Overview

The following sections explain how to integrate your .slint designs into your C++ application. The entry point is the .slint file containing the primary component you need to instantiate from C++.

Slint is a very flexible system and allows for different integration options.

First you can compile your Slint designs ahead of time into C++ code. This code is then built into your application. This allows for the smallest possible memory footprint and the best possible performance.

The second approach is to load your Slint designs at run-time, interpreting them as needed. This enables even more dynamic user interfaces that can be changed at run-time, but comes at the price of having less opportunity to apply optimizations.

Either way, once your user interface is shown, you interact with it from C++, for example by setting properties, populating data models or setting up and handling callbacks to react to events triggered by the user.

Compiled .slint Designs

The provided CMake integration makes it easy to compile your Slint sources: The slint_target_sources CMake command makes the translation automatic. The generated code has an API to set and get property values, etc. This API uses types from the slint namespace, for example slint::SharedString or slint::Color.

Run-Time Interpreted .slint Designs

Instead of compiling .slint designs to C++, you can dynamically load .slint files at run-time. This is slower than compiling them ahead of time and requires more memory, however it provides more flexibility in your application design.

The entry point to loading a .slint file is the slint::interpreter::ComponentCompiler class in the slint::interpreter namespace.

With the help of slint::interpreter::ComponentCompiler you create a slint::interpreter::ComponentDefinition, which provides information on properties and callbacks common to all instances. The slint::interpreter::ComponentDefinition::create() function creates new instances, wrapped in a slint::ComponentHandle. This is a smart pointer that owns the actual instance and keeps it alive as long as at least one slint::ComponentHandle is in scope, similar to std::shared_ptr<T>.

All property values in .slint are mapped to slint::interpreter::Value in C++. This is a polymorphic data type that can hold different kinds of values, such as numbers, strings or even data models.

More complex user interfaces commonly consume data in the form of an abstract data model, that is used with for - in repetitions or ListView elements in the .slint language. All models in C++ with the interpreter API are sub-classes of the slint::Model where the template parameter is slint::interpreter::Value. To provide your own data model, you can subclass slint::Model<slint::interpreter::Value>.

It’s possible to declare singletons that are globally available in .slint files. You can access them from to your C++ code by exporting them and using the getter and setter functions on slint::interpreter::ComponentInstance to change properties and callbacks:

  1. slint::interpreter::ComponentInstance::set_global_property()

  2. slint::interpreter::ComponentInstance::get_global_property()

  3. slint::interpreter::ComponentInstance::set_global_callback()

  4. slint::interpreter::ComponentInstance::invoke_global_callback()