V bindings for Dear ImGui and ImPlot

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For a fresh-clone setup and a one-command GLFW/Vulkan demo, see QUICKSTART.md. For Android Vulkan and Apple Metal/iOS build and lifecycle details, see docs/mobile.md.

The cross-platform setup entry point installs prerequisites and builds the native library without regenerating bindings:

./setup.vsh

Use ./setup.vsh --check for read-only diagnostics. The scripts are executable on Linux and macOS with V on PATH. On Windows, run the same files with v run setup.vsh or v run scripts/run_demo.vsh from a Developer PowerShell.

The V bindings are already generated and committed. Installing the module does not require the binding generators; see Maintaining if you are updating the upstream API.

Upstream variants

This repository supports both official Dear ImGui lines:

• master is the default docking build. It includes docking and multi-viewport support while retaining the normal Dear ImGui API.
• The standard branch tracks Dear ImGui's smaller standard line.

Both currently track Dear ImGui 1.92.9b. The b is an upstream patch-level suffix shared by the release; it does not identify the docking variant. Check UPSTREAM_VARIANT in a checkout to see which line its generated bindings and native sources use. Do not mix a generated binding from one line with a native library built from the other.

Applications can identify and configure the selected line without referring to docking-only generated symbols:

println('Dear ImGui variant: ${imgui.upstream_variant}')
if imgui.configure_docking(true) {
	imgui.create_main_dockspace()
}
imgui.configure_platform_viewports(true)
// After rendering the main viewport:
imgui.render_platform_viewports()

The configuration functions return false on the standard branch. Dockspace and secondary-viewport rendering helpers become safe no-ops there.

Dependencies

The setup and build tooling uses V, CMake, Git and a C/C++ toolchain. Python, Rust and Cargo are not required.

VPM installs the V dependencies listed in v.mod automatically when you install antono2.imgui; separate dependency installation commands are not needed. Those dependencies use release pins to retain the tested Vulkan/GLFW combination. They are package dependency choices, not a requirement to pin the ImGui installation command below. Change them only after checking compatibility. The desktop demo launcher also uses a tested examples release tag by default. Use --demo-revision REF to choose another tag or commit, or --demo-directory to build an existing checkout without changing it.

Install

v install antono2.imgui
# Build libvimgui for this machine (without regenerating V bindings)
cd ~/.vmodules/antono2/imgui
./build_vimgui.vsh

Native-library choices

The default uses a shared libvimgui and the system GLFW development package:

./build_vimgui.vsh --linkage shared --glfw system

To build a static archive and select it from V:

./build_vimgui.vsh --linkage static --glfw system
v -d imgui_static run your_app.v

GLFW can instead be downloaded at a chosen release tag. This is useful for a reproducible application bundle:

./build_vimgui.vsh --linkage shared --glfw bundled --glfw-version 3.4

VIMGUI_LINKAGE, VIMGUI_GLFW_PROVIDER and VIMGUI_GLFW_VERSION provide the same choices as environment variables. System GLFW is preferable for distro packages. Bundled GLFW is preferable when shipping a matching libglfw.so.3 beside libvimgui.so; use an $ORIGIN runtime path in the application package.

Vulkan loader ownership

libvimgui is built with IMGUI_IMPL_VULKAN_NO_PROTOTYPES and intentionally does not link directly to libvulkan. A Volk-based application must initialize in this order:

1. Call volkInitialize() before GLFW performs Vulkan discovery.
2. Create the Vulkan instance and call volkLoadInstance(instance).
3. Immediately call imgui.impl_vulkan.load_functions(...) with a callback backed by vkGetInstanceProcAddr.
4. Only then call helpers such as select_physical_device, select_queue_family_index or vkinit.

Calling an ImGui Vulkan helper before step 3 can produce an early segmentation fault with little or no stack trace. Do not combine the directly linked Vulkan prototype path with Volk's global dispatch table in the same application.

Examples

Using GLFW and Dear ImGui antono2/v_imgui_examples

The example releases contain the compiled GLFW/Vulkan example, widget gallery and ImPlot dashboard, with their application libraries. Open examples.exe on Windows or run ./run.sh on Linux to choose an example. Docking packages support docking and platform viewports; standard packages retain independent floating windows. Press F11 for borderless fullscreen and Escape to quit after an active edit or popup consumes it.

The Android touch/text APK includes its native libraries and font. See the installation guide for desktop requirements, Android installation without a Play Store and the gallery's integrated accessibility controls.

Compiling the generated ImGui and ImPlot V bindings can currently require about 11 GiB of memory. Use scripts/run_demo.vsh to build and run the demo from source.

Release binaries are built for Ubuntu 24.04 x86_64 and Windows 10/11 x64. Native-library linkage and the GLFW provider remain build-time choices for developers; they do not need to multiply the end-user demo downloads.

For binding regeneration, upstream updates and CI/release procedures, see Maintaining. To rebuild only the native library after a system upgrade, run ./build_vimgui.vsh.

Thanks

Thank you @ryoskzypu from #regex on libera.chat for helping with the original cleanup rules that the current V-native generator preserves.

Compatibility and diagnostics

See tested profiles and read-only diagnostics for compiler/dependency versions, setup recovery actions and upgrade checks.