TcMenu Designer Docs by system

TcMenu Designer Turbo allows you to rapidly generate a menu UI application for Arduino/PicoSDK from your browser, including setting up the display and IoT control. Designed from the ground up for non-trivial embedded menu-based UIs, it can shorten your project significantly. It is built using our web-based visual designer and trusted code generator that's been building menus for nearly 10 years.

Who TcMenu Turbo is for

TcMenu Turbo is a strong fit if you want to:

• Build structured menu-driven UIs for Arduino, PicoSDK, or similar embedded targets
• Configure displays, inputs, and plugins without wiring everything up by hand
• Generate code quickly, while keeping it readable enough to maintain in your IDE
• Add remote or IoT control without building a separate UI stack from scratch

TcMenu Turbo is designed for structured embedded menu applications. For smaller projects, a simpler hand-coded library may be enough, while a GUI framework may be a better fit for full graphical or touch-first interfaces.

Comparison with other menu frameworks

Each of these libraries brings something valuable to the embedded UI world, and "TcMenu Turbo" is designed to sit alongside them rather than compete with them. "TcMenu Turbo" fills a gap between a trivial menu and a full UI: I.E. it provides a modern workflow for structured menus, IoT integration, and rapid iteration through its fluent builder and web‑based designer.

Feature / Library	TcMenu Turbo >>	Arduino Menu Libraries	LVGL	GEM
Design Philosophy	Structured menus with modern tooling and code generation	Lightweight, simple, very Arduino‑friendly	Full GUI framework for rich, touch‑driven UIs	Minimalistic graphic menus for small displays
Designer UI	Web‑based designer with live updates	Typically hand‑coded	Hand‑coded layouts	Hand‑coded layouts
Code Generation	Automatic, template‑driven, non‑destructive	Manual coding	Manual coding	Manual coding
Hardware Support	Broad: LCD, OLED, TFT, U8g2, TFT_eSPI, JavaFX, and more	Varies by library	Extremely broad (touchscreens, GPUs, full GUI systems)	U8g2 + SparkFun Serial Backpack
Input Methods	Encoder, buttons, touch, keyboard, remote IoT	Buttons/encoders	Touch‑first	Buttons
IoT / Remote Control	Built‑in remote UI + Java API	Rare	Possible but manual	No
Complexity	Medium (guided by designer)	Low (great for beginners)	High (full GUI system)	Low
Best For	Embedded menus, IoT devices, structured UIs	Simple Arduino projects	Rich GUIs, dashboards, touchscreens	Minimalistic graphic menus
Community Strength	Strong docs, examples, and videos	Very approachable for newcomers	Large ecosystem and active development	Clear documentation and focused scope

Example code taken from real projects

The below shows just how far we've moved the dial on code readability. You can see the menu structure is very human-readable, and if it is human-readable, then not only is it easy to read and maintain, but AI can also understand it. Spend less time in designer and more time in your IDE:

void buildMenu(TcMenuBuilder& builder) {
    builder.usingDynamicEEPROMStorage()
        .actionItem(HIBERNATE_ID, "Hibernate", NoMenuFlags, onHibernate)
        .analogBuilder(INT_EDIT_ID, "Int Edit", ROM_SAVE, NoMenuFlags, 4)
            .offset(0).divisor(1).maxValue(100).unit("%").endItem()
        .subMenu(EXTRAS_ID, "Extras", NoMenuFlags)
            .textItem(EXTRAS_TEXT_ID, "Text", ROM_SAVE, 10, NoMenuFlags)
            .rgb32Item(EXTRAS_RGB_ID, "Color", ROM_SAVE, false, NoMenuFlags)
            .endSub();
}

Not only that, the themes are also very readable; once you've picked a starting theme, you can easily tweak it to your liking without a trip back into the designer. Even overriding individual items to draw in a grid layout is easy:

// we want to layout two items using XBitmap images on the same row, so what we do is to
// use the onRowCol method to specify the row and column 
void applyLayout() {
   int requiredRow = 3; // we want the third row to have two items split horizontally
   int numberOfColumns = 2; // We'll split the row into two columns
   TcThemeBuilder themeBuilder(renderer);
   themeBuilder.menuItemOverride(menuDirect)
            .onRowCol(requiredRow, 1, numberOfColumns)
            .withImageXbmp(Coord(20, 20), directBitmapOff, directBitmapOn)
            .apply();
}

As a bonus TaskManagerIO is built in too, there's an inbuilt scheduler that can also handle complex events. Example to schedule a task:

void setup() {
    // .. other code
    taskManager.schedule(repeatMillis(500), []() {
        // do some work here every 500ms, don't do anything that blocks for too long.
    });
    // .. other code
}

And lastly, if you want to use it, all display plugins we've written support TcUnicode, allowing you to use UTF-8 encoded strings in your menu with ease. While still maintaining 100% compatibility with existing graphics libraries.

How it works

Getting from idea to embedded code is a streamlined three-step process:

1. Start the Designer: Open TcMenu Web Designer Turbo directly in your browser.
2. Build Visually: Create your menu tree, configure display/input plugins, and set up IoT remote control.
3. Generate & Build: Generate a complete project (EMF file) ready to compile in CLion, Arduino IDE, or VS Code.

Documentation and Resources

Below you will find detailed guides for every aspect of TcMenu Turbo, from the initial setup to advanced code generation and IO expansion.

• Quick Start: Getting Started with TcMenu Turbo
• GitHub Discussions: Ask questions and share your projects
• TcMenu Docs: Full TcMenu library and plugin documentation
• Reference Docs: Full library API Reference

Desktop users only

Although strongly discouraged, you can still download the legacy version of TcMenu Designer, but we strongly recommend using the web designer. If there's any reason you can't use web designer, let us know in the tcMenu GitHub discussions.

Full Documentation Hub