The Prototypes extension of Views Studio allows you to define complex graphic objects, called prototypes, by interactively assembling Views graphic objects. Behaviors can be attached to these prototypes to define the whole graphical and interactive part of your application.

The prototypes can be instantiated and used as basic building blocks for application windows, object inspectors, or direct-manipulation interfaces, that is, when each application object is directly tied to an interactive graphical representation.

Views Studio with the Prototypes extension defines a new workflow to build highly interactive user interfaces: you develop the interactive part of your application in a graphical editor, store it in libraries, and then link it with your core functionality written in C++.

If you have installed the 2D Graphics Pro package, the Prototypes extension is automatically loaded when Views Studio is launched. The extension is called smproto in the configuration file. A compatibility extension enabling now deprecated features can also be used: smoldpro. This manual describes only the features of the smproto extension. To install or uninstall these extensions, see the section on Loading Plug-Ins in Introducing Views Studio.