# Need Help with understanding Threads, Timers, and Yield

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/need-help-with-understanding-threads-timers-and-yield/182100>\
**Category:** wxRuby\
**Created:** [January 22, 2010, 4:40pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/need-help-with-understanding-threads-timers-and-yield/182100 "2010-01-22T16:40:36Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![elricstorm](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/e/da6949/32.png) [@elricstorm](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/elricstorm)\
**Post date:** [January 22, 2010, 4:40pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/need-help-with-understanding-threads-timers-and-yield/182100/1 "2010-01-22T16:40:36Z")

</div>

Hi Everyone,

I’m posting this to the correct list now.

I’m a new GUI developer that is having some difficulty understanding  
some of  
the nuances of GUI development with Ruby and want to hopefully get some  
of  
my questions answered. First, let me provide my setup:

. I’m using Ruby 1.9.1 patch 243 installed from  
mingw32-ruby-1.9.1-wxruby-2.0.1-setup.exe  
\<[http://rubyforge.org/frs/download.php/63415/mingw32-ruby-1.9.1-wxruby-2.0.1](http://rubyforge.org/frs/download.php/63415/mingw32-ruby-1.9.1-wxruby-2.0.1)  
-setup.exe\> .

. I’m using DialogBlocks as my GUI designer.

. I’m using wg\_sugar/xrcise for compiling my xrc source files.

. I’m using Windows Vista and Netbeans 6.8 IDE for my  
development  
environment.

. I’ve created a full project template to make it easier to  
develop  
my GUIs going forward using all of this setup.

My design template is segmented as follows:

. \icons

. \images

. \lib

. \nbproject

. \psd

. \tasks

. \ui

. Rakefile

. Start

My xrc source and the ruby files that handle that source are stored in  
my UI  
directory. My lib folder contains my main program ruby files and the  
tasks  
folder contains my rake tasks. The rest of the folders are pretty  
self-explanatory. The start file houses the following in the first file  
listed here:

> <https://gist.github.com/anonymous/283794>

Notes:

I’m first requiring any files I need and then loading my globals and a  
wxhelper file. The wxhelper file is fairly simple in that it’s loading  
all  
of the ruby files that are listed in my UI directory for handling the  
GUi  
frames. In addition, any pre-init type of events that need to take  
place  
(building directories, reading configuration files, etc. are done with  
WxHelper. Then I’m loading my main.rb file which houses all of the meat  
of  
my code, including the listener events. As you can see on lines 16-18  
of  
the start file, I’m starting a timer to pass threads. I believe this is  
the  
proper place to put this code, but I may be mistaken. I’ll ask  
questions  
about this in a moment.

Lastly, my main.rb file handles something similar in the second file  
listed  
here:

> <https://gist.github.com/anonymous/283794>

When I’m ready to work on my GUI development, I simply design in  
DialogBlocks, save my xrc, run a rake task that automatically builds my  
ruby  
files from xrc using xrcise, and then type ruby start to execute my GUI.  
I  
prefer this type of setup because it feels right. However, it may not  
be  
the most efficient way to design and therefore, if there is a better way  
to  
implement a design template, please let me know.

So, now that I have all of my pre-requisite mish-mosh out of the way (my  
apologies for the length), you at least understand how I’m operating and  
can  
possibly answer my questions a little more easily now.

Here are my questions:

Question 1: Did I place the timer event in the right spot? I placed it  
in  
the init section of my start script. Second-guessing myself, the only  
other  
place I felt I could place it would be within the initialize section of  
my  
main.rb script but this didn’t feel right. Because my program is  
starting  
with the init, I felt it should go here. If I’m mistaken, please  
correct me  
and explain why it shouldn’t go here.

Question 2: My program is going to be using several open socket  
connections  
simultaneously and CPU processing will occur as well. Therefore, I’m  
trying  
to simplify my template by incorporating threads to handle CPU/IO  
blocking.  
I believe I understand the processes, but my biggest issue may be WHEN  
and  
HOW to implement threads in my programs. Coming from other languages  
where  
simple gui designs didn’t incorporate threading, I can understand and  
appreciate the concept behind threading. I had first thought about  
implementing fibers but I don’t believe this is the best thing for me to  
do  
since I’m going to be handling cpu blocking. In addition, some java  
users  
mention that even if you use a fiber, you have to have a thread to  
manage  
it. So, threading is the way I want to go. I’m a newbie and novice  
programmer in terms of threading and even looking over the examples, I  
just  
can’t wrap my head around it at the moment. Any help would be  
appreciated  
with reference to my code listed above and when to use threads and also  
how  
to use them.

Question 3: I really do love DialogBlocks because it does simplify GUI  
design. I read and parsed my own set of notes which I’ll outline below  
and  
post the follow-up question:

In DBLK, all top-level Frames, Dialogs and Panels become Ruby classes.  
The  
name you type in the class field within DBLK becomes the class name in  
your  
Ruby program. Likewise, for the controls “within” a container, the DBLK  
class name becomes the name of a Ruby module in your program that will  
be  
used to extend the control.

How am I supposed to properly include the classes and modules within my  
program template structure? Should I be placing multiple modules and  
classes in the same main.rb file or should I place them in separate  
files  
and (require?/load?) them from my main.rb file? For instance, the first  
class that I had which is listed in main.rb is GuiMain which is  
referenced  
from the main gui frame that acts as the parent container for my  
application. I haven’t added any other elements yet that will become  
modules or classes, so I’m just uncertain where these code bits will be  
placed, or how to properly include them in my GUI. Any help concerning  
this  
would be appreciated.

Question 4: This is more of a dialogblocks question but I’m certain  
someone  
who may use dialogblocks can answer it for me. The question I have  
relates  
to sizers and my application as a whole. I understand the concept of  
sizers  
but what I don’t understand is how to properly size my Gui App depending  
on  
resolution sizes of other users’ desktops. For instance, right now I  
have a  
simple 700 x 550 starting gui app. I know that if I place a vertical  
sizer  
into my app and a main panel into that sizer, that whenever someone  
resizes  
the app, it will stretch out the main panel as well. However, this  
appears  
frustrating to me mainly because I’m heavily into CSS designing and I’m  
always trying to optimize for different browser sizes. What is a good  
starting application size (and the absolute maximum size you should  
place as  
a minimum starting point, before resizing?) Or, is there a way to test  
for  
desktop resolution across all OS platforms, and determine an initial gui  
app  
starting size based on that resolution type?

These four question outlines are my biggest concerns at the moment. I’m  
a  
very fast learner, have a lot of free time to read/learn and browse api,  
etc. I soak up information like a sponge which is a good thing. So,  
please  
feel free to inundate me with as much information possible about these  
questions and/or other novice items that I may not know about. I like  
the  
feel of WxRuby and I’m really excited to get down into porting some of  
my  
older GUI app code over to WxRuby.

Many thanks in advance.

Sincerely,

Joel D.