Assignment 1: Getting to know FLTK and Visual C++

This assignment is intended to introduce you to the user interface toolkit we will use in class, FLTK (Fast Light ToolKit), and the programming environment for which you will have to submit assignments, Visual C++. For some of you this may also be your introduction to C++.

For this assignment you must:

• Complete the interactive FLTK programming demo at http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~arangara/assign1.
  This demonstration will walk you through starting a project in C++, opening an FLTK window, and creating some widgets (user interface elements). The page was written by Mark Pingel, the TA for last semester's class, and then modified by Raj. Some of the demo goes even further back than that.

If you were planning to use MFC or some other windowing toolkit, I must warn you that interfacing MFC and OpenGL is very very messy, and unless you already have experience, you will probably need to buy an additional book covering OpenGL for Windows specifically. Furthermore, neither the lecturer or TA are familiar with OpenGL with MFC, so you will be on your own. So, I recommend using FLTK at least for the latter two thirds of the class, which means you should still do this assignment.

You do not need to hand anything in for this, or any other, programming assignment. Your progress is not graded. However, you will require the skills developed in this assignment to complete the projects in the class, so you should do the assignment now to determine if you will have any problems. When project time comes around the TA, Raj, will be too busy to help you with problems that are covered in this assignment. Problems now should be directed to Raj during his office hours.

Enjoy it. It's your first graphics program, and getting something up on the screen that responds is always good.