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10. Programming notes

Gmsh is written in C++, the scripting language is parsed using Lex and Yacc (actually, Flex and Bison), and the GUI relies on OpenGL for the 3D graphics and FLTK (http://www.fltk.org) for the widget set. Gmsh's build system is based on autoconf. Practical notes on how to compile Gmsh's source code are included in the distribution. See B. Frequently asked questions, for more information.

10.1 Main code structure  
10.2 Coding style  
10.3 Option handling  


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10.1 Main code structure

Gmsh's code is structured in several libraries, roughly separated between the three main core modules (Geo, Mesh, Post) and associated utility libraries (Common, Numeric) on one hand, and graphics (Graphics) and interface (Fltk, Box) libraries on the other.

The geometry and mesh modules are based on an object-oriented model class (Geo/GModel.h), built upon abstract geometrical entity classes (Geo/GVertex.h, Geo/Gedge.h, Geo/GFace.h and Geo/GRegion.h).


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10.2 Coding style

If you plan to contribute code to the Gmsh project, here are some easy rules to make the code easy to read/debug/maintain:

  1. please enable full warnings for your compiler (e.g., add -Wall to FLAGS in the `variables' file);
  2. always use the Msg() function to print information, errors, ...;
  3. indent your files using `utils/misc/indent.sh';


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10.3 Option handling

To add a new option in Gmsh:

  1. create the option in the Context_T class (`Common/Context.h') if it's a classical option, or in the PViewOptions class (`Post/PViewOptions.h') if it's a post-processing view-dependent option;
  2. in `Common/DefaultOptions.h', give a name (for the parser to be able to access it), a reference to a handling routine (i.e. opt_XXX) and a default value for this option;
  3. create the handling routine opt_XXX in `Common/Options.cpp' (and add the prototype in `Common/Options.h');
  4. optional: create the associated widget in `Fltk/GUI.cpp';
  5. optional: if no special callback is to be associated with the widget, add the handling routine opt_XXX to the OK callback for the corresponding option panel (in `Fltk/Callbacks.cpp').


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