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Pepper Author Calls It Quits
gruber writes "Maarten Hekkelman, author of the cross-platform text editor Pepper, has thrown in the towel. He announced last week that he's discontinuing Pepper. He agreed to an interview with me, on topics ranging from the state of Mac OS X to the difficulties of cross-platform development." It's quite an interesting read, even if he does currently prefer Windows XP over Mac OS X and Linux.
The most interesting thing about the article for me is that Tucows let you buy a higher rating!
no sig.
Like someone else said, the most interesting factoid was that you can buy rating stars on Tucows. Also, I had to laugh at:
I think this guy is crying out to be a Qt developer....
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I found the sections on Cocoa to be intresting. From some general reading on the topic, it looks like more hobby developers are embracing Cocoa for their development, yet the commercial developers keep moving away from it. Another developer scraps his Mac version of the program because development for OS X requires buying too much into the Jobs way of thinking. I do hope that someone at Apple sees this and really pushes for moving back towards C++ instead of Cocoa.
For those of you that can't be bothered to read the article, the reason this cross-platform editor is listed under Apple is because it has been there the longest after coming from BeOS.
I find it interesting that the author thinks that Tucows has a lot of power. I never go there for software. I use Google and sometimes go to CNet or ZD-Net(Which recently appears to be essentially the same thing..since CNET bought it)
I hate to say it, but we may be seeing "Application Darwinism" at work here.
I've been on the lookout for a fast cheap text (only) editor to do HTML development with, on OS X. Many of the apps I've tried are just too clunky for me to consider paying anything for them. I eventually went back to VIM, even though it lacks some basic Mac functionality (i.e., it isn't a true document-based app). Since my LCD for a text editor is vi, this isn't so much of a hardship. I don't suggest everyone run out and use it on a daily basis. It work for me, but as they say: "Closed course. Professional driver".
I took a look at Pepper for a day or two, and I found it a very odd app. It seemed to operate contrary to some OS X usage expectations, and it rendered any typeface I chose terribly. The interface just felt all wrong to me. It crashed enough that I simply considered it "beta" and moved on.
I have similar complaints about the much beloved (but not by me) BBEdit.
I'm not saying that any of these editors are necessarily bad. If you like it, by all means, use it. However, I don't think all the comments about Pepper on Version Tracker are necessarily spurious. It seems that Pepper didn't quite cut it for other OS X users, as well.
Having less variety of apps available to OS X is sad, and some people will probably miss Pepper (even if they didn't pay for it), but I can't help but think that if it was a little more of a killer app, it would have survived.
-- clvrmnky
I didn't post it because of Pepper itself, but because of what the developer had to say. I personally think he has an interesting perspective, and I think others would agree. Perhaps the article title should have been different in light of that; c'est la vie.
You are right. GNUStep uses X and X uses Unix.... I should mention though since this is an OSX forum that GNUStep's window manager (Window Maker) will feel great to most OSX users. Its much faster than the heavy window managers and since its based on Next the learning curve will be shallow.
I think he's had some bad experiences in the shareware world recently, and it's affected his outlook. I mean, what else could make a Mac developer say this, "Windows is like heaven to a programmer. There are so many tools to chose from and the documentation is wonderful. I think the API's are on average very good.
Oh man, it sounds he hasn't been in the Windows environment very long, does it?
www.lucernesys.comHorizon: Calendar-based personal finance
Maarten Hekkelman doesn't like Mac OS X. He also doesn't seem to me to know much about it, nor does he seem to want to know much about it. He disliked the operating system offered on the platform on which it had developed a following, that is the simple reason why Pepper is no longer a viable option.
;-)
To justify my statements, amongst other thing, he says:
Mac OS X, however, loses on all fronts. It claims to be a Unix but it doesn't support much of the more advanced Unix features, since it is using such an old kernel.
For someone who is writing a text editor to blame the limitations of the kernel of the operating system on which it runs for lack of functionality is simply looking for excuses and is, in reality, a case of barking up the wrong tree (though he does mention a reference to a very old misfeature with regard 'piping', though there are/were very easy other ways to do the very same thing).
Though not exclusively based on FreeBSD 4.4, MacOS X 10.2 is based very heavily around a FreeBSD 4.4 core and, of course, GCC 3.1. Neither of these are 'old' by any practical definition.
Though the kernel has a certain level of maturity, the Mach layer currently acts primarily only as an abstraction layer for developers and has been very heavily hacked at since it's use in NeXT. The kernel is not 'old' nor 'krufty', despite the distinct impression given.
Maarten Hekkelman also says:
Did you ever consider dropping support for the old Mac OS, and making Pepper only for Mac OS X?
No.
I can understand not wanting to be locked in to Coca, but refusing to drop OS 9 (at the very least apart from bug fixes) was a mistake. More effort should have been spent on the Mac OS X (and Windows) versions.
Part of being a good developer is being able to make smart decisions. To keep supporting an out-dated operating system when it is clear that are other badly needed new features that need to be addressed (features needed to keep the product viable) is foolish.
Though I don't know him, the fact that he has now left development and gone to 'Database Administrator' speaks volumes to me about his ability to strategically plan product development, and his proficiency as a developer. I don't like to be critical of someone I haven't met, but that is the distinct impression I get.
I fail to see why a truly good developer would want to do this, as database administration is tedious at best and mind numbing at worse (and 1.5 TB systems are really not that interesting quite frankly, a Network Appliance Filer installation will do the job for you and is easily maintained part time by any administrator, with multiple redundant disks, multiple network connections, multiple power supplies, multiple controllers, the ability to roll back to previous versions (snapshots) and the ability to use Snap Mirror to keep a up-to-date version running off site which you can simply switch over to if the system goes FUBAR - makes it a no-brainer of a solution). I should point out, in the interest of fairness that they are not the only ones that make such a product (there are many cheaper competitors more suitable for smaller scale installations), but theirs is the best IME
Another thing I find telling is that he seems to dislike and find it hard to adjust to many things in Mac OS X and to dislike them quite passionately. I personally dislike little in most operating systems, other than crashes. IMO true hackers (as-in-the-coder-sence-of-the-word) never find it difficult to adjust and I have always believed this ability it to be innate in good hackers.
For example, I have never sat in front of something like Project Builder and bemoaned it's single window behavior (as Maarten Hekkelman does in this interview), I found it quite intuitive. I found it equally intuitive to have multiple windows, I've never had a problem with either. I also have no major problems with the Dock or with the Windows taskbar.
Of course I expect *users* to get confused over this sort of thing, but not developers!
Is this a bad thing? While I too wouldn't have minded being a full-fledged programmer in time to get rich developing small apps such as file archival software or FOSSIL drivers, there is a great deal of support that comes from having every user of the open-source small apps be a beta tester and potentially a developer.
I think it's less likely that Pepper was too small of an application to sell it in this brave new world than it is that Linux users just didn't hear about it or care. I don't mean this in a bad way - it takes a while for decent advertising to work, but how many people are defecting from Mac to Linux?
That's part of what aggravates me about many commercial developers peddling their wares on Linux... they don't take the situation seriously enough going in and they badmouth the whole situation on the way out. It's still a niche market. There are something like 10% of the users of Windows (similar to Mac numbers, but with fewer workstations/desktops in the mix), and a bounty of applications each of which does about 80% of what one wants and each in a different way, but all without costing a cent. So, in general, commercial products come to us by companies that understand only the needs of Windows users, with less/no support, less stability, and higher price tags.
In his case, it sounds like he was one of the few that was being fairly reasonable about all of the above points, and I would have seriously thought about buying his product, but I've never heard of it. Now that I have, he's pulled out already. Sorry.
No surprise there. He's an old Be bigot, and Apple's decision to buy NeXT instead of Be is probably the #1 reason why his favorite operating system is dead and gone. Nobody hates OS X with greater blind passion than a hard-core Be fan.
Whatever Avi Tevanian and/or Steve Jobs does over the next 10 years, for any company, I guarantee that this guy will hate it.
If you asked an Amiga or Atari user what he thought about Macintosh System 7 back in 1987 or so, the shrill of his whines would have been at about the same pitch.
Oddly enough, when an unpopular OS dies, the former users never seem to blame the most popular OS for killing it (Windows), but instead lay the corpse at the feet of the #2 player (Apple). Probably because these also-ran companies (Commodore, Atari, Be), having failed to get traction with general users, tried to shoulder their way into niche markets that Apple is known for (media, music production, publishing, etc.) and rapidly went out of business in the attempt. Just a theory, anyway.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Sure Google works well if you're trying to find software. But if you have a new product in an established category (like text editors), you're invisible in Google until you achieve something like critical mass. So you need to get noticed.
If you want a good free text editor, get xemacs/emacs!
If you want to pay for an excellent editor, get BBEdit!
'Nuf said!
Good point. I owned (I guess I should say I still sort of do) Pe on BeOS. I was, let's say, annoyed when he first dropped that one. Hey, I understand that there was a limited market once BeOS shop went kaput, yet there were quite a few users out there already.
In a way the interview has left me with a bit of a whinie aftertaste -- looks like things did not work out for him and but he would not want to admit that this was not (entirely) the fault of Be, Apple or users not rushing from BBedit to Pepper...
--AP
Cocoa = ObjectiveC + frameworks.
- ObjectiveC = Apple's own (free beer) DevTools
- ObjectiveC = NeXTStep dev kit.
- ObjectiveC = GNUStep
Ok, so the foundation and other frameworks are missing, but it's not fair to completely write off Cocoa as Mac-only as it's not entirely correct.IMHO, Cocoa is streets ahead of PowerPlant, and I've used both.
And he tried to buy a bonus rating on Tucows. *ack!* I didn't know you could do that. Why not let the software stand on its own merit, instead of artificially pumping it up??
It [redirection of pipes to a window] works in Mac OS X now (well, 10.1.x) but works much better and nicer on a real Unix using SVR3 style RPC calls.
A real UNIX?? Them's fightin' words. Just 'coz he prefers SysV syscalls over BSD! Geez
I had hoped to find new sources of income [porting to Windows].
Congratulations. Welcome to the world of yet-another-text-editor-for-Windows ....
Alison
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." - Albert Einstein
We have clearly entered the realm of "opinion" here. I'm definitely "pro user" (I've developed software on OS X at work, and use a Mac to make original music at home), yet I find Aqua a great GUI to work with.
My opinion: WinXP is not ready for prime-time on a semi-pro music production system. Mac OS X is the right GUI that gets out of my way to let me do what I need to do. YMMV.
-- clvrmnky
That would be exactly the wrong thing to do. Commercial software vendors are not using cocoa right now because they need to get their OS 9 apps running under OS X without re-writing from scratch. The path to do that quickly is Carbon and it works pretty well.
Cocoa is excellent for commercial and hobby projects. Apple will not abandon it and go to C++-- believe me, the very suggestion would be laughed at by the NeXT people. Objective -C with Cocoa is far superior to C++ and actually, any of the other frameworks I've worked with in the past. Even though I've just learned ObjectiveC and the cocoa frameworks in the past 2 months, I'm already more productive with them than I have been in the past with Java (and Java was far more productive than C++ at getting things done-- ESPECIALLY UI Code which is very difficult in the C/C++ way of doing things.) Cocoa is a breeze.
Its clear you haven't used it. IF you're a developer, I suggest you check it out and see how nice it is. If its your first framework you may not see what the big deal is, but if you've had to write event handlers under OS 9, or even Java, you'll see how nice it is. (And if you're a java fan you get all the power and glory and can stay in java space... though I chose to learn Objective C and made the language switch.)
Its funny to say the "jobs way of thinking"-- I doubt jobs thinking had anything to do with cocoa, except that he markets it pretty well.
I don't see anything limiting about it, at the worst you have to use carbon to access stuff, but that's the previous status quo.
I'm aware of no commercial cocoa developers who have left and gone to carbon. I think you're wrong there. Omnigroup, Stone Design, and all the cocoa commercial houses continue to be fans of it and on the developer lists there is grousing about things that could be improved, but nobody saying "I'm going back to carbon". I think you're mistaking companies like adobe using carbon to port their (carbon) apps to OS X. Future apps will likely be in cocoa from these companies.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
After reading the article I'm not entirely sure what the problem is. Did the timeline basically go:
1. Shareware author writes yet another fucking editor.
2. Nobody likes it.
3. Tucows tells him to go stick it.
4. Shareware author stops selling editor
Is that it? What's the problem? Not enough free editors to choose from? You need to hand over money for buggy and unpopular editors as well?
It's his right, its his code to keep it when he stops selling it. There's nothing "telling" about that, unless you think that people should be forced to give up their property because it fits your ideology. (eg: Stallmanism/Communism).
Hell, from what it sounds like, not giving the source away probably saved the world a lot of trouble.
I apologize if I misunderstood you and you were talking about the fact that his customers deserve better support. But I disagree with you if you were saying that all code should be given away if its not being sold.
Its my intention to open source my code when it becomes 5 years old... if the news stuff isn't innovative enough and compelling enough that opening the olds stuff hurts sales, then that's a sad state of affairs. But the last person I will give code to willingly is the one who insists that it is his right to demand my code from me-- that I don't have the right to sell my code and choose when/where/how or if I open source it. (That man being richard stallman, et. al.)
The pepper author doesn't "owe" us his source code-- unless we bought the product and are now screwed by lack of support. But then only those who paid money have right to ask for support.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
It comes free with Jaguar. Its called TextEdit.
Thing is there are so many free editors out there (at least four that come with jaguar-vi, emacs, TextEdit, project builder, hell you can make your own with 20 lines of cocoa code.) that commercial editors have a tough market. Either they charge real money and provide lots of features like BBEdit, or they go out of business.
So, if TextEdit doesn't cut it, you probably should buy BBEdit.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
...but at the same time, Pepper was a damn nice editor, for a wide variety of reasons. While I suppose there is no moral imperative for him to open the code, it would still be A Really Nice Thing To Do, particularly if he doesn't intend on developing it any further or making any more money off of it.
But it's his prerogative, I suppose. Still, it's a shame. He could have really helped advance the state of the art, given a few of his ideas. Or at the absolute least he could have handed off the code to someone else so that people who depend on the program (like me) could count on it still being actively developed.
Actually they didn't die... they morphed into Chuck-E-Cheeses! (seriously)
Same difference though. :)
This is also the same company that turned down the Apple I computer because their home Pong game was going to be The Big Thing...
-- if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic - Lewis Carrol
Y'know, this discussion thus far has pissed me off. Every time a software author decides to give up on a project people rip him down - usually without checking out the project. I respect Hekkelman for the amount of work that he put into Pe / Pepper - Enough so that Neal Stephenson used Pe to write his book "In the Beginning there was the Command Line" Not many shareware authors can say a book was written on their program.
That's funny.
Move towards the light, Pepper....
let me get rid off those horizontal gray stripes and the chewing-gum Dock.
10.2 got rid of the stripes and you've always had the ability to turn off the bouncing applications (System Preferences: Dock: Animate Opening Applications).
"First you gotta do the truffle shuffle."
It comes free with Jaguar. Its called TextEdit.
While TextEdit does let you edit text (better than Word, for instance), it's not quite on the same playing field as any of the code editors such as BBEdit, Pepper, vi, or emacs. TextEdit is really just a SimpleText for Mac OS X*. The fact that the default setting for new documents is Rich Text Format is very telling (who wants to write code in Rich Text?).
* (why don't doc-writers just save their stuff as PDFs and let people open them in Preview?)
"First you gotta do the truffle shuffle."
That would explain why the source for Pe for beos is now opensource.. apparently there is no sense in depraving the future of this code if its not going to live on in pepper. BeUnited.org has the news and cvs of the pe code so perhaps an opensource apple varient will spring up?
He could at least be a nice guy about it and release his old code as abandonware.
http://www.beunited.org/
Either that or Mac users are generally slow to change and like their os they way it has been for several years?
You prefer vi or Emacs? Great you get those for free too.
As for writing code, there's project builder, which has a very good code editor, on its way to being excellent. Also free. If you prefer vi or emacs then you can use them for you code, you can do all your development within emacs, for instance (building and debugging as well, I believe.)
IF you like BBEdit, though, then get it, great. I'm just saying that its a tough market when Apple ships 4 editors with the OS, and BBEdit is there for those who want BBEdit like features.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
From the interview: "A huge amount of work that went into designing the ultimate GUI was thrown away and all we got back was a bag full of candy that was dog slow."
Some of you know that I've been pretty vocal, complaining about how slow Mac OS X is. I've been called a liar and a troll. It's been implied that I must have had some configuration problem on the OS X machines I've used. I've been called stupid and ignorant.
Yet here in the article, we have Maarten Hekkelman, a well respected developer, and even HE says OS X is slow. Is Maarten a troll, or is it just that OS X is slow, and no one wants to admit it?
Because PDFs suck for reading on screen. The author doesn't know how big my monitor is or how much screen real estate I want to devote to his file, and having separate pages just gets in the way. Using HTML or RTF gives the user much more flexibility.
How to solve most of our problems: 1.Lots of nuclear plants. 2.Cure aging.
Only cracked once? Once is enough ;) Obviously no-one cared enough to do it again.
Poor baby can't sell his shareware anymore. Boo hoo.
It's a text editor dude, not a fricken app development studio. Like he said in the interview, in the future it may only be possible to sell big application suites, and not ream people out for a text editor. I can't say I see this as a big loss.
That's what peeves me about MacOS vX and Windows.. everyone wants to make money with their programs. And Linux? People distribute good programs out of the kindness of their heart.
http://barebones.com/products.html
:-), I think you will find it worth it if you do any serious editing. Personally, I love this text editor dearly.
BBEdit Lite, I think you will be quite pleased.
Of course, if you want to go for the full out, $120 version ($80 for me
Your other option, of course, is xemacs.
Integrate Keynote and LaTeX