Hi David,

> On May 30, 2018, at 5:54 AM, David T. Lewis <lewis at mail.msen.com> wrote:
> 
> This topic deserves a new subject line, and it would be great to get some
> more input regarding who prefers using the All-In-One distribution for
> regular use, versus other approaches for organizing their image and VM.

Thanks for the request for comments.  :)  

I think the AIO is neat on its own.  I sometimes use the AIO and/or app bundle for one-off experiments which require a quick "download-n-go" experience where I expect to throw away any changes.  

But for Mac users, I'm afraid the AIO and especially the .app bundle take too prominent a place on the website compared to the more traditional VM & sources + image & changes combination, which takes a few extra clicks to discover.  I say this because there is AFAIK hardly any in-image or in-VM support for the "work style" imposed by the AIO / .app bundle on OS X / macOS.  

For example:  new users working with the AIO / app bundle may try "save as..." or "save as new version..." from the world menu and be surprised when any changes they thought they'd saved are gone the next time they run the AIO.  This is because, AFAIK, the AIO / .app bundle work style has no in-image support (or in-VM support) for loading any image other than the one bundled within an AIO / app bundle.  IIRC there have been discussions on the mailing list about adding this support (say, making the .app bundle load the highest successive .1 .2 .3 image inside the bundle, as created by "save as new version...") but I don't know if any changes ever were implemented.  Forgive me if they have, and I missed it!

When I really set an OS X system up for Squeak, I create a folder called "Squeak" in the /Applications folder.  Inside that folder, I put VMs and .sources files.  (The VM, when used in this way, already contains the facilities to pop up a file requester asking which image to load, which the AIO/.app wouldn't do.  It usually even remembers the last-used directory.)  I'll usually throw my current preferred VM onto the Dock.  My image and changes files live elsewhere, either on my Desktop or in my Documents folder.   To load an image, I either double-click, right-click and "open with," or drag its icon onto a VM icon on my Dock.

If I had my druthers, the default OS X / macOS download on squeak.org would no longer be the .app bundle, since this is too close to the AIO experience and shares its drawbacks.  It would instead be an archive or dmg with some combination of VM, sources, image, and changes files.  It could potentially even contain an installer .pkg which sets up the environment similar to what I described above.

> My personal view is that the All-In-One is a valuable enhancement to
> the basic image and VM downloads. I do not think that it is practical
> to maintain it as the primary release artifact, but I do think that we
> should provide it, as best we can, in addition to the primary image and
> VM release downloads.

Hear hear.  

best,
{ 'tim'.  'tim'.  'tim'.  'tim' } anyOne


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