Simplicity In the Age Of The GUI

evenprime writes: "Wired is running a story on Mark Hurst's extremely retro GoodEasy computing environment, and how it's old fashioned *nix approach to computing -- flat text, small simple programs that can be chained together -- increases user productivity" It's an interesting, hyper-simple approach, though any user outside of Mark's agency would have to apply some creative adaption. Every few months, I try to re-organize and simplify the documents and programs on my system, this looks like a good experiment for the next time.

Comments

I'll say this -- this guy knows his Macs

[connorbd]

...though why Office 98? It's a well-executed program, but it's a monstrosity...

A simple desktop is not a bad idea, and it's sort of a shame that what he's doing doesn't really apply to OS X (there's a reason Apple hides the Unix directories from public view -- it can get very confusing).

I have one particular thing I've always done on Macs that's worth mentioning, though -- I keep a tabful of aliases down on the bottom corner of the screen of both of my Macs (near the trash, but just far enough away) that lead to various important applications on my system (BBEdit, Netscape, Stuffit, etc.). It's a great convenience factor for me, and since it all snaps out of the way it manages to avoid ugly desktop clutter.

/Brian

Clear the desktop???

[zephc]

But thats where i keep all my STUFF!!

*tip of the hat to The Tick*

Re:Clear the desktop???

[Ghoser777]

So do I, but you really shouldn't. It would be like taking all your bills, letters, homework assignments (or real work), picturers, porn, etc and threw them into a big pile on your desk. It's a lot faster to find them all if they're not all on the desk top and sorted in some meaningful fashion. Hey, I hate it when I can't find my porn fast... err... nevermind.

F-bacher

Re:Clear the desktop???

[Happy Monkey]

I find it much easier to find stuff that's been strewn over my desk. Whenever I file it away in a meaningful fashion, it's too much effort to go and find it. Also, out of sight, out of mind...

Re:Clear the desktop???

[sydb]

Maybe you just need a better filing system. I was going to recommend a system to you, but mine stinks too. I keep running out of drawers.

Anyone out there got a really good filing system, either real world or computer-based?

Re:Clear the desktop???

[sharkey]

Really? On the Desktop? I never thought about that. I've been saving my stuff in the filing bucket named Recycle Bin. It keeps my files together, and I am protecting Mother Earth by recycling.

Re:I guess...

[weslocke]

It would really depend on whether or not you're wanting to produce music, layout a magazine, and whatnot. If you're wanting to just use the applications included (Calendar, very lightweight web browser, email, etc) then I imagine it would be great. Definitely cuts out the bloat.

If you use a *NIX then you probably know the ease of running Lynx to hit a webpage, or just WGET'ing a file real quick. Let alone hitting Pine for email, or a ton of other oft-used apps without the overhead of a GUI environment. (Plus remember the hardware requirements that come with a decent GUI environment.)

Good and Easy slashdotted already?

[Ghoser777]

Geez, you don't get much simpler than a text file. Maybe they should spend more time working on their server than just the interface.

But I have to admit the stripped down version of everything to text files sounds effecient and fast - but most users also like the colorful bell and whistles. Might try this out sometime... if I can ever get at that blasted text file.

F-bacher

To make your computer efficient, think like one.

[mblase]

My wife uses our Mac at home. She clutters her desktop with icons, rarely empties the trash can unless I tell her it's essential, and (like the article says) never looks for more than one way to do a task, once she's found a way that works.

My office email is filled with people mailing MS Word documents to me for Web-related projects. Often there's nothing in these documents but plain text and some bolded topic headlines. If I try to convert them to HTML to make my job easier, it doesn't work, because MS litters Word-generated HTML with styles and nonstandard tags that only IE5 can understand, all to make the Web page look as much like the Word doc as possible.

Friends use instant messenging to send me short, two-sentence "hi"s throughout the day. Half of them use brightly-colored backgrounds, harshly-contrasting text colors, and hard-to-read fonts because they look cool to them. They rarely use good spelling or punctuation to make sentences easier to read. "KISS" is a slogan that has never occurred to them. They probably never empty their desktop trash, either.

All these people have something in common: they don't think like a computer. It doesn't occur to them that searching for data is easier if everything is in plain text, or that organizing your files into directories makes them easier to archive and find later, or that removing all the pretty colors and fonts and complicated layouts would make it easier for others to read what they've written. They're just here to have fun.

They're the reason for XP's Luna and MacOS's Aqua. Pretty colors and gradients don't help anyone get the job done, but it makes the computer more "friendly" and less computer-like.

Meanwhile, I send all my IM's in high-contrast colors and sans-serif fonts. I email plain text whenever possible and RTF whenever it's not. I organize my files pathologically so that I don't have to throw old things away to find new things. And my desktop background picture is only two colors: medium blue and navy, so it doesn't distract or take half a minute to redraw whenever I minimize my browser.

Because I do think like a computer. I like plain, readable text; I solve problems logically; and (unfortunately) I have a "stateless" memory which loses track of one thing as soon as it starts another. Keeping everything in neat lines and plainly-marked boxes is the only way for me to get any work done.

But if I didn't spend 8-12 hours a day in front of a computer screen, I probably wouldn't know that. I'd probably prefer the pretty colors and chaotic fonts, too.

Re:I guess...

[JabberWokky]

How does this help me use my computer to produce music, layout a magazine or produce commercial art?

It doesn't. But then, that's like saying that a saw is a lousy tool because it won't drive a nail easily. And a mouse and keyboard in a GUI is (IMO) a horrible tool to produce music. That's why we have MIDI keyboards and hardware mixing boards that interface to computers. And why we still sell guitars, violins and flutes in the age of computers. The slight nuances that I can add completely intuitively with a fretboard far outstrip the control you can have with a mouse interface.

That is not to say that purely electronic music is not good, but even people like Chip Davis, Trent Reznor and Wanda Carlos use all sorts of dirty tricks and analog processing to create their music, not just a mouse.

The right tool for the job... that's the point here.

--
Evan

Re:I guess...

[Villain]

He didn't design it to help you produce music, etc. He desinged it to improve the productivity of him and his employees. And it sounds like he did a damn good job.

The whole idea is good, but..

[thanq]

it lacks to take into account needs of different users, as well as it assumes that everyone is an office drone that only does two, three tasks on their default-set Dell with a bunch of aliases everywhere.

I like the overall idea of simple computing, but the fact is that power users, who use their machines multiple tasks, would not find most of the recommendations in this article useful.

Sorting out and organizing stuff according to your preference and style of computing is something that may work best for you.

I think that saying that 'this is the only good way' or 'this is the good way, other way is a bad way' is shortsighted and unreasonable. Some people cannot afford to have only 4 folders for specific purposes. And desktop was a designed as a place for aliases that allows you to organize and speed up the workflow.

After all, I feel that "GoodEasy" computing environment is not one that is as simple, basic, and unified as it can be. The real "GoodEasy" computing environment is the one that allows you to feel most comfortable in and lets you be most productive, depending on the tasks, work ethic, type of work, and your preferences.

Re:The whole idea is good, but..

[Dixie_Flatline]

Try and keep in mind that studies have shown that people can be more productive with an interface that is NOT appealing to them than one that IS appealing to them, as long as the interface is designed well. So saying, "I like it better this way, so it must be faster" is false. Actually, take a look at that statement carefully, and it seems to me that it's rarely true.

It may be easier to think of it in real world terms. It doesn't really matter that some people would like the gas pedal on the left, or the shifting stick on the roof or whatever. A car has a fairly standard interface, and arguably, it's because this interface is well designed that it works so well. If you don't like it, too bad. Get used to it.

Try reading 'The Humane Interface' by Jef Raskin. He explains the whole thing better than I do. But don't get sucked into the trap that because something is subjectively more appealing, it makes you more productive.

Simple solution are the best

[jjr]

Most people these days think they need complexity in there life. Most of the time there are simple solutions that will solve our problems

Re:Simple solution are the best

[Junks Jerzey]

Most people these days think they need complexity in there life. Most of the time there are simple solutions that will solve our problems

"Complexity" and "simple" need to be clarified here. For example, you could write text file filters in a subset of pure C. But it is much, much easier to just use Perl or Python or TCL. There is much, much more complexity under the hood in this case, but you can ignore that and just write a script. On the one hand, you have a tool that makes things easy, but actually has 18 megabytes of code hidden away. Or you could have 2K of code, but the user is expected to do more for himself. Is that really simpler?

I've been doing this for a long time.

[dwlemon]

And I think most people who program under some kind of unix do too. It's a combination of the GUI and the command line, not choosing between the two.

Windows users can't seem to grasp it for some reason. In my Red Hat class last quarter, whenever the Windows users needed a terminal they hit Ctrl+Alt+F1 to get to a virtual console instead of just opening a terminal emulator. And when they did discover that the terminal emu did everything that the console did, they still didn't grasp the idea that they could have more than one terminal on the screen at once.

The only problem is that no operating system default is set up exactly how I want, so when I get to a new system, it takes me a while to set everything up the way I like... it's especially silly having to carry around a copy of my .emacs and .Xresources files that I can't work without (I can use vi just fine though). At least my preferences aren't in some registry.

Re:I've been doing this for a long time.

[MrBlack]

What were windows users doing in your red hat class? Were they lost? Seriously though..I'm a windows user and I often have multiple vt220 terminal emulators open to various *nix boxes (I love that retro green-screen look! - I even have a windows theme to make all my windows apps look like that too!) It's not rocket science. I'm sure your experience in your red hat class had more to do with the individuals than any operating system idioms they may have picked up. (hey - admitting that you went to a red hat class doesn't make you sound very 1337 btw either! - unless you were the instructor).

GUI grep, find, awk, sh

[ENOENT]

Wow, somebody has created a GUI for some of the
really useful Unix utilities, at least in effect.
The program to search all of your files quickly?
grep or "find ... -exec grep ...". No wonder it's
fast. Replacing abbreviations? awk. Every feature
describe is, as the article mentions, exactly
what Unix users expect from their computing
environment.

I wince every time I try to use a system that
lacks these features.

Why text?

[geophile]

Microsoft's Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and much of Access, are all built around the idea that bits are most useful when converted to atoms.
...
Unix uses quick-to-transmit plain text files instead of large, slow, printer-centric documents. Unix ties together multiple small programs to create systems both simple and powerful, instead of building complicated, monolithic applications that must compromise between flexibility and ease-of-use.

So Microsoft application's are based on the idea that computer users eventually want paper but Unix isn't -- but it's text-based?

I personally prefer to develop my code in a Unix, non-IDE environment, but I still think that piping text around is a real throwback. Even slightly advanced users will find themselves gluing bits of data together in a single line of text, and then using something along the lines of regular expressions to pull it apart.

For example, think about stdout and stderr. In Unix, you need two separate streams. Interleaving them is a bad idea because then you can't tell text in one stream from text in the other. You could have a single stream of output if each item in the stream were, let's say, a Text object or an Error object. You could then, in the next application down the pipe, choose to examine either Text object or Error objects, or pay attention to both. Also, the interleaving of Text and Error objects would convey useful information; something that's harder with two independent streams.

If you like the ideas of command-line, and small functional units that can be composed, and you want to build an environment from scratch, why focus on text as the main paradigm? Other things that programs could input, output and pass around include objects and tuples, which would have more intuitive tools for putting together and taking apart complex data that would otherwise be encoded into a line of text.

Re:Why text?

[GypC]

Because text is a universal interface, easily exchangeable with most computer systems and most humans. When your programs stop working it's nice to be able to get to your data with a text editor.

Re:Why text?

[geophile]

So a little app to convert the object or tuple to an app would help out. Much of the data that gets passed around is text, so mostly you've got Text objects, but if that's all you have, you end up having to encode all sorts of things as text. Yech.

Re:Why text?

[GypC]

True. But once stuff starts to get binary, programmers start getting lazy, featuritis creeps in and pretty soon you've got something like Postscript to deal with ;-).

But you're right, a compromise with the best of both worlds and a simple standard would be ideal.

Re:Why text?

[Jerf]

'So Microsoft application's are based on the idea that computer users eventually want paper but Unix isn't -- but it's text-based?'

A classic example of premature optimization. Formatting is the last step before printing. Trying to change that natural flow results in disaster.

Re:Why text?

[gimbo]

> For example, think about stdout and stderr.
> In Unix, you need two separate streams.

Yes, they're two seperate things. This is a good thing because you can treat them seperately if you need to, or treat them as one if you want. It's really handy.

> Interleaving them is a bad idea because then
> you can't tell text in one stream from text
> in the other.

Interleaving them is a good idea when you don't care whether what you're looking at is ordinary output or an error. It's a bad idea only when you need to tell the two apart, and then you can seperate them. But in that case you don't need to interleave them, you just redirect them to seperate places, as in the following examples.

# Interleaved output:
/bin/foo

# stderr to a text file, stdout to less:
/bin/foo 2> /tmp/foo.err | less

# stdout and stderr to seperate text files:
/bin/foo > /tmp/foo.out 2> /tmp/foo.out

# Same as above, but also pipe stdout to less:
/bin/foo 2> /tmp/foo.err | tee /tmp/foo.out | less

Beatifully simple once you understand what's going on, and modules for achieving similar things exist in, eg, perl and python - and many other languages no doubt.

> You could have a single stream of output if
> each item in the stream were, let's say, a
> Text object or an Error object. You could
> then, in the next application down the pipe,
> choose to examine either Text object or
> Error objects, or pay attention to both.

How is this better than having two seperate streams, each of which consists only of ASCII characters, which are easily examinable, easily understood, easily printed, etc? Your Text and Error "objects" (whatever you mean by that) are just adding an unnecessary layer of abstraction, exactly the kind of complication that makes computers hard to program and hard to use. When you want to read text what could be simpler than, er, plain text? It's an absolute godsend!

> Also, the interleaving of Text and Error
> objects would convey useful information;
> something that's harder with two independent
> streams.

So, contrary to what you said earlier, interleaving ordinary messages and error messages is sometimes desirable? Good, I'm glad you see that. But tell my why that's harder with two independent streams??? You get them interleaved by default!!!

Am I totally misunderstanding you? It just seems that you're overcomplicating things in a big way...

Re:Why text?

[mrogers]

You can easily make each item in the output stream into a "text object" as follows:

$ some-command 2> some-fifo | sed -e "s/^/TextObject:/" > some-fifo

Now you can read the combined error and output streams from some-fifo and separate the "Text objects" from the "Error objects" based on whether or not each line starts with "TextObject:".

If you feel primitive using plain-text tools you can always call the FIFO an ObjectStream. ;-)

I know this much

[WickedClean]

From my experience with trying to make 30 and 40+ year old adults change from one computer program or OS to another, they will always resist and bitch and complain about "how it used to be".

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[Planesdragon]

All these people have something in common: they don't think like a computer. It doesn't occur to them that searching for data is easier if everything is in plain text, or that organizing your files into directories makes them easier to archive and find later, or that removing all the pretty colors and fonts and complicated layouts would make it easier for others to read what they've written. They're just here to have fun.

The reverse is also true, y'know. Most UIs need to be redesigned (hence Luna and Aqua) because they weren't made to work with someone who thinks like a person. Specifically a business person.

Y'know, someone where the trash is emptied regularly, where chatting is a way of life, and where things are filed long-term, but they're also kept short-term on the desk--not because they're filed there, but because they stay there because you *haven't* filed them.

The ideal would actually be the best of both worlds. Filters that can convert an e-mail attachment at a single command. A switch to filter out your "buddy's" preferences. And a way to have files you open and don't "file" head to the desktop, where they're periodically "saved" as a backup.

Too bad we'll never get that ideal.

Re:I guess...

[weslocke]

Actually they probably spent their money getting out of their parents' basements.

You might want to start saving.

(Aren't AC's wonderful?)

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[pthisis]

My wife uses our Mac at home. She clutters her desktop with icons, rarely empties the trash can unless I tell her it's essential

Wow. My wife gets mad at me because I clutter my desktop with papers and rarely empty the trash unless she yells at me to do it.

Sumner

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[Chundra]

I used to be like you. But I just gave up. Now I use a perl script to convert my plain text messages to prismatic, bold, italic, underlined, visually obscene messages littered with random mispelings and profuse punctuation!!!?!!!??

And you know what? I have lots of friends now, and I regularly sleep with two beautiful women at once. I've got another perl script that filters their cruft into my own vanilla format. You might say I've developed my own private babelfish. Things are good for me. They could be good for you too.

Embrace and extend, grasshopper.

Soft synths and trackers

[yerricde]

And a mouse and keyboard in a GUI is (IMO) a horrible tool to produce music.

What's a better way to input parameters for soft synthesizers and tweak them in real time? Or to edit samples non-linearly? And how is keyboard input of note values (such as that used in trackers) so terrible, especially for students who cannot afford high-end musical equipment?

simplicity on my desktop

[ywwg]

my desktop.

Along the left side of my screen are launchers for my most often-used programs. Thanks to badgering of programmers on my part they respond to edge-clicks, making them easy targets.

The top of my screen has hacked versions of the deskguide and tasklist which also respond to edge-clicks. Thus, I can switch desktops and windows quite quickly with the mouse

I have a transparent terminal for when I need it. The large panel on the bottom is auto-hide. The applets there are too big to fit on a 24 pixel panel. Brak is there for dancing to music.

I don't believe the Keyboard is God, I think my setup is quite efficient, pleasant to look at, and very functional.

Re:simplicity on my desktop

[zephc]

my desktop, a mix of messiness and elegance =]

Re:simplicity on my desktop

[djweis]

Where did you get the dancing Brak?

Re:simplicity on my desktop

[zephc]

somewhat, offtopic, but the vid i screen-grabbed my desktop pic from is here, its VERY cute =]

Re:I guess...

[rfsayre]

And a mouse and keyboard in a GUI is (IMO) a horrible tool to produce music. That's why we have MIDI keyboards and hardware mixing boards that interface to computers. And why we still sell guitars, violins and flutes in the age of computers. The slight nuances that I can add completely intuitively with a fretboard far outstrip the control you can have with a mouse interface.

I'm sure the "slight nuances" you can add on your fretboard are great, and no doubt difficult to model on a computer. But you seem to be ignoring the vast DSP possibilities of the computer. There are plenty of tools that benefit enormously from computer GUIs, I'm thinking of sound-visualisation tools and signal flow models. There's a whole world of sound that exists nowhere except the computer. I notice that you didn't advocate analog sequencers over Cubase, Logic, et al. Of course a computer is no substitute for an real violin, but a violin is no substitute for a computer either. There is no Drum and Bass violin music (I hope).

I've always seen the Unix way of doing things (small chainable components) as derived from patchboard/signal flow ideas that are used in music studios among other things. But that doesn't mean it 's the only way, or can't be improved upon. The GoodEasy solution to the interface pap from MS, Apple, KDE, Gnome, etc. is nostalgia. This may work quite well for math and word processing tasks (hurst's intented purpose), but productivity in many fields has nothing to do with anything of the sort. The main problem I see with creative tasks and the Unix way is that it constantly forces the user to interact with the file system, which can be a needless distraction.

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[cmstremi]

So, then, there are two types of people in this world. Those who occasionally empty their desktop trash and those who don't.

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[garcia]

KISS doesn't cross their mind b/c it isn't something that they care to know about or understand.

"think like a computer". No. People think like people. That's why they do what they do...

My mother used to use Lotus123 + WYSIWYG extensions to type documents b/c that's what she was accustomed to.

I am glad that I use gAIM for my IMing b/c I can at least disable incoming colors from idiots that seem to think that red letters on a blue background are "cool".

The entire article really has no bearing on today's computer users. People are NOT interested in simplicity. Do people buy cars that just have the bare esentials? NO! They *need* a/c, CD players, power windows, etc. They feel that they need all this fancy shit as well.

I have always used eye-easy color-schemes and organized desktops (no fucking icons all over the place) but then again I am a computer-dork.

It is only going to get worse b/c people aren't interested in KISS.

Just my worthless .02

WordPerfect 5.1

[Fastball]

I always thought that WordPerfect 5.1 was the pinnacle of word processors. I had the priviledge (or curse depending on your point of view) of running for a law firm back when WP5.1 was the standard bearer, and when we began moving to the GUI-centric Word, the administrative staff rose up in revolt. They were so crafty with those keystrokes, it was simply amazing. I gravitated towards Word myself, because it was sexier and I was young and immature ;) but I can guarantee you I was no more productive or quicker with Word than any of those secretaries were with crusty old WordPerfect 5.1.

Re:I guess...

[sydb]

The main problem I see with creative tasks and the Unix way is that it constantly forces the user to interact with the file system, which can be a needless distraction.

A needless distraction from what? One of the beauties of Unix is that everything is a file, hence once the user knows how to handle files, they know how to handle everything. "Interacting with the file system" is just a long way of saying "using the computer". So, needless distraction from what?

A good pro-UNIX article.

[Rimbo]

This is a good article, in that it explains the UNIX small tools approach and dependence on text streams well, and in a way that normal people can understand. But aside from the brief blurb about GoodEasy and a quick explanation of a basic UI design principle, it's mostly just that -- UNIX advocacy.

Not that that's a bad thing, mind you.

Re:Frogs boiling in water...

[Arandir]

How to boil a live frog without him jumping out of the pot:

1) Put frog into pot with cold water. Make him comfortable.

2) Very, very, very slowly, turn up the heat.

This lesson, and accompaning experiment, is taught in PolySci 101 at all reputable Ivy League schools. Buddng politicians quickly learn that if you dump frog/public into boiling water, they will immediately jump out and loudly complain. But if you use the above method, the frog/public will not realize you are killing him, and will continue to vote for you.

Okay, what did this have to do with a clean desktop? Well, their productivity is slowly being damaged and they don't know it, so they keep at it until they're poached and unable to think any other way.

You have to catch the computer uers when they're young, and teach them that pots of cold water are deadly.

Re:I guess...

[iabervon]

Well, if you do one of those things, you should find a similarly straightforward program to do it with, and use that. But you'll probably be much more efficient if you don't have to scroll past programs for all of the tasks that you don't normally do to get to the program you actually use. Furthermore, you shouldn't lay out memos or presentation slides as if they were magazines, or sketch diagrams as if they were commercial art.

You certainly shouldn't use a set of programs that's insufficient for your tasks, but it's just as bad and more common to use a program that's excessively complicated for your tasks.

Re:I guess...

[JabberWokky]

From the Jargon File:

IMHO

(From SF fandom via Usenet) In My Humble Opinion. Also seen in variant forms such as IMO, IMNSHO (In My Not-So-Humble Opinion) and IMAO (In My Arrogant Opinion).

a violin is no substitute for a computer either. There is no Drum and Bass violin music

Again, the point is: The right tool for the job. Trying to draw a wave form for the vocal lines of Pie Jesu would be ludicrous (*if* you're going for a human feel), but the Mighty Steven Hawking is damn cool. Jimi Hendrix's legendary performance of the US National Anthem is great, as is Lords of Acid's Sexy Space Chorale, which wouldn't be the same without computer use.

You're talking to someone who spent months on Amiga and PCs using various software and hand assembling MOD files (or before that, did 6502 asm to generate Star Trek themes on the Apple ][). I'm well aware of the fact that computers can generate music in ways that acoustic inturments cannot.

The point is - right tool for the job. Keeping my phone book drawn in the gimp would work. I keep it in a text file, and grep -i for names. There are a myriad of "right tools" and "wrong tools"... I use Konqueror to browse, and often wget files. All of this proves the *authors* point that you use the tools you got used to rather than what might be better or faster.

Music wasn't the best path to go down... the thread will invariably wind up somewhere devolving into a debate on shielding on patch cords. ;)

--
Evan (Who was up all night, and shuddered when he read the ramble above).

Re:The next big OS

[zephc]

how about goodfun ;) (ah, bad art and a bad game heh)

Funny Mac Tech Support story

[Anonymous Coward]

The part in goodeasy where he says "your first job is to clear off the desktop" reminds me of two funny calls I had when I did Mac tech support (which by the way, is 10x easier than the Windows tech support I do now but only 1/10 as easy as the VM/CMS support I did years ago)...

In the first call I determined the cause of their problem was that their hard drive was full. Caller disagreed so I Timbuktu'd in and examined their hard drive and showed them it was full. Caller said I was still wrong as "All of my documents are kept in this folder on the desktop". They took the mouse and opened a folder on their desktop... sure enough it contained hundreds of (MS Office) files. "See, all of my files are on the desktop, not on my hard drive." Of course I had explained that what is on the desktop is really on the hard drive too. The user says "You mean they are not stored in the monitor?"

The second caller was a person who kept all of their files in their trash (recycle bin for you Win people). When I asked them why they said "That way they won't take any disk space!". I explained that they actually do and in addition to it being rather awkward to keep all their files in the trash they ran the risk that somebody else using their computer would empty the trash and wipe out their files. User says "Yes, that has happened several times already".

UGGHHHHH!

Re:Funny Mac Tech Support story

[sphealey]

"Although this is a funny story - it has appeared many, many times in "greatest hits of support" joke list over the past five years"

And both of them have actually happened to me in the last 3 months (note that I am not the original poster). So its possible the guy was in fact sincere.

sPh

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[jhoffoss]

Noticed this last night after installing IE6: (on Windows) I opened an attached Word document opened through a webmail system and the document opened in an MS Word-style editor/view inside IE6. Just a sidenote...

Another important thing some do not realise is you can save an HTML file edited in Word as "Plain HTML." Don't know if that's available on a mac or not though.

Re:I guess...

[rfsayre]

One of the beauties of Unix is that everything is a file, hence once the user knows how to handle files, they know how to handle everything. "Interacting with the file system" is just a long way of saying "using the computer".

Unix is beautifiul. I don't dispute that. However, "interacting with the file system" and "using the computer" are different things. Of course any program is interacting with the file system on some level, but the fact of the matter is that all large (in scope and/or people) creative projects benefit from content management systems that handle the actual manipulation of files. So while Unix often provides the underpinning for these systems, the user isn't required to where anything is, where to put it after an operation is performed, etc. None of that stuff is particularly complex, making it a perfect candidate for automation.

So, needless distraction from what?

Writing, composing, drawing, maybe even, dare I say, coding.

It's true.

[TeknoHog]

And it's not just the usual mourning but in fact a Score: 5, Funny.

Re:I guess...

[tshak]

But then, that's like saying that a saw is a lousy tool because it won't drive a nail easily.

You're philosphy is correct when we are talking about a Palm Pilot, not a multipurpose machine. If you want a simplified tool, buy a $99 PDA (for example). A computer IS designed to enable us to do many things - it is not designed to do very simple and specific things well.

All I want is this..

[lukel]

...a program that watches what I type and when it sees me repeating a word or phrase several times, suggests a short cut without interrupting me, e.g. displaying it in the info bar at the bottom of the window. For example, if I keep typing "String", it might suggest [S][T][space] as the shortcut.

I don't want to have to stop working and think up shortcuts since the computer would be better at identifying which words and phases I use most. I don't want the computer to try to guess what I'm going to do next since no matter how good it was, it would still piss me off when it was wrong (and it's none of the computer's business whether I'm writing a letter).

Where can I find it?

Re:All I want is this..

[lukel]

If you wanted it to be global across all applications, it'd be more work.

Actually, I'm not convinced it would be that hard. All that you would need to do is intercept key presses, record them, and pass them to the relevant application. Suppose that [S][t][space] was the shortcut for "String", since you had already passed the [S] and [t] to the application, you would need to send [backspace], [backspace], followed by [S],[t],[r],[i],[n],[g]. You would also need a an escape character that cancelled shortcuts for when you actually wanted to type "St ". Perhaps you could use [S][t][space] [backspace] to get "St "?

I don't have enough time for the projects I'm involved in already, so there's not much prospect of implementing it myself.

I guess my Where can I find it? got taken the wrong way. I thought I had a good idea, and that if I expressed enthusiasm for it, it would increase the likelihood of someone picking it up.

Re:All I want is this..

[ftobin]

...a program that watches what I type and when it sees me repeating a word or phrase several times, suggests a short cut without interrupting me, e.g. displaying it in the info bar at the bottom of the window. For example, if I keep typing "String", it might suggest [S][T][space] as the shortcut.

Emacs has what you want. I'm not familiar with the exact command (an Emacs guru showed me how it works, though). Basically, you type away at whatever you are doing, and if you want it to auto-complete a word, any word, you give a short command (maybe a C-x thingy), and it looks at the surrounding context and typing history, figuring out what word to complete it as.

FYI, I don't know if Xemacs has a similar command.

Re:All I want is this..

[ftobin]

Emacs has what you want. I'm not familiar with the exact command

It seems like Xemac's version of the command is simply "complete" (access via "M-x complete"). You should probably bind this to an easier to access command (something else I have to look up how to do).

It's amazing what you can find with the "apropos" command.

Re:All I want is this..

[ftobin]

Xemacs is very nice. I was typing "M-x complete", and the next thing it told me was that "complete" is also bound it "C-return". So, just hit Ctrl-return, and Xemacs magically completes any word for you!

Re:All I want is this..

[LetterJ]

OpenOffice.org. If you're using the OpenOffice word processor, it "auto-completes" words you've type a few times. If you just keep typing, it goes away, so it doesn't interfere, but you just have to hit enter to accept the suggestion. Not exactly what you're looking for, but similiar.

Sold Our Soul to GUI

[suavew]

A friend of mine has often commented that we've sold our soul to the GUI. His point is that GUIs don't always make life easier. People seem to focus on GUI for GUI's sake. I think that GUIs can make life easier, but not always.

Even when GUIs do make life easier, often the investment is not worh it -- Developers spend so much time on the GUI that either underlying functionality suffers or the entire program is bug-ridden.

What are your views on this?

What are some good alternatives to GUI development? Do you use any libraries for creating nice text-based apps with simple interfaces? If so, which ones?

Re:Sold Our Soul to GUI

[SCHecklerX]

Every utility I write is text based. The quickest, most efficient way to use many of them, however, is to bind them to my favorite two gui's, ROX-Filer and Windowmaker's desktop menu.

This is how it should be. It took me no extra effort to 'gui-fy' my code, because the UI takes care of that FOR ME. You shouldn't HAVE to write gui code for simple tasks. You should be able to merge it into your GUI of choice to make you most productive. Windowmaker is awesome for this, as is ROX-Filer.

To see examples of what I'm talking about, please feel free to browse my code pages, http://freefall.homeip.net/ where I show examples of integration with ROX and Windowmaker, despite some of the utilities being text only. I do this with my envelope printer too (I have both a ROX App for it, and a fly-out windowmaker menu...I just tell it which envelope to print...drag drop in ROX's case, click the envelope I want to print in windowmaker's case). I just haven't gotten around to doing the example on the web page for the envelope printer yet.

Re:Sold Our Soul to GUI

[Compuser]

I think it is true that most people do not RTFM.
Therefore for most people all options should be
available in a non-text form. This leads to GUI,
and especially hierarchical toolbars. When
entering a complicated maze, which would you
rather have: a document telling you to turn right
then left then right then straight then...
or each turn be labelled?
As for coding, GUI programs should be less buggy
in principle, provided that the infrastructure
(foundation classes, e.g. MFC or QT or GTK) is
well done. The reason is that GUI allows less
degrees of freedom for user input: you know that
a slider will return numerical value in a given
range. I hate coding command line stuff (including
allowing users to enter parameters via edit boxes)
because that makes me think about crazy stuff a
user might enter.
I think many people lay out the GUI first as a way
to plan their app. That way they can restrict the
user as much as possible and make coding core
functionality easier.

How to think like a computer..

[TeknoHog]

This is exactly why the command line is so powerful. It is closer to the guts of computing than any GUI. The same goes for types of programming: is there any object-oriented hardware around? Didn't think so either.

Of course the combination of some sort of a GUI and command line is very powerful, having the best of both worlds. Even in a graphical environment you can do most things with the keyboard in a more efficient way. I don't understand fancy mice with wheels and all when the good ol' keyb does the scrolling just as well. That's literally reinventing the wheel.

What's interesting that in the 80s and early 90s people were quite happy to learn shortcuts in DOS applications; someone already mentioned WP5.1 being more efficient than Word. Then came the GUI and suddenly everything just had to be graphical, even many things that have nothing to do with graphics.

Speaking of IMs, I am more than happy with MICQ. That is IMHO the easiest and most natural interface to IM. The command line.

You're right but that's not what I meant

[TeknoHog]

I mean the conversion from a source code to binary. What goes on in the processor with the machine language is procedural. Higher-level procedural languages are essentially macros for assembly.

Maybe object-oriented programming isn't that much different, it is just a neat way of arranging the data and the functions. Ideas like encapsulation are important in any kind programming, you want to keep the interface stable even if the guts of a function changes. The difference to procedural code is then like that between a GUI and a command line: in the end the same task is performed by binary code. It's just that one of the interfaces is closer to the machine language, and hence _maybe_ more efficient.

Re:You're right but that's not what I meant

[furiousgeorge]

>>It's just that one of the interfaces is
>>closer to the machine language, and hence
>>_maybe_ more efficient.

*maybe* more efficient. But you'll hate your life every minute you have to deal with it.

How much more productive am I writing code in Lisp/Smalltalk/C++/Perl, etc etc vs. hand coding assembly? I can't even comprehend.

There's a tradeoff - efficiency isn't everything. Their is also convenience, extensibility, maintainablity and so on.........

I always kinda shake my head by people who are just obsessed with the command line and "nothing is more powerful". Bull. It's a tool. Personally, everytime i have to deal with GDB i feel like going outside and kicking cars - it's a painful experience ( DDD is slightly better - about as fun as being poked in the eye with a pointed stick). MSDEV/VC6 is a 'GUI' - but man my performance with it is an order of magnitude higher.

(and yes, i DO write linux/unix code. I do everything in VC with a samba share, and just reach over to my linux box and run make. I do all debugging under Win32 unless i absolutely have to touch linux because the tools are MUCH MUCH better).

j

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[jhoffoss]

"We don't use IE" (read, latest version, 5.5 when I went to 6) and Office 97. I've never had a document open in IE like this before, so I dunno. It's possible our standard install package doesn't install features like that with office.

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[jhoffoss]

A. I rarely get sent word documents, and when I do they're at work in GroupWise.
B. I don't regularly use webmail.
C. I don't have a C, but those other two reasons are reason enough, I think. =)

Cleaning up MS-Word generated HTML

[Louis_Wu]

My office email is filled with people mailing MS Word documents to me for Web-related projects. Often there's nothing in these documents but plain text and some bolded topic headlines. If I try to convert them to HTML to make my job easier, it doesn't work, because MS litters Word-generated HTML with styles and nonstandard tags that only IE5 can understand, all to make the Web page look as much like the Word doc as possible.

HTML Tidy, a program available from the World Wide Web Consortium, will strip out the junk from Word-to-HTML documents you've converted to HTML. Go to the HTML Tidy web page and search for "Support for Word2000" - it should be a page or two down.

You can grab binaries for several OSs, binaries of other programs which have incorporated Tidy into themselves, or get the source. Hope that this works for you.

Everything old is new again...

[sphealey]

I am all in favor of tools like this. But it sure sounds like a reinvention of Quarterdesk DesqView!

sPh

simplicity? where?

[tim_maroney]

Seven pages of installation instructions and a bunch of keyboard commands to memorize, and it's "simple"?

Man, some people just will never get it.

Tim

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[sphealey]

"All these people have something in common: they don't think like a computer."

This reminds me of economists, who have spent 30 years building theories of human behaviour based on utility maximization and rational choice. When they finally realize that real humans are neither utility maximizers nor particularly rational, rather than change their theories they get mad at the humans for not behaving the way they "should"!

sPh

Re:I guess...

[HamNRye]

Files = DATA Computers manipulate data.

Using a computer=Maniputalting data=Maniputalting Files

I currently use a cli program for mixdown, as well as sequencing. I am sure that many people enjoy clicking on staves to make up a bass line, and then clicking option buttons until the time of the note is right, etc... This is soooo annoying.

The reality of it is that it is more efficient to maintain a file with the sequencing pattern in it. Also, because the file is plain text, other applications can understand it. (I can actually read it.)

But to keep it simple, XML is an ASCII text standard. One that is supposed to bring about a new era of interoperability. You do the math.

~Hammy

command line is simple?

[Digital_Fiend]

memorizing the syntax to dozens of cryptic commands is simple?

This is the Mac Way not *nix Way

[Tachys]

As anyone read the actual guide? goodeasy. From the the wired article and these post this sounds like this was done on some sort of Unix. Wrong this was done on a Macintosh.

These things have always been part of the Mac philosophy. Apps do one thing and do it well, use keybinds for everything. This is why IE defeated Netscape on the Mac side even with Mac Users often fanactical hatred of Microsoft. IE just a web browser and supported Inter Config. In Inter Config you can say what apps you whant to handle http,ftp, news etc. Of course Netscape would not allow you to use other apps for email, or news. It had all that built-in.

Of course Linux GUIs and other web browsers are over-bloated "suites" or "platforms". Mozilla a "platform" for developing appications. Konqueror is a file manager was a built-in web browser. Nautilus is a file manager, web browser, note taker and help browser. Are lynx and IE for Mac the only web browsers that exist? I know IE for windows is os is supposed to be a file manager/web browser. But they don't do that on the Mac, knowing Mac users will have little tolerance for that.

Thoughts on Win Gui and OS layout.

[BrookHarty]

As a long time computer user, starting from a C64/Floppy/300 baud modems to DualP3s/Terrabyte storage/DSL I have migrated and changed the way I interact with GUI's and store my files many times over the years.

Mark Hursts ideas are almost like mine. I will break it down a little as to HD layout then OS.
I have normally have 2 HDs in my system, HDA for my OS's and HDB for my Games and Work. HDA I break down into 4 Paritions.
HDA1 for Win98,
HDA2 for Win2K,
HDA3 for either a Linux dristro or WinXP beta
HDA4 for the swap if im using linux.
HDB1 is 1 parition, normally 3 folders, Games, Work and Emulators. (Im a UAE and Mame freak.)

I dont normally use boot loaders other than Win2k's, If i boot linux i use loadlin, it seems easier for me to maintain. (C:\linux)

Im a big fan of Norton Ghost, using ghost on the paritions, I can restore quickly. As I like to play around with drivers and migrate my HD's to more space. I also burn the .gho files on CDs. If the files are larger than 700 megs, I rar the ghost images and make it self extractable. So I can boot a fresh HD from floppy. I also copy the CD images to the HD, unrar, and ghost from the whole image.

I'm a little more in depth on my HDA1 drive, I use directory names, Apps, GFX, Net, Sound, Utils, Work. I also have the normal windows directories, My Documents, Windows and Temp. Under My Documents I put My Pictures, My Music and Favorites. I then use M$ Tweak UI to point all windows versions on my HD to c:\My documents, C:\My Documents\favorites, etc.. This keeps all my files at hand if im either Win98, Win2K or linux. It makes it easier to keep every file in the same place under ever os. (Example, IE for Win2K and Win98 point to the same favorites, so my bookmarks are the same.)

After I get the basic windows installed (doesnt matter what version). I upgrade the entire installation with the newest patches and drivers. Then register file types for my apps, not windows defaults. Apps include textpad, winzip,winrar,cdrwin,nero,acdsee,winamp,proxomitro n. Windows modifications as x-teq and m$ powertoys.

Now that windows is installed, and apps, I keep a shortcut to a folder NET in c:\net\net on my desktop. This folder c:\net\net keeps shortcuts for all my programs. Even if I reinstall windows, my c:\net\net folder stays. I put a shortcut of my NET folder in my tooltray. I can either alt-tab or click on the tooltray icon (in case my apps are maximized) to have access to my favorite apps. I really dont use the start menu, as it takes longer to get to my commonly used applications.

Microsoft has weened us off Dual pane file managers.(I miss fileman!) This was (IMHO) the hardest thing to get used to in win95 and new versions of windows. Trying to copy files from a file viewed pane, then select the destination folder is slower and has more steps involved. M$ introduced powertoys that included "Copy To and Move To" extensions to windows, that at least helped. I do keep a copy of 2xExplorer for when I need to handle large ammount of files.

The part that actually increased my productivity was the toolbar. Being able to have access to my running applications, instead of alt-tabbing was a nice changed. It also provides a quick visual que on what programs im running. The tooltray also speeds up access to my c:\net\net quick launch folder full of shortcuts.

Drag and Drop, right mouse menus have become standard. I have found that I now drag mp3's onto winamp, and right mouse clicking and enqueing them. My older habit was using playlists for everything. IE didnt have the best right mouse menus, but with IE6, they have the most common menus again. (Using proxomitron and enabling all right mouse clicks also helps)

Now as my Linux GUI, I really use Windows as workstation, and unix as a server and display X back to my windows box. (X-win32 is far the best for this.) But when Im using a unix workstation, I normally install IceWM. IceWM is small, fast and has a toolbar and tooltray. It is highly customizable and can add those extra buttons that come in handy. The windowshade mode which rolls up the window to a bar is very handy. Comes in handy when I need to view multiple load balanced servers at the same time. Also for quick eye-candy, I like the network and cpu meters on the toolbar, dont really need it, but nice to see.

Started to use WinXP beta, and I'm pretty impressed with its Font Smoothing features. Check out some screenshots I made for friends here and here.. The font smoothing works all throught the GUI, notice how the menus are changed.

I spend too much time playing around with new utilities and GUI's for windows. If your interested in modifing your windows GUI, check out Shell City, WindowBlinds, and Litestep.

Have fun!
-Brook

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[Alpha State]

I have a word macro which converts a document to basic HTML if anyone is interested. Unfortunately it's not online ATM.

Re:I guess...

[unitron]

Not sure that I've ever heard anyone advocate unshielded patch cords, even balanced ones.

Now whether to ground the shield at one end (and if so, which one) or both, now there's a good way to start up a red hot holy war.

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[unitron]

"I organize my files pathologically..."

I find that alphabetically usually works better.

Re:why is is necessary to empty trash/recycle bin?

[Foaf]

The whole point of the trash/recycle bin is to make it easy to retrieve files that have been deleted. Emptying the trash means you don't have that option any more.

The only reason people feel the need to empty
their trash/recycle bin is because as soon as you put any file in there it looks like it's full. Since it looks full, the natural instinct is to empty it to make room for new files. This metaphor is completely false.

Mac OS and Windows set an upper limit on the size of the contents of the trash/recycle bin. You can change that limit to however big or small you want it. After that files are deleted to make room for newer deleted files.

Ideally, the trash icon would reflect how much of the space allocated to deleted files is being used.

GUIs, command line and BASIC

[os2fan]

The thing with the command line is that you have to think more carefully about the data structures you use. This means that you already have applied the necessary pre-planning required.

The same thing can make BASIC programs work faster. In essence, one writes for Z=function(X,Y):

A1=X:A2=Y:GOSUB {function}:Z=A1

If you think about the functions you use, you can make, and where the output is placed, you can replace the one function with serveral functions.

Interestingly, the people who fiddle around with lots of little tools will split the problem into lots of smaller ones when a single larger tool would be faster. The tools are often on hand, and are faster to assemble than it is to write one big tool. The bigger tool should be looked at if one is doing lots of the same task. The reference for this is Knuth "Literate Programming".

The increase in productivity is because the CLI forces one to consider the data structures earlier, eg, up front, and this is the right thing to do.

Re:I guess...

[sydb]

That depends on your definition of 'handle'.

And if you just define it as 'locate, select' then you're right, that's not enough to do something useful. But once you've done those two operations, the filesystem no longer enters the equation. It is no longer a distraction.

If you define it as using standard Unix tools like awk, grep, sed, vi, cut, paste, join, split, tee, etc., then there are plenty useful things you can do on a computer, just 'handling' files.

I think the whole 'the filesystem is a distraction' line is really just a distraction.

Re:To make your computer efficient, think like one

[frankie]

To them, anything with text in it is a Word Doc. Quick memo with 3 sentences, Word Doc. Non-formated copy for website, Word Doc.

Hell, I'll see your coworkers and raise with my distance students. To many of them, any form of content is a Word doc. I provide exact instructions how to take a screenshot, use Paint and save as gif. They send a multi-megabyte Word doc -- 24bit uncompressed bitmaps are big, and wrapping a .doc around it gets even bigger. Since Word can import and edit pictures (sort of), it's their default graphics app.

They can't comprehend why I complain about their bloated, KakWorm infested files.

Re:I guess...

[sydb]

I don't think I said that. Do you?