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Linux Software

Building Nautilus: Behind The Scenes 84

Posted by timothy from the lookin'-forward-to-mandrake-9-with-this-and-2.6;) dept.
mholve points to this LinuxPlanet feature titled "A Sneak Peek at Nautilus from Eazel." Despite that title, it's not just a collection of bulleted feature lists and screen shots. Instead, it's a nicely balanced, in-depth look at the thought process behind the creation of Nautilus as well as a description and critique of the current preview. The article raises some interesting points about the complications that Eazel has found in trying to make Nautilus distribution-neutral: "In the future, I think we're going to have to look for a way to abstract the package system much in the same way we've abstracted the file system," [Darin Adler, Eazel software engineering honcho] allows. In addition, he notes that the diversity found in other areas of Linux distributions presents a daily challenge: "We try to get weirdnesses out of our code as much as possible, when we discover we've accidentally done something distribution-specific, we try to 'unweird it.'"
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A Sneak Peek At Nautilus From Eazel More

A Sneak Peek At Nautilus From Eazel

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  • Ironically, their action probably had the reverse effect. OO code in C++ is better maintainable than OO code in C. The ++ in the language name means that some usefull features were added to the C language. No (or hardly) any features were taken away.
    It's a pitty that eazel went to work with gnome instead of kde. At least their developers recognized kde it as technically superior. This is extra sad now that the license issues are resolved. Luckily the KDE developers didn't wait for somebody else to fix their problems and created Konquerer and KOffice.

  • Sure, users can be educated that the same window displays two different kinds of information. However, as far as I can see, the only reason why a combination file manager/web browser program was created to start with is that Microsoft had commercial reasons for welding its web broswer as tightly as possible to its operating system, contrary to good software design.

    I don't understand why the free software camp is prepetuating that legacy. If Microsoft had had reason to write a file manager/spreadsheet program, say, or a file manager/photo editor, does that mean that the free software world should continue the same strange groupings?

    It doesn't strike me as good software design to write a single program which performs two unlike functions. Better to write two separate programs, and then, if there's a need, work out a way for them to talk to each other, while keeping the internals of the two completely separate.

  • Well, you asked...:^) (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    As far as Windows goes, it's not *quite* as bad, but, IMHO, close. :^)

    As far as Nautilus goes, yeah, I agree with you. What I'd like is to see the desktop icons handled by themselves in one process, and the file views handled in yet another. Quite frankly, what I think ought to be done is to write a highly-scriptable file manager, along the lines of TkDesk (but, for the love of God, don't make it Guile. :^) That's the one thing I miss about TkDesk--the configurability. One could do a bit of shell scripting and, viola, it could be in a list of right-click actions. This is one area where Windows has us beat--you can actually "script" Explorer via the Registry (ugh.) Yet another nice thing about the Explorer interface is that one doesn't have to have all that extraneous crap--my '98 box looks more like a '95 box, to tell the truth, because I've done away with all the crappy toolbars (they aren't necessary.)
  • (Replying to self, I know)
    Um, ah. Parse error. You said "GUI like GMC", or words to that effect. That clears it up, at least somewhat... What you want is a dual-paned file manager but with icon-based display, right? Cool. Good luck finding one. ;)On a (somewhat) related note, one question I have about all these programs that do "icon-based" browsing of file systems concerns icon positions. When I see a big window full of fluffy icons, I want to be able to reposition them freely by dragging, and I want the resulting positions to be persistent. This helps me arrange a directory's contents in a way that aids rapid access. But it creates a problem: where should the icon positions be stored? I see several alternatives:
    1. In a per-directory file, e.g. .iconinfo or something. Perhaps the best choice on typical Unix-y filesystems...
    2. In a global magic database somewhere. Keeps individial directories tidy, but is probably difficult to get to work well with (dynamic) mounting etc.
    3. In the icons themselves. This was how the Amiga did it; the Workbench only displayed icons for files that had a matching .info file (so foo's icon would be in foo.info). Works well, but creates an extra file for each visible file. Uglifies the filesystem, and takes loads of space.
    4. Not stored at all. This seems to be how Windows does it, I think. Icon positions are only maintained as long as the particular window is open. Clearly, this doesn't solve the problem (for me). ;^)/
    Wow, I guess I got a bit carried away, there. Anyone got any ideas about this? Let's hear them!
  • I don't see how someone prefers lightweight interfaces would like something like emacs....

    Chris Hagar
  • A file manager is for managing files

    One problem with the managing of files is that, in general, users don't want to manage files and directories, they want to manage information. It's only because we've had years of experience with computer systems that we can effortlessly make the file -> information jump.

    So, the real problem is how to build an extendable interface which allow people to build "information management" applications into their user interface. In this light, a web shell is actually a decent design decision -- it's runtime interpreted, the language is widely understood, and you presumably have the software installed anyway. (The downside is local vs remote security.)

    Aside from the political and legal problems with MS's IE integration is the fact that they never did a really good job providing any sort of decent "information management" on top of explorer. (JPEG preview is merely the obvious gimme.) So, like you say, in a stock Windows config the reasoning behind using a web component is really non-obvious when you can have a simple OSX-style browser

    Now, Nautilus, from what I can tell from the screen shots, really takes this up a notch with far more component integration. Whether or not this is a useful way of managing file-based data remains to be seen. But, hopefully it will be a full enough implementation that (unlike Windows), users will get the idea and start runnig with it.

    What I'd really like to see, for example, is a hierarchical search interface which abstracts the actual directory structure. Also, a standard policy way of doing database-like attributes is a longterm must. "Home pages" for shared project directories and integrated versioning would also be features that I could start using tomorrow. Something like Natalius would be the perfect place to start to implement these sorts of interfaces.

    (Note that I'm not trying to say that something like Nautilus is a cure-all, just something useful. There will always be the need for a shell, a stripped down Mac/Win95 file browser, and specialized database and cataloging tools.)
  • "grep", "tail", "less","cat"

    nope, nope, "more", "type"

    Those commands were included in Win95 at least. I hate DOG, but at least it has "|" and ">". I can't wait until all mainstream OS's have real shells hidden somewhere, and all slashes are the one true slash /. At least Apple is on the right path.
  • Even if he uses emacs ... you can probably get to vi through a shell. But on a Mac or Windows box, you're not going to find WordPerfect if the owner is a Word user. Even worse is if you need to do some image processing (for example) and he or she isn't a graphics person; then you're not going to be able to do certain tasks at all.

    This is actually one of my complaints about Linux installs. You try to do a basic RH install and you'll be getting 650-750 meg of stuff, most of which you won't ever use.

    Why should I have to install 12 editors if I only use emacs (with the occasional jump into pico)?

    And it's not just editors, it's across the whole spectrum. I've tried to do installs where I select only certain components, but then I always have dependency problems that make absolutely no sense and I STILL end up with garbage that I know I didn't select being installed for me.

    Why can't we easily get an install that works correctly with nothing more than a kernel, the gnu tools, x, a desktop and window manager of choice, and a couple of basic apps?

    If Microsoft came up with a distribution of Windows that came with all the crap that Linux distributions come with, we'd all complain about it.

    Maybe this was ok when there were only a few apps available for Linux and people just chunked everything in because they could, and so they could prove that apps for Linux actually existed, but not now.

    I just don't understand why when I want a non-Xed server that due to dependencies for text based apps I am required to install XF86 libraries?

  • The problem with your argument is that you are comparing users, not the interface.

    Yes, A typical *nix user would probably be able to adapt and work around any problems they may encounter sitting on a strange machine, but that's because typically they are more technically savvy than the average joe.

    I have probably touched thousands of Windows boxes (usually 20-30 a day) at many different offices in the days when I did such things as a consultant. Windows is pretty much windows.

    I sit down on other people's *nix boxes and curse the machine and think they are idiots for setting things up the way they have. I wonder in the back of my mind if they don't know how to configure it the "correct" way (ie, my way ;) It's like working on completely different desktop.

  • they are themeable, so yes, you can change the icons, also you can change tool bar icons, and many other parts of the Nautilus ui.
  • Gnome doesn't need The App That Does Everything (neither does KDE, for that matter). All that does is lead to bloat, redundant apps on a system, and confusion for new users.
    Luckily, though, Nautilus is not "The App That Does Everything." It is "The App That Can Use Components That Do Various Things." So, the web-browsing "feature" of Nautilus is really a Mozilla component embeded into Nautilus. If there was a spreadsheet "feature" in Nautilus, it would more likely be a Gnumeric component. Much better that way, in my opinion -- code reuse and consistent interfaces (looks the same/similar in Gnumeric the application and in Gnumeric the component) help the overall user experience.
  • Well, I don't really want it ;) Well, maybe I do.. heh. Let me put it another way. I don't want it, but I want Linux to have it...

    You see, I love gentoo, and filerunner. They both have what I want, which is point, click, copy.. etc. Two panes, and not like GMC, but a real set of two panes, with real scriptability like gentoo and filerunner have for each pane.

    Now, as for your comments on the icon info, it does definately present problem. I mean, you can't do #1 really, because you don't have write access to every directory, even though you may have read access. #3 isn't viable either.. I don't think anyone will accept that, and its problematic because of the write access to each dir once again. Obviously #4 isn't what you want, otherwise why even bring the subject up? ;)

    That being the case, you're probably stuck with #2. I suppose you could use this to set individual icons for every single file on the system if you wanted to. Sounds cool, but it might slow down things quite a bit. Then again, I suppose you could always allow someone to turn said option off, or if they never used it I guess the database would remain empty, and queries would be almost instant to it. I suppose you could have default for icons, like gnome and other apps do, but have anything in the database override those default. Would work quite well, I guess.

    Anyhow, the big thing here is that we do need something LIKE gmc for the new users that want the purdy icons, and if we're gonna have it, it should at least be good, like Dopus5 (no, I hate dopus 5, and prefer dopus 4 to it.. in fact I prefered DirWorks2 on the amiga.. since it was so customizable). The point is, DOpus 5 would be great on Linux. It would get icon based access to the file tree, and tons of power to boot.

    One last thing. I know that you don't want to gnomify Gentoo, but have you thought about allowing a user to import or use the mime.types file from gnome? I would speed up configuration, and allow the user to edit one file, instead of 10...

    Anyhow, Gentoo rocks, so keep up the good work!! ;)
  • "It doesn't work right because it's 'policy'" sounds an aweful like "It doesn't work right because it fukin br0ken." to most users.

    This is a problem of education. Certainly there are many users who simply want to get work done, but understanding the mechanism versus policy issue would help many proto-geeks to gain a better understanding of why X is the way it is.

    A Linux distribution is a good place to start with policy enforcement.

    GNOME and KDE are certainly good places to have policy.

    The X Window System is not; if you warp X so that it enforces policy, you will have an X that many current users will not or cannot use.

    --
    "Where, where is the town? Now, it's nothing but flowers!"

  • Nautilus is certainly a fine tool, and a very good copy of Microsoft's IE-integrated file manager.

    Actually, I see quite a bit of a old Mac software project called Savant. Don't remember the year it came out, but the late eighties seems to be about right. For those of you not familiar with Savant, it was an effort to dramatically redefine the Mac Finder. The author? Some guy named Andy Hertzfeld :-)

  • Can't agree with you: puting a scrollbar on the left is basically like sitting in a normal (left-sided) car, but with a [gear-shifting] stick to the left of the wheel, instead of right: you'd have to [sub-conciously] cross your field of vision and put a hand (or rather a mouse pointer) across yourself.

    Now, menus are a different matter and left/top is more convenient than left-bottom. They can also be on your right, close to your scrollbar -- this is also nice.
  • I'd love to try Nautilus right away, but I'm unable to find usable .debs for Debian Potato anywhere. Can someone point me to an URL for addition to my sources.list?

  • Windows Tips (Score:4)

    by xonix7 ( 227592 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @05:39AM (#792607) Homepage
    When I'm sitting down at a Windows box, I find myself constantly wishing that I had "grep", "tail", "less","cat",etc. The best thing I've found for Windows in a long time is the native GNU utilities [tu-muenchen.de]. Sure, you can always download CygWin [redhat.com], which is a kinda emulation layer, emulating the Linux API with the Win32 API, but I find that the native GNU utilities mentioned about (native Win32) are quite cool. It's the first thing I put onto a Windows box I'm working on. Oh, that and, if it's a Windows 98 box, 98 Lite [98lite.net]. This thing takes out a lot of the useless rubbish (bloatfiles) in Windows 98. The free version removes Internet Explorer from the OS, making it quite a lot faser sicne IE doesn't have to bog down the system by being "integrated" into it.

    Cheers

  • Can anyone tell me if the icons for folders/directories can be changed? I know, this might seem a stupid request but, this is the one thing I miss from the OS/2 Shell.

  • No, Windows users don't. (I'm a reformed, and now pro-Linux Windows user) I can generally sit down at someone else's Windows box and know my way around inside of five minutes. This is because, in general, Windows just doesn't allow for as much reconfiguration as other systems do. (Linux I have experience with, what about other OSes?) I like being able to configure my system so that everything works the way I like it to. The defaults may not be what I like, but the flexibility is there to make it what I like.

    Yes, it does create a larger learning curve. But I think the end result, being able to create an environment you're comfortable in, is worth it. Whether that environment is mainly text, really simple graphics, or the latest and greatest from KDE or GNOME.

    I also know that its not always easy to get Linux (again, what I have experience with, can others provide more general details?) to work the way you like. Some things are easy to change, others are harder. But almost everything can be changed.

    (My main area of preference is that, for most things, I like a light-on-dark color scheme. Unfortunately, almost everything in the Windows universe defaults to dark-on-light, and changing it in a way that doesn't make a lot of things look like crud is hard for me to do.)


    -RickHunter

  • What's this about the Gnome project strong-arming the developers into switching from C++ to C? Leaving aside my religious beliefs in OOP, that doesn't seem in keeping with "open source ideals" at all.

    Well, given gnome's cross-platform ideals, C++ can be a bad choice for core libraries. I've seen complaints than Sun changed the ABI for C++ libraries with each of the major releases of their C++ compiler. This is not good if you expect your code + system libraries to interoperate in the slightly longer term. C based libraries have a very stable interface on the other hand which is well established + unlikely to change.

    This argument wouldn't matter if we weren't talking about a core API -- you can write an app in whatever language you've got bindings for.

    Has anyone written core 'system' type libraries in C++ and made them accessible to other languages than C++? I haven't seen any, but that doesn't mean it hasn't been done...

  • and a very good copy of Microsoft's IE-integrated file manager

    I've never used it so i really can't say. But I do know that the main dude for it worked at Apple for a while. so I imagine he wasn't really trying to copy Microsoft UI. He talks about how they carfuly chose when to borrow, and when to invent. hopefully he wasn't just blowing hot air.

    A file manager is for managing files. A Web browser is for viewing files. To integrate the two is to create confusion

    Not unless your a complete freakin newbie. I think most people understand then when you type in c:\temp\ (or /root/) you'll be be in local file mode and when you type www.slashdot.org you'll be at a website. As for this being "bloatwhere" it's all in the implementation. I'm sure your aware that explorer ISN'T IE, it's just a wrapper for IE, even IE is a wrapper for IWebbrowser. they are loaded at different times, it's not like they are both loaded in RAM when you load it.

    -Jon

  • You've said basically what I tried to say below, but much better. Yes, a Windows environment may be familiar, so I can use it quickly... But the limitations of the model mean I can't always do what I want. (For example, even though I'm not a graphics person, I've got The GIMP installed in case I or someone else needs to. Couldn't do that on a Windows box.)

    Excuse me if my wording's not clear, I'm a bit rushed.


    -RickHunter

  • What about the keyboard? (Score:3)

    by Destrius ( 956 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @08:35AM (#792613)
    One thing I've noticed is that most of the file managers nowadays go on and on about how good their graphical interface is, how well implemented drag-and-drop is and so on, but almsot none of them touch on how the keyboard can be utilised.

    I understand that some people would prefer to use the mouse to do everything, in which case something like Nautilus would be ideal, but how about those of us who prefer the keyboard? Adding in a good set of keyboard mappings is quite easy to do, but sometimes its sorely neglected.

    I almost never use gmc. When I want to work with the filesystem, I open up an xterm. When I work in Windows, however, I use Explorer all the time, and one of the reasons for this is that its very easy to do everything with the keyboard. I can select a set of files, Ctrl-x them, Alt-Tab to another window, and then Ctrl-v them into the new directory. To me this seems much faster than arranging the windows and then dragging the set of files to the other directory.

    One reason why I don't like dragging and dropping with the mouse is that I find it a bit stressful on my hand after doing that for too long. If somebody has a physical disability that prevents them from using the mouse in such a way, can he/she still use Nautilus?
  • Does anyone else think this looks *exactly* like Windows Explorer? Particularly with the revised design in Windows 2000? Where's the innovation?
  • I don't understand why the gnome folks are doing this kind of development in C. KDE is written in C++ and therefore KDE is more object oriented, more robust, more maintainable, more extensible and a better choice for a desktop.

  • Easel's choice of Gnome (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 09, 2000 @08:58AM (#792616)
    I think it's good that Easel chose to work with the Gnome framework, but the reasons given in the interview left out a lot. The real reasons are more like:

    1. Kde already had a similar product, Konqueror, well under development at the time. Konqueror is now in release state or very near release and is quite stable, fast and fairly efficient with memory use. While Kde always welcomes more developers, I don't think they would have wanted developers working at cross purposes with Konqueror so near to completion.

    2. Kde and Easel have different philosophies. Easel is a money-making project started by entrepeneurs hoping to capitalize from application delivery and commercial services using the Easel/Gnome framework. Both are free software, but Kde's purpose is simply to provide needed free software to unix users, not to make money from such software. Gnome, through Helix and other spinoffs, already had established itself as a free desktop environment for the purpose of such capitalization by developers and entrepeneurs close to the project. This more than anything mandated Gnome for Easel.

    3. Gnome did not have a competetive file manager/browser in the eyes of most users. Personally I like gmc *a lot* but it does have its limitations. Therefore Gnome had a real need for Easel.

    4. Of course the licensing issue with Kde was a factor, and the only reason given in the interview which was legitimate. Not that the Eazel principals thought that there was a problem with licensing (they didn't) but the uncertainty among others made Kde a less attractive choice at the time.

    I'm a big Kde enthusiast - using Konqueror right now. However, the competition from Easel will help Kde. Of course I think Konqueror already provides most of what Easel promises, and much more, although in some areas Easel will be innovating first. Integrated web/network/local search comes to mind.

    The main advantage of Kde 2 is efficiency and speed, both for the user and developer. For example, Kde 2 is performing beautifully in most ways with my now antiquated P200mmx 32 meg PC. When it doesn't I bitch at the Kde developers and lo and behold they fix it the next week. "Your Kde is in deep shit! Now fix it!"

    Everything, or almost everything, in Kde 2 really is a component either with a thin wrapper to make it a separate app or embedded in another app. It works smoothly. I think Gnome will have a lot of trouble getting that working without tremendous bloat and slowdown and stability problems - when it is *really* used by the vast majority of apps like Kde is using components right now, not just by a few showpieces or to embed a memory monitor into the panel.

    I hope Kde learns something from Easel about the importance of a "finder" to users. It should be fairly easy to integrate that into the existing Konqueror with compnents and the results can already be displayed and manipulated in a number of ways with Kde 2. (Konqueror already has multiple paned browser windows and the ability to embed different views or viewers in different panes if you want to, though I usually prefer one or two panes).

    Finally, on the choice of languages, if CORBA and bonobo really are language neutral, then the preference of the Easel developers for C++ should have been respected. But these interfaces really are not so language neutral after all. So, I don't think it was so much a matter of Easel being "pressured" by Gnome founders to use C with Gtk+. It was a matter of their realization that C with Gtk+ would be more likely to work with the Gnome framework and that C++ would cause problems for them.

    Sure, you can use languages like Python and Perl to glue components together, but the components themselves usually are written in C, or C++, depending on whether Gnome or Kde is being used. It is possible to use other languages for creating components but no so easy to use anything other than C with bonobo or C++ with Kparts. CORBA is certainly not the magic bullet though it has uses in some situations.

    I do know from personal experience that application development in C++ with Qt is a lot more FUN and faster than using C with Gtk+. This is especially true for more complex apps. I can imagine the cursing and swearing at the Easel workshop where coders are trying to use a mixture of Gtk's gimped up object oriented C, corba IDL, and a constantly changing set of libraries requrired to support Gnome and Gtk.

    Anyway, I am quite impressed with what I have seen of Easel. They have done much in a short time under trying circumstances as explained above. Congratulations to the Easel coders and designers!

  • Re:Get this out of the way (Score:3)

    by Junks Jerzey ( 54586 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @02:05PM (#792617)
    I understand the sentiment, but there's a difference between "spartan" and "highly usable." I think Gnome, et al, are going off in the wrong direction. They're interfaces for the sake of being interfaces. Arguably, that's okay, because for many people Linux is the operating system that exists solely to be an operating system :)

    So, yes, I'd rather see less cruft devoted to customizing interfaces and fiddling around with a desktop, and more focus on real tasks. But if you take away flashy GUIs from Linux, you don't necessarily end up with more. You end up with something slimmer, faster, and more reliable, but often awkward and misdirected. The next step is to design something that's geared toward what people need out of computers. Jef Raskin has done much work in this area. The OS in the Apple Newton is another good example; it's more radical than most people realize. Open Genera is another OS designed with real problem solving in mind. Unfortunately, we're not seeing much in this direction any more, as being like Windows is seen as much more important (kinda surprising from the subversive Linux crowd, I must say).
  • Gnome doesn't need The App That Does Everything (neither does KDE, for that matter). All that does is lead to bloat, redundant apps on a system, and confusion for new users.

    I just want to point out that one of the best things about Nautilus is the way it uses Bonobo. Because it's componentized, bloat and redundancy are not problems, and confusion is actually reduced by allowing you to do basic interaction with data in a standardized interface and environment.

    They're not creating an app that does everything; you won't be editing documents or writing HTML in Nautilus, or really doing anything at all other than basic file management. But the point is to extend "basic file management" to include more intelligent handling of attributes. Right now file managers only know byte size, and date created, and filename, but this is not how information works in your mind; you don't organize your ideas by "ideaname." The file manager should know things about the file, like what it looks like if it's an image, or how long it is if it's a sound, or what the content is if it's a text file.

    The only reasonable way to do this is components.

  • I agree. When I first heard about Eazel there was a lot of "revolutionary" talk. Now it turns out they're making YAFM. That's nice, but I don't see any evidence that this is leap forward. I'm glad they're around and making this software, but I was hoping for exciting new things that no other OS would have. It turns out we're just catching up to Windows.

    quite a few of the same interface mistakes Microsoft made

    I think one problem is that it's hard to agree on what a good interface is. I think one of the biggest problems that technical people have with Microsoft is that it only offers one iterface and claims that it is good for everyone. It seems to be aiming at users who are somewhere above a complete novice and somewhere below a professional. They end up alienating a lot of new users and it's really frustrating for UNIX people who are used to having a sophisticated interface to have to dumb down to Windows. I don't think everyone needs the same interface.

    Hopefully Eazel's file manager is just the first step to a more user friendly UNIX. I personally think the the Mac is too complicated for most people, so UNIX is right out.

  • The ultimate file manager for Windows is Windows Commander. Maybe it's just because I started using Norton Commander on DOS many many years ago, but it just feels right.

    The two directory windows side by side metaphor is the best way to manage files and information. New users can use the mouse to do what they want to do, but power users can navigate the system using nothing but the keyboard.

    I know there are quite a few Norton Commander clones already available for *nix, but they're all pretty sad when it comes to actual usability.

    The guy who writes Windows Commander, Christian Ghisler, is supposedly going to work on a *nix version of it as soon as Kylix is released, so there is hope. I don't think I can completely change over until I get this.

  • Navigation bars should always be on the "left" its a pretty safe bet to assume most people will feel much more comfortable dropping menu's down from left to right (english speaking folks) anyways.

    Think about it, you read left to right most everything you do is from left to right, typing its deeply ingrained in your mind by the time your 20 or so.

    Going from right to left seems to make less sense to me, so do sights that put the menu on the left just to be cool?

    It dont make any sense to me.. Thats why I like left to right navigation on all my sights as I think it makes it more useable to a greater number of people...

    Jeremy

  • What's this about the Gnome project strong-arming the developers into switching from C++ to C? Leaving aside my religious beliefs in OOP, that doesn't seem in keeping with "open source ideals" at all.

    Worse, I thought gnome was supposed to specifically address inter-language issues (everything thru an ORB, or whatever). The fact that this issue even arose suggests that there is some kind of deep architectural unsoundness to this project.

    This wasn't going to be just another module, this was going to be a part of the core GNOME...

    A file manager is part of the core? Must be written in the same language? Bad signs. Someone who knows better tell me I'm wrong.

  • Get this out of the way (Score:4)

    by rongen ( 103161 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @03:09AM (#792623) Homepage

    I'm just going to say what we are all thinking. Well half of us anyway...

    Some people like stuff like Nautilus, evolution, Gnome panels, really loaded root window menus, etc... Others like about 4 items in thier root window menu, gno panels (and I mean gnone), run emacs (as file manager, editor, ftp client, eye-washing area, short-order cook, etc), and just think that click-heavy interfaces slow them down.

    As someone who prefers lightweight interfaces (text) in a slimmed down windowing environment without gnome, etc. I can also appreciate the attraction of a richer interface experience. But since I am not into gnome, etc, I am not going to say anything for or against it other than to thank all the developers and testers out there for all their hard work.

    I do have a question though. Most of us who have been using a system that is highly configurable and application rich (I don't want to say "Linux" because there are lots of others) settle into a rut after a while with respect to the tools we like and how we want to have them layed out---whether we like lazy focus or click-to-focus, auto-raise, emacs, vi, etc.

    When I sit down at my friend's Linux machine it's a bit wierd. Nothing works exactly like it should and I don't know where to find anything :) then I sit down at a Solaris box and the same disorientation follows. I prefer this to being in a monotonous environment but I want to ask if Windows users experience this same mild disorientation when they use other boxes than the ones they are normally on (do other unix users or am I am freak)? I am pretty sure Mac users do (again due to it's high configurability).

    --8<--

  • I am glad to see the progess in Gnome. Will the new gnome create a major shift in the Desktop war? I hope so I hope to see that KDE and Gnome gives choice to the consumer. It choices that helps make things better.

  • Re:What's up with gnome's tactics? (Score:3)

    by Shadowlion ( 18254 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @03:54AM (#792625) Homepage
    What's this about the Gnome project strong-arming the developers into switching from C++ to C? Leaving aside my religious beliefs in OOP, that doesn't seem in keeping with "open source ideals" at all.

    It probably had something to do with the fact that Nautilius was going to be considered a "core" GNOME package. Since GNOME itself is written in C, not C++, I think it's reasonable to want all the core GNOME packages to be written in the same language. Utilities, applications, and what-not can be written in Perl, Scheme, or whatever else has a language binding, but the core program(s) should be developed in the same language.

    This has a number of benefits, not the least of which is that the package is easier to integrate into the rest of GNOME, since those working on the other core packages can still read and understand Nautilus. It's difficult to get used to a C-variant language (Java, C++, C#) coming off of C, and it's not an adjustment that takes a couple of hours.


    --
  • How about the passing comment to the effect that Open Source developers are susceptible to "delusion" when it comes to software quality and testing? I assume this means self-delusion about how good your code is, how little testing you can get away with, how well-tested your released code is, etc. In other words, all the usual delusions. The Gospel says, open development (aka continuous peer review) is an IMPROVED quality/testing approach--the harsh glare of truth, not another source of delusion. Does anyone know what he is talking about?
  • As a windows user, I can see what you're tlaking about, and I have the same issues with other people's windows machines, though not to the same extent. For the most part, you can trust the Start menu to have the same 8 (if you're using win95) initial items. Anything found above that can probably also be found under Programs.

    But there are little things. Color scheme, though that's not much of an issue. Font size (under Control Panel->Desktop->Settings) can give me a sort of vague feeling of discomfort, because it messes with the maximize/minimize/close buttons, till I eventually break and set it all to Small fonts with 1024x768 (then I restore it when I'm done ;D ). Radically different cursors can give me that same, pseudo-subconscious feeling that something isn't right. And when you have things with panels that slide out when you nudge the edge of the screen with the mouse, the same thing happens.
    But it's the same with every OS, I think. I'm used to my customized DOS prompt ( LCARS | C:\> in bright green, so the basic C:\> in light gray is kinda boring). I'm used to the way I have apps arranged on my Palm. From what I can tell of Linux, though, you have a much greater degree, or at least ease, of rearrangement and customization.
    -J
  • The article is excellent. The topic most important to me on Slashdot is the progress of Open Source development.

    It's interesting to get a glimpse into the inner workings of what apparently is one of the most socially important and socially advanced endeavors in the world today. Open Source development is an example of humankind working in a truly cooperative way for the benefit of all of us.
  • I would expect that Windows users feel more disorientation than *nix user when switching to another machine, as *nix users _tend_ to quickly click a couple of times to bring up a shell and run thier programs from thier if they are not quickly available on a menu/taskbar. I would guess that windows users would be less likely to search for a piece of software if it isn't an icon on the desktop or an entry in the start menu. In the past when I used windows at home, then went to a friends house I would spend more time scrolling around menus to find XYZ package, than it would have taken to to a Find on the package name.
  • GMC has multiple panes available, you just need to bring up a second window. The code is the same inside. If you notice, when you do an action (like copy) in mc, your default target is the opposite pane. Likewise, in gmc, your default target is the last window you were in, or the desktop.

    GMC has a lot of the same features that the original mc had, but in retrospect was missing an important one -- that of keyboard navigability. Too many actions required too much mousing.
  • Gnome dosn't force C programing. It has all sorts of bindings.

    Onfortunatly it's a lot easier for a C++ programer to switch to C than to use the almost functional C++ bindings in Gnome.

    The same goes for nearly all the other language bindings so Gnome is esentialy a C environment to the same extent KDE is a C++ one.

    It's about as silly as the Window Manager choice argument. I.e. Most Gnome Window Managers are KDE compliant too.

  • You can make Be OS look like the Windows, Mac, or even the Amiga !!
    Hold down: Ctrl-Alt-Shift, then select the BeOS system menu, and you should see a new menu option called "Windows decor"
    Great fun to play on a Be friend/user when they aren't looking :)

    Come on Linux, where is this one-click functionality?

    Also why isn't it *easy* for a user to customize their UI ? i.e. a) I want to be able to drag the close button to where _I_ want it, not haphazardly placed because it's "hard-coded" into the window manager. b) And give the user the option of HOW BIG the title bar is, etc.
  • Is it really a good idea to abstract this
    away? It reminds me of the old maxim, "in
    abstracting away X toolkits, you inevitably
    end up inventing your own". There is a
    certain amount of necessary complexity in
    a useful package system, so abstracting away
    for simplicity isn't a good motive. Abstracting
    away for compatibility might seem on the face
    to be a good thing, but the abstractions in
    this case might be impossible to get right and
    the replacement could concievably be much worse
    than the underlying package system. There are
    limits to effective abstraction, and I'm worried
    that this might me a losing battle.
  • Leaving aside the question of C++'s portability, it may have had something to do with the state of flux in the GTK+ C++ bindings. As I understand it, some questionable design decisions have been made with gtk--, and now there is Havoc Pennington's Inti API too.

    Personally, I seriously doubt that the "must be written in the same language" thing had anything to do with it. That just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

  • I can't find anything that Konqueror (KDE2s filemanager/browser) doesn't have or that couldn't be built in there. KDEs component based code allows to implement _all_ the mentioned features that Nautilus has. Should you really take a filemanager because of services the company that coded it will make money with?
    BTW, Konqueror looks much more beautyfull anyway.
    http://www.konqueror.org

  • Be kind to vi users (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Whenever my husband sits down at my Linux box, he types a few commands, then mutters and switches my bash editor to VI-style from emacs-style.

    Ok, you've had your fun - now stop torturing the poor man and just make him his own account and .bashrc. ;)

  • I really wonder if they will fix all the little things that don't work well in X, things like the wheel mouse, TAB stops, consistant hot heys, even window focus - much bigger issues too, like an consistant way to install programs.

    None of those things have anything to do with X Window System. To say that they do implies a misunderstanding of what X is.

    Simply put, X provides the mechanism, not the policy. X is plumbing and electrics. X is not your interior decorator.

    • Wheel mouse: X handles wheel mice perfectly. Buttons 4 and 5 are mapped to up and down. Making those buttons actually do something is up to the toolkit or the application. X's responsibility ends once the ButtonPress and ButtonRelease events have been delivered.
    • Tab stops: Nothing to do with X at all, unless the Tab key has been remapped at the X level. If tabs are messed up in your xterm, it's likely that either your application or your termcap is broken.
    • consistant [sic] hot keys: X provides the mechanism: delivery of KeyPress and KeyRelease events. What happens when a key sequence is entered is a toolkit, application or desktop environment issue; in other words, policy.
    • window focus: Window focus is handled by the window manager. It's policy.
    • consistant [sic] way to install programs: Again, nothing to do with X. Since many programs don't use X at all, solving this problem at the X level does not make any sense.
    and most of all SPEED Gnome makes me think my computer is a year older then it is.

    I don't know what version of GNOME you last used, but GNOME 1.2 runs like greased shit on my Pentium II box.

    hell i can't even play Quake III on it without crying.

    Quake has nothing to do with GNOME. Frankly, if you're running a game on anything but a bare X server, you're already on a loser.

    Truth be told, I'm not going to use and *nix for a desktop until i get a decent browser. Mozzila seems to be coming around nicely. maybe in a year of so. So for now i'm sticking to Win2k.

    I'm using nightly Mozilla builds as my main browser and have been for three months. Your estimate of a year is unduly pessimistic.

    If you find that Windows 2000 does everything you want out of a desktop OS, then by all means keep using it. You won'e be struck down by a bolt of lightning if you do.

    --
    "Where, where is the town? Now, it's nothing but flowers!"

  • An important feature I would like to see on any window manager or configurable GUI of any kind is the ability to switch between a standard configuration and one or more custom ones. People tend to learn their customized GUIs and when they get to someone else's customized GUI, they are lost. (I've even found myself not customizing some things because I know it will cause problems.) With the Basic and Custom switching, we'd all just learn our Custom config well, and the Basic config to a usable degree and then we would have no trouble when using someone else's computer or even computers with new software which we've not customized yet.
  • Umm, no. Since its inception the purpose of the WWW was to both manage and access information. Read Tim Berners-Lee's proposal.

    With WebDAV (which Nautilus has rudimentary support through gnome-vfs) you will be able to read and write everything from a source code repository to your own website using the same interface.

    ..I think I have said this before..

    /mill
  • No sarcasm, either!

    Windows is a GUI built on the foundation of DOS - not much in the way of heritage, and the result shows all too well.

    Ever had a buggy program crash your whole computer? (Happens all the time on my Windoze box)

    Linux on the other hand, is this awesomely stable sky-scraper grade foundation - with a tent on it.

    KDE isn't so bad, I've been using it about 1 1/2 years and I like some of the features it has.

    But, let's face it. KFM tries to be a browser - and it ain't. It sucks. And you can't (easily) by-pass kfm to use netscape, either.

    When I last evaluated Gnome, it crashed twice on me within an hour or so - negating the most compelling reason to use Linux. (yeah, it's been a little while)

    But, I haven't seen anything in Gnome that blows my socks off!

    A decent (and I do mean something that doesn't make me want to think of things to say to justify it's existence when I show it to new users) file manager, along with a DECENT browser would be very good foundational steps towards a desktop-ready linux.

    -Ben

    PS: Of course, when we finally HAVE a "desktop ready" Linux, are we even going to have a desktop to invade? From what I read, we're all going to use alarm clocks and microwaves to do our e-mail and slash-dorking in the future!
  • actually producting modern,high quality software in C is not all that bad. just ask some kernal developers =-)

    C is not all that bad. I think that some people had a hard time with in college or something and that is why they hate it. I like OOP and the benifits that it offers, but it does not solve everything and automatically allow you to produce bug free code.

    Your still free to write your gnome software in python, perl, C++ or whatever if you prefer those languages, but don't assume that because you personally write good software in C that nobody else can.

  • Re:konqueror has multiple file panes (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    before complaining about "every graphical file manager" take a look at konqueror...

    ...and then you'll really have something to complain about? :)
  • good response. (and I'm not being sarcastic =-)) Why is it that whenever a gnome article appears we get the usual... gnome sucks, mozilla sucks, I'll continue using win2000... jeez, I wan't to scream: I'm sure a large quanity of us don't care that you can't get your software working! submit bug reports if you want the software to get better!
  • There are plenty of reasons to use C:
    - most of the programmers who have programmed under the different flavors of UNIX have traditionally been C programmers.
    - g++ is not completely up to the whole ANSI standard.
    - until recently, C++ support in g++ sucked
    - the C bindings of GTK+ are the most mature
    - the gnome programmers probally like C
    - linux is a clone of UNIX, UNIX is almost as old as C, does that mean we should all go to windows, and leave the 'old' stuff behind?
  • Thanx plazma.
    But I was asking about having individual (different) Icons for folders.
  • >KDE is written in C++ and therefore KDE is more
    >object oriented, more robust, more maintainable,
    >more extensible and a better choice for a
    >desktop.

    Wow, you win the award for the most contrived non-sequiter of the year.

    I'm getting sick of saying it, but GTK+ and GNOME are OBJECT ORIENTED. Every itsy bitsy widget in it.

    As for robustness and maintainability, that is a function of the programmer, not the programming language. I've seen snippets of C++ that would make a Perl hacker blush.

    Better choice for the desktop? I appreciate your offer to think for the rest of us, but its unecessary.

    Matt

  • When I sit down at my friend's Linux machine it's a bit wierd. Nothing works exactly like it should and I don't know where to find anything :) then I sit down at a Solaris box and the same disorientation follows. I prefer this to being in a monotonous environment but I want to ask if Windows users experience this same mild disorientation when they use other boxes than the ones they are normally on (do other unix users or am I am freak)? I am pretty sure Mac users do (again due to it's high configurability).

    They definately do. I use both Windows and Linux daily, and when I am using Windows it's usually on a common machine (i.e. in a lab or the like.) I always like to do a little customisation so I feel at ease - I set the taskbar vertical instead of horizontal, which takes half a second to do or undo, and makes my document windows look more like an actual document dimension-wise. It also looks more like my windowmaker setup of course :> but on the right side, whereas in windowmaker I put everything on the left - I want the taskbar/mini-windows/dock on the same side as the scrollbars. Anyhow... you wouldn't think that would be that big a deal, but you'd be amazed how many times I've been yelled at for that. I had a teacher (in a network administration class of all things) totally freak out over it, he sat down at the machine I was using and appeared completely lost, then yelled at me to make it normal again. Every so often I walk out to get a drink of water, and come back to find someone staring at my screen slack-jawed. It's really funny. What's less funny is the one time I forgot to switch the taskbar back to its normal position when I left, the next day I caught all hell. Apparently someone had sat down at the machine and freaked out and one of the techs had wasted half an hour trying to figure out how to make it "normal" for her.

    I bet you're laughing, I know I was, but there is a serious side too - people want a certain amount (how much varies) of stability in their environment, whether you're talking about their computer or their car or whatever. That stability, that familiarity, is a big factor in what we call "comfort level." Even tiny, functionally insignificant changes can throw someone for a loop, and make them suddenly feel lost, adrift, unsafe. Particularly when that person wasn't particularly secure in their environment to begin with.

  • 'Other people's system disorientation' can be a problem under Windows, but its not as big a problem as it is with UNIX systems.

    From personal experience, I don't like to do things on other people's Windows systems if I can avoid it -- invariably they won't have some software that I use often, or their keyboard feels weird (so, to some extent for me its a hardware issue as well). I don't know where to find things...C: drive? D: Drive?

    But in my experience UNIX systems suffer from basically all these same problems, and a few more...

    It is very rare indeed to find Windows users (maybe not as rare on Slashdot) who use alternate window manager/shells. Basically everyone seems to run explorer (by explorer, I mean explorer.exe, the default Window GUI manager...Not IE)...With UNIX systems, the diversity of WMs can be a blessing and a curse. If you're not familiar with the window manager, there's going to be a bit of learning before you can actually get anything done...And even if you ARE familiar with the window manager, most of them are so flexible that you can bet the person whose system it is has it configured quite a bit differently than you might have it set on your systems...

    Also...different UNIX systems handle even the most basic input in different ways. So many times have I sat down to use someone's system (and thus their settings), hit the backspace key and up pops a visible DEL character in the terminal. Makes me want to smash the keyboard (please no flames about the 'right' keyboard layout...its all preference :) Easy enough thing to deal with, but its just one example...Using 'other people's systems' usually causes you to run into multiple such issues.

  • re: Get this out of the way (Score:4)

    by msnomer ( 226842 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @04:37AM (#792649)

    In many things we do, driving being a notable example, we tend to move repetitive actions to "body memory" in order to reduce the cognitive load. It's strange driving someone else's car, isn't it, when all the controls are in different places and it "feels" different?

    In Linux/Unix, our fingers tend to hold a lot of our knowledge. We don't want to have to waste foreground mental processes moving the cursor to the beginning of the line, after all. Whenever my husband sits down at my Linux box, he types a few commands, then mutters and switches my bash editor to VI-style from emacs-style.

    If you're used to a visual environment, there's visual noise as well. We tend to stop seeing things that are familiar, so an unfamiliar visual set-up tends to take too much of our attention. This is true no matter what kind of OS it is.

    But on Macs or PCs, it goes beyond that. To a large extent, it's a free vs commercial software issue. On any Linux box, chances are good the familiar apps are there whether or not the person whose box it is uses them. Even if he uses emacs, and it's sitting right there on the desktop, you can probably get to vi through a shell. But on a Mac or Windows box, you're not going to find WordPerfect if the owner is a Word user. Even worse is if you need to do some image processing (for example) and he or she isn't a graphics person; then you're not going to be able to do certain tasks at all.

    In conclusion, you're going to have the cognitive noise problem with Nautilus, but probably not the much more wrenching problem of not being able to do certain things at all.

    --meredith



    --meredith

  • Pretty Cool (Score:3)

    by jon_c ( 100593 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @04:41AM (#792650) Homepage
    It's good to see some really experianced UI developers doing something with Gnome. I really wonder if they will fix all the little things that don't work well in X, things like the wheel mouse, TAB stops, consistant hot heys, even window focus - much bigger issues too, like an consistant way to install programs. an easy way to configure all my hardware (which drivers for will always seem to be in beta). and most of all SPEED Gnome makes me think my computer is a year older then it is. hell i can't even play Quake III on it without crying.

    I'm a little out of the scene, are these already working well? Last time i used X I was an enlightenment or blackbox junky. I always found KDE and Gnome to be cheap 1.0 like rip offs of Windows, the really big important things worked. but all the little details we're missing.

    Truth be told, I'm not going to use and *nix for a desktop until i get a decent browser. Mozzila seems to be coming around nicely. maybe in a year of so. So for now i'm sticking to Win2k.

    -Jon

  • Re:quality and testing heresy (Score:4)

    by g_mcbay ( 201099 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @04:44AM (#792651)
    While Open Source is without a doubt capable of better quality in theory (due to the "many eyes" argument) in practice it seems that most of the time when bugs are found in programs, they are reported to the original author(s) in simple bug-report-feedback formats...Which is to say, without a 'fix' included...And the original author(s) will then fix the bug themselves.

    This is no different than the closed source model, except that the end user DOES have the option of fixing the bug him/herself, if they choose. But in my experience they tend to only do this when they absolutely need to (original author(s) don't respond, or are dead, or something).

    Of course, there are nice people out there that will once in a while submit not only a bug report but the fix as well...But this is a hard thing to do, because finding the source of most bugs requires a pretty deep understanding of how the code is working, which can be very time consuming.

    Well, the short version of all this is that while many eyes DO make all bugs shallow, those eyes have to have brains attached that are capable of understanding the code and also enough free time available (and the desire) to learn the internals of the buggy program.

  • What's this about the Gnome project strong-arming the developers into switching from C++ to C? Leaving aside my religious beliefs in OOP, that doesn't seem in keeping with "open source ideals" at all.

    They said the Gnome core developers wanted to be certain they would be able to take over if Eazel crapped out. Makes sense they would want it written in the language they prefer so they could maintain it.

    A file manager is part of the core?

    Well, yes. They are trying to make a warm-fuzzy-gui "desktop environment" to make all the hordes of windows and mac users feel at home, after all. This stuff is NOT being written for the hackers. Given their goals, it makes perfect sense that the file manager be considered part of the core. Gmc is certainly a central component of gnome now.

  • How could they? Last time I checked, Sun didn't own anything in Eazel.

  • EFM? (Score:3)

    by linuxonceleron ( 87032 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @04:47AM (#792654) Homepage
    I've stopped using GNOME a long time ago to replace it with just plain enlightenment. I've recently started using EFM [enlightenment.org], the enlightenment file manager. While EFM is still pretty slow and buggy (version 0.0.0), it has many features which make it unlike KDE and GNOME's filemanagers. For example, if you begin typing in a window, a transparent box will come up so you can see what you're typing, with this you can do all sorts of things, from selecitng files to running commands to opening web pages. If you were to type 'www.slashdot.org' it will open a new NS window of it, typing 'make' will launch an Eterm running make in the current directory. EFM fits my needs better than any of the other linux FMs that I've seen, annd I can't wait for it to get more stable. Though nautilus has many interesting features which EFM doesn't, they're probably aimed at different audiences anyway, EFM is more 'graphical shell' than filemanager. Nautilus may be good for people who want an embedded web browser/mp3 player/etc. in their filemanager, but I think that we can all benefit from their work, regardless of weather we are interested in the filemanager itself.
  • Then switch the user level to "Expert", and don't use "view as icons".

    You weren't just judging based on the looks of screen shots, did you?

  • In every case: navigation buttons across the top; in the main window on the right, the object you're viewing is rendered - jpg, directory, info file, web page, whatever; on the left a panel gives you control over the object. Great: stuff everything into the same model as far as it will go. I don't see any blatent misdesign so far.

    Is there a file edit view? Can I gdb an elf file, then <back> into the editor and <forward> in the debugger?
    --
  • I understand the emphasis on Redhat, and I don't pretend to understand what it would take to address the problem of making sure that Nautilus works with different Linux distributions, but I think it's extremely important that the Eazel team does not forget Debian. I think doing the preview using the Debian package (along with feedback from the community) may help to insure this.

  • I'm still mixed on this... (Score:5)

    by Millennium ( 2451 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @04:57AM (#792658)
    Nautilus is certainly a fine tool, and a very good copy of Microsoft's IE-integrated file manager. But even the best copies of a bad interface are still bad interfaces. There is no need for quite a few of Nautilus' features. Foremost among these if the integrated Web browser (Konqueror is guilty of this too). A file manager is for managing files. A Web browser is for viewing files. To integrate the two is to create confusion, because you have the same app doing entirely different things (remember the OSX Dock, both an app launcher and task switcher? Same basic problem, though the purposes it serves are different).

    Gnome doesn't need The App That Does Everything (neither does KDE, for that matter). All that does is lead to bloat, redundant apps on a system, and confusion for new users.

    The Win/IE filemanager does have a few strengths, but these can be gained without bloating the filemanager itself. For example, the ability to show file information in a sidebar, rather than pulling up a new window for it. OSX's Finder can do this without the need to throw a browser in. The ability to navigate a filesystem using buttons in the toolbar is a Good Thing (particularly if you use only one window for file browsing), but you don't need a whole browser to do that (OSX's Finder, however, does this one very poorly; just a Back button which runs totally counter to the column-view paradigm).

    I'm not trying to bash Gnome or KDE. I'm just pointing out that they're making quite a few of the same interface mistakes Microsoft made, and it'll only hurt them in the end.
    ----------
  • One of the supposed advantages of Gnome over KDE was language independence. Now it looks like core modules must be in C. It sounds like "language independence" means "Gnome is language independent, unless you are writing anything significant, in which case you must use C".
  • Exactly what I thought.

    CORBA is a pretty complex and impractical environment to work in, but that's the price you pay to get OO programming in a platform and language independent environment. To pay that price, and not use any of the things you paid for seems really stupid.

    Producing modern high quality software in a non OO language like C must be a royal pain. I guess it's goodbye to my dreams of becoming a GNOME developer when I retire with my zillions...
  • The Stop button (big X) should be just to the right of the Reload button, not all the way over on the right side. I can see the thinking is 'it's like a period, put it at the end of the sentence'. But I think this is superceded by: I always want it in the same place, where I can find it fast, near the other navigation buttons. Having it on the right off the location pre-sets messes this up.

    A more important issue: suppose the Nautilus designers and I disagree on exactly where the best location for the Stop button is. How do I put it where I want it in *my* version?
    --

  • At the same thickness it takes less absolute space vertically than horizontally. I can only make sense of your comment by assuming that you don't realise that you can resize it ;^)

  • When I sit down at my friend's Linux machine it's a bit wierd. Nothing works exactly like it should and I don't know where to find anything :) then I sit down at a Solaris box and the same disorientation follows. I prefer this to being in a monotonous environment but I want to ask if Windows users experience this same mild disorientation when they use other boxes than the ones they are normally on (do other unix users or am I am freak)? I am pretty sure Mac users do (again due to it's high configurability).

    The only thing that bugs me when I'm using somebody else's Windows box is that I have to hunt through about two hundred submenus to find a program, because every damn program that they've installed has created a new group to put things like uninstall and readme, and they haven't cleaned up after installing it.

    However, from a newbie point of view, I'd imagine Windows is better than most. For instance, if my mom sat down at my old Windows computer, she was unable to use it simply because auto-hide was switched on for the taskbar, and even if I was standing behind her, telling her what to do, she couldn't understand it. And my mom is better than most when it comes to computers. Imagine the difficulty she would have if she was used to KDE, and I had GNOME installed.

    If you regularly use somebody else's machine, I suppose Linux would be better, since you can just tar up your dot files, and move them over to the other machine. If there's a network available, then it's even easier, since you can share home directories.

  • Ehum, would you mind elaborating a bit, there? I don't really see what adding a GUI front end to gentoo would mean in practice. In my world, it has a very graphical front end, albeit one dominated perhaps by rendering text. Hm. Are you after a more "icon-dominated" view here, or what? Curious developers want to know! ;^)
  • Notice how a decent window manager puts the Close button at the opposite side from the other, less damaging buttons? Well, not all windowmanagers should be like that, but they should be. In MacOS The close button is on one side and minimize/maximize are at the other side. This is so that it's hard to accidentally close a window, and it's easier to focus on the button you want.

    This is the principle at work here. "put all the buttons in the same place" is not a valid design principle (IMHO), because different butons do different things, and ot put them all in the same place just encourages confusion. Even worse is the recent toolbar-style trend, where you have a bunch of vague icons all in the same place, and you have to mouse over them and wait for the tooltip to pop up before you can tell what one of them does. (GNOME people, are you listening? Is it too much to ask to put text labels on my icons?)

    'Course, it's all my opinion. I'm in favor of skinnability, but not without at least a usable reference implementation, and I have some faith in the peopel at Eaze, since so many of them have experience in interface design, of the kind where you hire non-authors to try the interface, and actually see how fast it takes to do things.

    Actually, one of the better innovations I have seen is the use (in GDAM for example) of Glade xml files for interface descriptions. If you don't like it then bop into Glade and put the buttons where you like them. This is a Good Thing as far as skinnability goes, and I wish more people would use it.

  • That clears it up, at least somewhat... What you want is a dual-paned file manager but with icon-based display, right? Cool. Good luck finding one. ;)

    The NeXT filemanager, Greg's Browser, and the MacOSX browser all work like this, IIRC, haven't used one of those in a while.

    Oh, you meant find one for Linux, did you? Can't help you there, I don't even LIKE dual-pane filemanagers. At least they're better than single pane filemanagers. But I prefer to have my folders open in a new window when I'm given the choice. And the latest versions of Windows make it very hard to do, blech.

    The filemanager is dead. Long live the filemanager. Bah.

  • The only way to do this is with some sort of database that would live in the user's home directory. A general solution must handle multi-user systems.

    This is, in principle, not too hard. The devil would be in the details; getting all the fine points right would take some time and experiment.

    For example, how do you keep the database tidy? Suppose you install a hundred apps, arrange the icons just so, and then uninstall all the apps. Unless the uninstall also does something with the icon positions database, you will now have a hundred orphan icon positions. The obvious initial solution is to ignore this problem, but schedule a program to walk the database and toss out the obsolete data.

    What do you do when the user arranges the icons just so, and then a bunch of new icons appear in the directory? Just put them wherever they fit?

    As you noted, how do you handle the dynamic mounting problem? Suppose you mount a remote filesystem at /mnt/temp, and arrange the icons; then un-mount, and mount some other remote filesystem in the same place. Well, maybe that's not really a problem, because you could remember which remote system was mounted, and save that with the database, and do the right thing. (Of course, if you mount a hundred remote filesystems and then never look at them again, you will have significant junk in your database. Perhaps you should age-expire the info in the database?)

    Interesting problem.

    steveha

  • Languages do not make bad programmers good,

    Of course. But what I said was something completely different, that a bad language makes good programmers bad.

    Or in better terms, tools not suited for the task makes the end result worse. C is not a bad language, it's the best procedural language there is. But a procedural language is just not suited to build complex high quality software.

    Your argument is a good example of the old fallacy (a -> b) -> (b -> a).
  • Notice how a decent window manager puts the Close button at the opposite side from the other, less damaging buttons? Well, not all windowmanagers should be like that, but they should be. In MacOS The close button is on one side and minimize/maximize are at the other side. This is so that it's hard to accidentally close a window, and it's easier to focus on the button you want.

    Amazing how otherwise rational people can argue themselves into coming up with wrong design decisions huh? May I draw your attention to the fact that it's not a close button, it's a STOP button for crying out loud. Put it where it's easy to hit. What's the downside of hitting it by accident? Move over one button and hit the reload button. And while I'm ranting, would you please tell me why 'accidently' hitting the stop button is worse than accidently hitting the reload, forward or back buttons? Sheesh.

    Argument rejected.
    --

  • I agree completely. NeXT style scrollbars are on the left, where they should be, but since I can't get windows to behave like that I have to reverse when I use that...

  • Why can't we easily get an install that works correctly with nothing more than a kernel, the gnu tools, x, a desktop and window manager of choice, and a couple of basic apps? If Microsoft came up with a distribution of Windows that came with all the crap that Linux distributions come with, we'd all complain about it.

    Amen, I have struggled with this paradox before as well. Time and again I have ended up letting it all get installed and removing stuff later. Great. I realize it's due to dependencies... and it is intended to make the system less confusing for new users, etc... but still...

    Have you ever tried those minimal linux roll-yer-own systems? I keep meaning to but never quite get around to it. I am thinking that the kernel, some compiler stuff, networking, and an editor would be all I need to get started (and documentation, and printing, and maybe a light window manager, and maybe... DOH!) :)

    --8<--

  • I don't see how someone prefers lightweight interfaces would like something like emacs....

    Okay, guilty! But the fact is I can do just about everything I need to do on my machine in a daily workday using only emacs and Netscape or Mozilla (whichever is crashing less that day). :)

    Emacs has a file browser, ftp, IDEs, you name it and it's all accessible through key strokes. That one major beef with GUIs is I don't like mousing too much, hence Emacs is great for me.

    --8<--

  • Screenshots and more (Score:4)

    by mholve ( 1101 ) on Saturday September 09, 2000 @05:00AM (#792673)
    Screenshots up the wazoo here:

    1 [linuxplanet.com] 2 [linuxplanet.com] 3 [linuxplanet.com] 4 [linuxplanet.com] 5 [linuxplanet.com] 6 [linuxplanet.com] 7 [linuxplanet.com]

    The home page for Eazel here. [eazel.com]
    ...and their latest screenshots are here... [eazel.com]

  • Why is it that every graphical file manager only has one file pane? Why is it, that GnomeMC is nothing like midnight commander? It doesn't have any of the features, or quality that midnight commander had. It doesn't have one tenth of the features, or usability. I shouldn't even be allowed to take the same name!

    Its seems that we have another dull file manager here, one meant for people that don't want to manage files, but just look at them, and access them. A single pane interface is slow for copying, and working with the files. Sure, it looks nice, but I'll take something like Filerunner or Gentoo ANY day over something that looks good, but is completely non-functional.

    When someone takes something like Filerunner or Gentoo, and then gives it a GUI front end like GMC, then I'll be interested. Otherwise, what's the point?! I can use Filerunner right now to do everything GMC does, plus tons more!

    Bah! (yes, this was a rant ;)

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