[squeak-dev] Survey: what do you do with Squeak, what do you *want* to do?

Stéphane Rollandin lecteur at zogotounga.net
Thu Feb 22 09:57:17 UTC 2018


> What do you use Squeak for?

I use it for everything. I belong to the generation that grew up with 
personal computing, and I believe Squeak is the pinnacle of personal 
computing. It is fun, powerful, beautiful, intelligent.

Morphic provides a unique level of interactivity with graphical 
representations.

I have been working with Squeak for the last 15 years or so.

I developed (and am still improving daily) a system for music 
composition, http://www.zogotounga.net/comp/squeak/sqgeo.htm

.. and used it to write all pieces post-2003 in 
http://stephanerollandin.bandcamp.com/

I also made a game, http://www.zogotounga.net/comp/saucers.htm

.. a package for functional programming, 
http://www.zogotounga.net/comp/squeak/functionaltalk.htm

.. and a Lisp/Scheme implementation, 
http://www.zogotounga.net/comp/squeak/lispkit.htm



 > What does Squeak lack?

First of all, whatever Squeak lacks should not overshadow what Squeak 
has. It is a mature system IMO. It is paramount not to improve it just 
for the sake of improving it, at the risk of killing some of its current 
balance between "serious" and "fun" (or between "corporate" and 
"personal' if you wish) system.

Also, and somewhat related, not many people actually grok what makes 
Squeak and Morphic awesome. And not many people routinely uses features 
that are unique to Squeak, which may put them into danger.

For example, I regularly see people complaining that Morphic is a mess, 
undocumented, ugly, unusable, etc. While they may have a point (notably 
about documentation, and there are indeed messy parts), I think I can 
safely say that nobody has used Morphic as much as I have for muO, and 
it is just amazing. For all its wards, it is still a unique and deeply 
satisfying way to deal with graphical interfaces. It is a jewel.


With that said, what Squeak lacks IMO is, off the top of my head:

- a good handling of fonts and text coding systems (I cannot write my 
name in a string, as the accented é will get converted upon file-out, I 
also did not find a way to work with music fonts).

- facilities for touch screen devices, and all events generated by 
physical gestures on a phone (tilt, etc.)

- easy HTML/Javascript integration. It would be great if it was 
straightforward to embed Squeak images in a web page (I know some 
impressive work is already being done in that area, it is just not ready 
yet)



> What things are too hard or annoying to do?

A behavior bugs me: when moving a Squeak image window in Windows, all 
processes pause, including MIDI out. Not too good for games or live music.


> What would you like to be able to use Squeak for?

I would like to keep using it for music and games, and for musical games.




Stef


More information about the Squeak-dev mailing list