libui. While still very experimental, it aims to bring the modern Compose programming model to these lightweight native apps:

kotlin
fun main() = runLibUI {
    Window(title = "Compose Example") {
        VBox {
            Button(text = "Click Me") { /* action */ }
            MultilineEntry(text = remember { mutableStateOf("") })
        }
    }
}

If you're interested in lightweight UI development, cross-platform native apps, or helping with the Compose implementation, I'd love your collaboration! Who wants to help bring this lightweight Kotlin UI toolkit to the next level? 🚀
https://github.com/kdroidFilter/kotlin-libui

[Frank Bouwens]

Very cool cool cowboy

[אליהו הדס]

It would also be necessary to add support for a system tray, because I imagine that this type of very light UI is often for a service that we want to leave constantly active on the system.

[אליהו הדס]

otherwise I don't really see the point of not using compose desktop

[Frank Bouwens]

another kotlin lib that support system tray exists 🙂 Maybe they can work together.

[אליהו הדס]

I guess you're talking about mine 😅

[Frank Bouwens]

Haha, indeed I am 😉

[אליהו הדס]

https://github.com/kdroidFilter/ComposeNativeTray

[Cies]

really cool project indeed!

[Mervyn McCreight]

cool that this project gets revived 🙂

[Mervyn McCreight]

just wondering why you decided to fork a fork instead of the original project :D

[אליהו הדס]

@Mervyn McCreight because he had started working on a compose version