I now have a semi-functional GUI system that uses the ECS style to build gui elements rather than inheritance.

tests/ecs_gui.cpp

@@ -0,0 +1,28 @@
+#include <catch2/catch_test_macros.hpp>
+#include <fmt/core.h>
+#include "constants.hpp"
+#include "ecs_gui.hpp"
+
+
+TEST_CASE("prototype one gui", "[ecs-gui]") {
+  GUECS gui;
+  gui.position(0, 0, 1000, 500);
+  gui.layout("[test1|test2|test3][test4|_|test5]");
+
+  for(auto& [name, cell] : gui.cells()) {
+    auto& world = gui.world();
+    auto button = gui.entity(name);
+    world.set<lel::Cell>(button, cell);
+    world.set<Rectangle>(button, {});
+    world.set<Clickable>(button, {});
+    world.set<Textual>(button, {name});
+  }
+
+  gui.init();
+
+  // at this point it's mostly ready but I'd need to render it to a window real quick
+  sf::RenderWindow window;
+  window.setSize({SCREEN_WIDTH, SCREEN_HEIGHT});
+  gui.render(window);
+  window.display();
+}

tests/lel.cpp

@@ -2,10 +2,6 @@
 #include <catch2/catch_test_macros.hpp>
 #include <fmt/core.h>
 #include <string>
-#include "ansi_parser.hpp"
-#include <codecvt>
-#include <iostream>
-#include <vector>
 
 TEST_CASE("test basic ops", "[lel]") {
   lel::Parser parser(0, 0, 500, 500);