Re: Great SWT Program

In article <c8a97b08-c123-479b-bf57-5acef0af082d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
<twerpinator@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jan 7, 5:41 pm, blm...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <blm...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

[ snip ]

no CLI lets you rename files without typing
the name *twice*, the full old name and then the full new name, unless
it slightly ameliorates this with an auto-complete you can use to type
a bit less of the old name. Explorer lets you type not only *just* the
new name, but *just* the parts that are changed.

[ snip ]

But to get the new name, at least one shell (bash) has a mechanism

that hardly anyone knows about

described earlier in this thread that allows duplicating the
old name (ctrl-W ctrl-Y ctrl-Y), after which producing the new
name requires only editing the second copy rather than typing
the whole name.

Awkward, undocumented, unobvious, virtually unknown, and two
keystrokes more than F2 anyway.

All of this might be true. Nevertheless, what I wrote is a
counterargument to the claim you seemed to be making, above,
about whether any CLI allows you to rename a file without typing
the name twice. Easily? In a way that's obvious to newbies?
Maybe not, but that's not the point; the point is that it can be
done.

[ snip ]

If I wanted, say, to search for files modified in the past week and
containing the string "foo", I might do something like the following:

[short but complex one-line mini-script deleted]

You might, and another 9,999 or so out of the 600,000,000 or so
routine users of computers in the world might, but that whatever-it-
was won't even occur to the other 599,990,000.

Contrast with Explorer's search, which enables the same capability in
an easy and natural way that all 600,000,000 can easily learn and use.

So? Again, I'm not trying to demonstrate that my preferred tools
are easy for newbies to use; I'm trying to counter what I perceive
to be incorrect claims about their other limitations.

(And if you thought that one-liner was complex -- good heavens.)

The fact that one of the search criteria isn't provided by "find"
itself somewhat complicates things; it's easier to combine multiple
criteria if they're all ones "find" can, um, find. For example,
to find all "*gif" or "*pdf" files changed in the last week:

[snip slightly less complex one-line mini-script]

*sigh* See above.

Also true. However, this "mini-script" is an example of searching
based on multiple criteria, something I thought you were implying
might not be possible. (You didn't actually make that claim in
so many words, however, and perhaps you didn't mean to suggest it
either. "Just sayin'", maybe.)

Probably there are other ways to accomplish the same thing.

Any that involve something as intuitive as pointing and clicking and
reading on-screen instructions and filling on-screen search criteria,
such as at http://www.google.ca/advanced_search or in Explorer's
search?

I don't know of any. However, the search facilities provided by
Google Groups' "advanced search" are in at least one respect less
flexible than those provided by "find": "find" allows arbitrarily
complex Boolean expressions involving search criteria (up to the
limits of the command-line buffer); GG's search facility, as far
as I can tell, doesn't.

[ snip ]

It's true that "find" doesn't know how to search on all possible
criteria.

It doesn't even know how to search on all possible criteria that
Explorer can. So much for Explorer's being the *less* powerful search
tool. :)

Saying that Explorer can do something "find" can't proves nothing,
unless Explorer can do everything "find" can do. Maybe it can,
though. Does it allow searches on file ownership and permissions?
(That, of course, doesn't really make sense on a single-user
system. But presumably Explorer runs on versions of Windows that
do have some notion of file ownership and/or access rights?)

[ snip ]

Extensible?

Poor choice of word on my part. I suppose I had in mind that it
would be relatively straightforward [*] to combine "find" with
other command-line tools

That's a ludicrously optimistic idea, given that the system in
question makes nothing else, even isolated commands, anything remotely
resembling "straightforward", let alone *combining* commands. :P

So, you didn't read my footnote corresponding to the [*], in which
I noted that it probably wouldn't seem straightforward to everyone?
and/or you did read it, but chose not to quote it, for reasons that --
oh, I can't be bothered to write something you'll just "summarize"
as "insult" anyway.

Extending Explorer, meanwhile, is as simple as download, scan, and (if
clean) run some installer after googling for the sort of extension you
need. After that it should be integrated into the UI. No cruftiness
with manually cobbling together mini-scripts to glue it together with
what you already have and make a sticky mess everywhere in the
attempt.

Sounds lovely. Is that faster than combining tools one already
knows .... Oh, who knows. For some people it probably is. For
others I'm not so sure.

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

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