iup-go

Go bindings for IUP, a multi-platform toolkit for building graphical user interfaces. The toolkit provides system native UI controls for Windows (Win32), macOS (Cocoa), and Linux (GTK and Qt).

IUP C source code is included and compiled together with bindings. Note that the first build can take a few minutes.

Requirements

Go 1.21 is the minimum required version.

Windows

On Windows, you need a C compiler, like Mingw-w64 or TDM-GCC. You can also build a binary in MSYS2 shell.

• To remove a console window, i.e., compile a GUI app with WinMain entry-point, build with -ldflags "-H=windowsgui".
• You can add an icon resource to an .exe file with the rsrc tool.
• Windows manifest is included in the build by default. See below how to disable the manifest if you want to include your own.

macOS

On macOS, you need Command Line Tools for Xcode (if you have brew, you already have this).

• To create an .app bundle or .dmg image, check this gist https://gist.github.com/mholt/11008646c95d787c30806d3f24b2c844.
• You can build for Qt in macOS, with the qt build tag. Install deps with brew install qt.
• You can build for GTK in macOS, with the gtk build tag. Install deps with brew install gtk+3.

Linux

On Linux, you need a C compiler and development packages for GTK or Qt.

GTK

GTK3 (default)

• Debian/Ubuntu: apt-get install libgtk-3-dev
• RedHat/Fedora: dnf install gtk3-devel

GTK4

• Debian/Ubuntu: apt-get install libgtk-4-dev
• RedHat/Fedora: dnf install gtk4-devel

Note that you can also build for GTK2.

You do not need to install WebKitGTK development packages for WebBrowser control; libraries are loaded at runtime.

Qt

Qt6 (default)

• Debian/Ubuntu: apt-get install qt6-base-dev
• RedHat/Fedora: dnf install qt6-qtbase-devel

Qt5

• Debian/Ubuntu: apt-get install qt5base-dev
• RedHat/Fedora: dnf install qt5-qtbase-devel

For the WebBrowser control, install qt6-webengine-dev or qt6-qtwebengine-devel.

For the GlCanvas control, Qt6 needs private headers for Wayland; install qt6-base-private-dev or qt6-qtbase-private-devel. You must manually export the path to private header files. For example, check pkg-config --modversion Qt6Core and pkg-config --cflags Qt6Core and then based on that use:

CGO_CXXFLAGS="-I/usr/include/qt6/QtCore/6.9.3 -I/usr/include/qt6/QtGui/6.9.3" go build -tags qt,gl

Other

The library should work on other Unix-like systems, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, DragonFly, Solaris, Illumos, and AIX.

You can also compile for a time-tested Motif library if GTK or Qt are not available.

• Debian/Ubuntu: apt-get install libmotif-dev libxmu-dev libxpm-dev
• RedHat/Fedora: dnf install motif-devel libXpm-devel

Build tags

• ctl - build with support for Matrix and Cells controls
• gl - build with support for GLCanvas control
• web - build with support for WebBrowser control
• gtk - use GTK in macOS or Windows
• gtk4 - build for GTK4, default is GTK3
• gtk2 - build for GTK2
• qt - build for the Qt framework
• qt5 - build for Qt5 version, default is Qt6 (used with qt)
• motif - build for X11/Motif 2.x environment
• xembed - use XEmbed tray protocol instead of SNI
• nomanifest - do not include manifest in Windows build
• nopkgconfig - do not use pkg-config for compile and link flags

Compiler flags

You can provide explicit compiler and linker flags instead of using the defaults provided by pkg-config. For example, if dependencies are in a non-standard location:

CGO_CFLAGS="-I<include path> ..." CGO_LDFLAGS="-L<dir> -llib ..." go build -tags nopkconfig

You can also point PKG_CONFIG_LIBDIR to some local directory with custom modified .pc files.

Documentation

IUP documentation is a must; every Go function in the doc reference there. Also check Go Reference and Examples.

Thread-Safety

User interfaces (and OpenGL) are usually not thread-safe, and IUP is not either. Some platforms enforce running UI on the main thread. Note that a goroutine can arbitrarily and randomly be scheduled or rescheduled on different running threads.

The secondary threads (goroutine) should not directly update the UI; instead, use PostMessage, which is expected to be thread-safe. See example that sends data to an element, which will be received by a callback when the main loop regains control. You can also use the IdleFunc and Timer.

Cross-compile (Linux)

To cross-compile for Windows, install MinGW toolchain.

$ CGO_ENABLED=1 CC=x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc GOOS=windows GOARCH=amd64 go build -ldflags "-s -w"
$ file alarm.exe
alarm.exe: PE32+ executable (console) x86-64, for MS Windows

$ CGO_ENABLED=1 CC=i686-w64-mingw32-gcc GOOS=windows GOARCH=386 go build -ldflags "-s -w"
$ file alarm.exe
alarm.exe: PE32 executable (console) Intel 80386, for MS Windows

To cross-compile for macOS, install OSXCross toolchain. Ready-made SDK tarballs are available here.

$ CGO_ENABLED=1 CC=x86_64-apple-darwin25-clang GOOS=darwin GOARCH=amd64 go build -ldflags "-s -w"
$ file alarm
alarm: Mach-O 64-bit x86_64 executable, flags:<NOUNDEFS|DYLDLINK|TWOLEVEL|WEAK_DEFINES|BINDS_TO_WEAK>

$ CGO_ENABLED=1 CC=aarch64-apple-darwin25-clang GOOS=darwin GOARCH=arm64 go build -ldflags "-s -w"
$ file alarm
alarm: Mach-O 64-bit arm64 executable, flags:<NOUNDEFS|DYLDLINK|TWOLEVEL|WEAK_DEFINES|BINDS_TO_WEAK|PIE>

Screenshots

See more screenshots.

Credits

• Tecgraf/PUC-Rio
• matwachich

License

iup-go is MIT licensed, same as IUP. View LICENSE.