[squeak-dev] Re: [Squeak-dev Images] About the different flavors

Juan Vuletich juan at jvuletich.org
Fri Jul 4 11:38:33 UTC 2008


Hi Stéphane,

I fully agree with you. Even if I'm the guy who "wants to kill Etoys"!

I believe Etoys is wonderful. And I love the way it is being used by the 
SqueakLand and XO adults and kids. It is just that I like to separate 
different things, and now I'm building Morphic 3. And I need not having 
Etoys around, to make it easier.

I also believed that many people would prefer simplicity over "having it 
all". But it turned out not to be the case. So I didn't push the idea of 
removing Etoys from the official release anymore. I just don't use the 
official release.

Cheers,
Juan Vuletich

Stéphane Rollandin wrote:
>
> ok I see I did hurt some feelings so let's be a bit clearer...
>
> there are many serious environments for serious programmers doing 
> sierious jobs for serious reasons. but there are not many things like 
> Squeak, both well grounded in quality, fun and lively, even in the 
> look: childish, not serious at all, but tremendously interesting and a 
> real catalyst for creativity and experimentation.
>
> so when I read over and over people complaining that it does not look 
> serious enough, my feeling is: why, how come these people are doing 
> Squeak in the first place ? can't they leave us alone having fun with 
> our non-serious, colorful, clumsy, unclean mess of great software ?
>
> some people want to kill morphic, others want only to kill etoys, 
> others yet what to clean up everything with weapons of mass 
> refactoring, more people just want to get rid of all colors and kill 
> the mouse, which they did (you know, the animated mouse head with 
> following eyes we had up to 3.8, which is the first thing my young 
> children see when I work in squeak; and sometime I let them play with 
> it).
>
> I know I'm pushing the thing too far here and that things are not so 
> simple. but at times I feel the need to state publicly that among all 
> you people serious and professional (who I actually do respect, with 
> your own expectations), among *us* there are people like me who like 
> Squeak as it is, messy and fun and colorful.
>
> the sentence I (over-?)reacted to was the following:
>
>  "As a professional programmer used to other tools like Eclipse, 
> Visual Studio, Dolphin, Visual Age - the bar is quite high and Squeak 
> struggles to attract new blood in its default incarnation."
>
> see the bits in it:
> "professional programmer" ... so what ? any better than me ?
> "used to other tools like Eclipse, Visual Studio, Dolphin, Visual Age" 
> ... so why change ?
> "the bar is quite high" ... because we all have to do the same things 
> in the same way, with the same interface and the same look and feel ?
> "Squeak struggles to attract new blood" .. ah yes I forgot, we are in 
> a cruel world were struggle and competition rule, it's a war actually; 
> Squeak needs more blood else, else, else what ? what kind of blood 
> should we perfuse ?
>
> ... so, no personal attack intented, and with all respect due to its 
> author who I do not know at all, this sentence summarize a lot of what 
> I think heads Squeak to the direction of insignifiance: pushing it in 
> the Right Tracks, dumb, grey, boring and professional. for what ? who 
> is going to win anything when all colors are gone ?
>
> Squeak is an amazing, unique environment demonstrating a very unique 
> way to do programming. if it was not unique, I would not care that it 
> becomes a standard development tool for serious people. but since it 
> is unique, I feel compelled to answer back when what I feel is part of 
> its paradigm, nature, originality is threatened. but of course that's 
> just me.
>
>
> that's it, sorry for the noise...
>
>
> Stef
>
>
>
>




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