On 27 Jan 2014, at 22:19, Chris Muller <asqueaker at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi John-Reed,
> 
> On Mon, Jan 27, 2014 at 3:23 PM, JohnReed Maffeo <aldeveron at graffiti.net> wrote:
>> 1. There is an interesting (and to me, unnerving) new feature in Squeak Squeak4.5-13663.
>> 
>> Automatic pane resizing in System Browser.
>> 
>> When I mouse around in a newly opened window, the panes resize their height and width in seemingly random ways.
> 
> It's not random at all.  The philosophy of the horizontal-splitter
> algorithm is to 1) only expose additional information but, 2) don't
> truncate any information to accomplish that, e.g., only encroach on
> whitespace.

I showed this off last night at the UK Smalltalk user group, to a positive response. That may have been aided by me explaining why things were resizing. Nick Ager pointed me to Josh Gargus' Cassowary project from a while ago, which does constraint solving for UI layout.

It took me a while to get used to the resizing, but as Chris says, it does alleviate the need to move splitters around so you can see your text. One thing that would help for me is speeding up Morphic, because on my low power laptop, if there are a few windows open things get too slow for my liking. (And on my laptop slowing things even a tiny bit hits the 'too slow' threshold quite quickly.)

But really, give Chris' tweak a good try. Setting the Preference on by default at least gives the algorithm and UX a good whacking.

frank

> For vertical bars; the bars between lists will automatically
> reposition themselves to encroach on whitespace in one pane to expose
> more information in adjacent panes.  It will balance the number of
> characters occluded on either side of the bar, if necessary.
> 
> For either, if a particular splitter is manually positioned, it will
> remain still at the dragged location.  To reactivate
> automatic-positioning, yellow-click it.
> 
>> I find no value in the resizing that is done.
> 
> A lot of thoughtful consideration, design, and implementation work
> went into it.  It's a major productivity boost.  It alleviates 90% of
> manual sizing otherwise required by the user in a typical day.
> 
> Everyone should give this chance for at least one full day's work
> before judging it.  I struggled with the animation distraction for a
> day or two, but now when I open a window, I simply let them do their
> work while I put the window where I want.  I'm 90% liberated from
> manual twiddling, positioning and scrolling.  I've noticed even the
> _need_ to resize windows is reduced too.
> 
>> 2. Comment:  From an experienced user perspective, I appreciate the clean look when I first open Squeak.
>>> From a new user perspective, I appreciate the introductory screens.
> 
> I want to deliver a clean-look this time.  If a new user is presented
> with nothing but a clean desktop, they have no choice but to
> "explore".  I don't to want to fool new users into getting comfortable
> by thinking those workspaces have everything they need to do useful
> things with Squeak.  I want them in the "drivers seat" from the get
> go.
> 
>> 3. Presenter(Object)>>doesNotUnderstand: #associatedMorph
>>     a. Open Squeak
>>     b. Open a new morphic project
>>     c. Return to previous project
>>     d. Select red X, close this window.
>>     d.  MNU Really delete the icon
>>          and remove the project
>>          'Unnamed' from Etoys?
>>          (file will still be saved on disk.
>> 
>> Thats all from my lunch break.
> 
> Shit, we should fix that.
> 
> Thanks.
>