FAQ's for the General Community
Client User Interface
Desktop Application / Rich Client
Q: Is the openPETRA Client Windows-only?
The Client is not strictly Windows-only as it is done using the .NET platform and .NET WinForms. An open source, cross-platform implementation exists which supports both (Mono). Mono supports e.g. Mac OS X and Linux.
The openPETRA Client does not rely on anything that would make it Windows-bound, e.g. Win32 API calls. However, we know that there are some shortcomings in the implementation of Mono WinForms on other operating systems. The openPETRA Client starts up on either of the operating systems mentioned, things just doesn't look that good when it comes to more elaborate forms. This isn't a fault of openPETRA, it is due to some shortcomings of the mono implementation of .NET WinForms. As the mono WinForms implementation matures, things might improve in this arena. Also, openPETRA's user interface is generated and not hand-painted, therefore our WinForms Generator could help in overcoming some of mono WinForms' shortcomings by emitting special source code for platforms where mono WinForms is used for running the openPETRA Client, if needed.
We test and support the openPETRA Client officially only on Windows. The reason for that is that we ourselves only need it on Windows and we are concentrating our efforts on what we need. That said, if somebody puts some work into it, it should work on other operating systems as well.
Web Frontend
Q: Is there a 'web client' for openPETRA?
openPETRA can have a web frontend in addition to its desktop application user interface. A demo of some web forms that were made with and for openPETRA can be found here: http://demo.openpetra.org:8009/ (esp. the last two links on that page).
We don't have plans to implement larger parts or even the whole of openPETRA as a web application. However, there is nothing that would prevent somebody from doing that if time and energy is put towards it. We just won't do it as our focus is a desktop application.
More questions?
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