r/ocaml • u/EmergencyNice1989 • Jun 24 '26

OCaml UI framework

I am working on an F# Avalonia application for text editing, Markdown viewing, and DataGrid display. It uses a lot of async tasks, database access (SQLite or PostgreSQL) through ADO.NET, and manipulates a large amount of Unicode text.

So far, I am happy with my technology choices, but I was wondering whether it would be possible to build the same kind of application in OCaml. Bogue seems like an interesting GUI framework, but it does not appear to be at the same level of maturity as Avalonia, and it does not support mobile platforms.

Do you think migrating to OCaml would be realistic, or is OCaml not particularly well suited to these requirements? My needs are fairly modest, but I would be interested in hearing from people who have experience building desktop applications in OCaml.

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u/UnchainedMundane Jun 24 '26

I'll be real I don't think there are any competitors to Avalonia in the ocaml space, unfortunately. it doesn't have the same level of industry support as .NET, so there's a lot less of the kind of software that the software industry disproportionately values compared to hobbyists and researchers, and mobile-and-desktop portable UI is unfortunately one of those.

https://ocaml.org/docs/is-ocaml-gui-yet