Re: Great SWT Program

In article <1192243074.800215.222560@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
<bbound@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Oct 10, 6:17 am, blm...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <blm...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Yes. They pretty much get exposure to some Linux "desktop
environment" as a side effect of using Linux at all. But it's not
clear this is much of a paradigm shift. It's like saying they
should learn something about both C++ and Java, which is good,
without adding that they also should learn something about a
functional language as well.

Should they though?

I think so -- if we're talking about people enrolled in a degree
program in computer science. In my opinion, the goal of such
programs should be to turn out people who know how to learn, not
people trained in today's hot languages/technologies/whatever.
Exposing students to more than one language paradigm seems to me
to contribute to that. I believe this is a fairly common view
in academic CS circles.

For myself. Can you find a post in which I said everyone should
prefer text-mode tools to GUIs? I'm not finding anything like that
on a quick review of the record.

Not in those exact words no, but you implied a claim that GUIs were
inferior in this newsgroup.

I've said I sometimes find them frustratingly limited in some ways.
I've also said on many occasions that they have their advantages.
Perhaps I'm coming across as more partisan than I really am --
I *am* biased, but I know that, and .... Well, whatever. I think
I'm repeating myself here.

You, however, seem to be saying that your way (GUIs) is the only
way. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding. It happens.

I'm saying that making full use of a) common interface standards and
b) the full input and output capabilities of the hardware allows
better, easier to use software. These days, this means GUI software
*can be* superior to all non-GUI software in a particular task domain.
It doesn't mean that the superior software was actually written and
made available, but it certainly can be.

Since you say "can be superior" rather than "is superior" -- I think
I actually agree. Amazing.

I've said that I think it usually has some limitations that I find
annoying, and I'm willing to give up some novice-friendliness to
have access to tools that don't have the limitations I find annoying.

If you're already a non-novice with those, then I can see that.

Wow.

I'm not sure I can imagine a system that's powerful enough to
let you do anything you might reasonably want to do that won't
also allow you to sometimes make a huge mess -- unless "anything
you might reasonably want to do" is defined to be somewhat more
restrictive than I think most people would like.

There's a big difference between "allow you to sometimes make a huge
mess" and "make it bloody easy, and indeed hard to avoid". We all
agree that stairs are useful things. They let you have buildings that
are taller and can hold more stuff. On the other hand it's possible to
fall down them.

Many of the tools you recommend have lots of creaky old stairs and no
lights. This seems to create an environment that outright encourages
falling down the damn things. Is it too much to ask to be able to see
WTF you're doing at least with the more dangerous, potentially-system-
hosing functionality? Apparently so. :)

Well, let's take an example -- a mass deletion of files using
"rm". If you *want* to be asked, for every file, "are you sure?",
this behavior is readily available. If you don't want to be asked,
that behavior is available too.

There's also this nifty thing that, used right, makes *really* tall
buildings practical and can be safer too. It's called an
elevator ... :)

And sometimes elevators get stuck, trapping the occupants in a
state from which they can't recover without outside help, or --
well, there may be a way to get out of an elevator unassisted,
but I'm not sure most people would know how?

The more I think about it, the more I like this analogy. I'm not
a big fan of elevators either. Just a touch of claustrophobia ....

Based on what you've said here, I find it highly unlikely you'd
find it either easy or natural: It's interactive, but with
command-line-style interface, and a built-in help system unlike
either man or info pages. I'm not sure I find it easy or natural
either, just useful, and worth the trouble of learning to use.

How the hell are you supposed to get started using something like
that? :P

Well, you could type, from the command line, "gnuplot", whereupon
you get a screenful of text telling you how to access the online
help and giving the URL of a FAQ. Following the directions for
accessing the online help brings up something that tells you more
about how to use it.

No, it's not point and click with menus. But .... Yeah, whatever.

[ snip ]

"Easy for novices" and "complying with my ideas about scriptabilty
and playing nice with the Unix philosophy" aren't mutually
exclusive in principle. In practice, I'm not sure I know of any
tools that are both. As for why that is -- my guess would be
that developers on both sides of the GUI/CLI divide figure they
have finite resources and shouldn't spend them trying to attract
people who are unlikely to like their stuff anyway.

I don't see how that follows, unless you mean to imply that a GUI
automatically fails to "play nice with the Unix philosophy".

Automatically / in principle, no. In practice, yes, I think so.
The old-time Unix philosophy emphasizes having lots of small
limited-purposes programs that interact by means of streams
of text, store configuration information in text files whose
locations are readily discoverable, etc. Most GUIs I know of
don't seem to work like that. They do seem to have their own
kind of interoperability, for example transferring text and
other objects via a system clipboard. A "compare and contrast"
between that and interoperation based on streams of text might
be interesting but is beyond me right now.

I notice that someone else has replied to your post, so I'll
continue in a follow-up to that.

--
B. L. Massingill
ObDisclaimer: I don't speak for my employers; they return the favor.
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Great SWT Program
    ... clear this is much of a paradigm shift. ... It's like saying they ... Not in those exact words no, but you implied a claim that GUIs were ... This seems to create an environment that outright encourages ...
    (comp.lang.java.programmer)
  • Using Eclipse to build GUIs
    ... If I use the org.eclipse.swt.* libraries to make my GUIs will the user ... need to download and have additional libraries installed on his machine ... other than the Java Runtime Environment?? ...
    (comp.lang.java.programmer)