How This Book Is Organized

The Programmer's Overview is divided into two parts. Part I contains an architectural overview of the Common Desktop Environment, including high-level information on both the run-time and development environments. Part II contains information useful to know before developing an application, and describes the development environment components.

This section provides brief descriptions of the chapters and appendixes contained in this manual.

Chapter 1, Architectural Overview presents an overview of the Common Desktop Environment architecture.

Chapter 2, Development Environment Considerations discusses information you should know about the environment before you start to develop an application.

Chapter 3, Developing an Application presents information specific to developing a Common Desktop Environment application, such as naming conventions and guidelines to follow.

Chapter 4, Portability and Maintenance discusses issues pertaining to writing portable and maintainable applications.

Chapter 5, Basic Application Integration summarizes how to make your application launch-integrated (that is, started by double-clicking an icon on the desktop).

Chapter 6, Recommended Integration provides overviews of all components and guidelines that you should use so your application has the same look and feel as, and interoperates well with, other Common Desktop Environment desktop applications.

Chapter 7, Optional Integration provides overviews of the components to incorporate into your application as needed for added functionality.

Appendix A, Common Desktop Environment Motif describes the differences between Motif 1.2.3 and Common Desktop Environment Motif.

Appendix B, Component and Guideline Reference lists in alphabetical order all development environment components and guidelines, with associated library, header files, and documentation.