2009/6/28 Göran Krampe <goran at krampe.se>:
> Hi!

Hi Göran!

> Not sure what you mean there.

Squeak is hardly approachable to newcomers (either seasoned
programmers or simple new ones). Gaining popularity explicitly means
to have newcomers. It's not possible if they can't understand what's
going on.

> Personally I like the colors. I also don't equal "normal" with
> "professional". But such is taste!

We could certainly debate on tastes but it's perfectly fine that you
like the current colour scheme. However, you're not alone using Squeak
and we have to consider other tastes.

I just mean something approachable (normal look-and-feel), where
people will feel comfortable from the day they start using Squeak
through every other following days.

A professional look-and-feel is probably more about simplicity and
usability. It doesn't need to have colours by truck load. Something
that one can spend countless hours looking at without eyes popping out
of their sockets. And it's about everything... for example, Squeak has
these childish window buttons and so on... it's NOT that cool, far
from being trendy. Why would we get stubborn to keep such things? It
looks like a toy, Squeak sometimes feels like a toy. When I squeeze
Squeak, it squeaks. Just saying... =)

And, unless some of us are graphic designers, why not just focus on
something simple, usable and approachable? That's definitively not out
of reach.

> Note that talking about what we "need" and what other people "want" is not
> really that fruitful. We get what we *do*, or in other words - if someone
> feels it is important enough to spend time on it - it will get done. Noone
> works on something because *someone else* told him to.

It seems to me that we are crying for direction as a community. Squeak
seems to be lost. Consequently, need, want, do, etc... it's just not
happening. Don't get me wrong, but it's just that you make it sounds
like everything can be done without a plan. And some of the things we
could want requires a lot of work hours and man power. It's not going
to happen overnight.

>> requirements of my distributors, which makes it overly challenging for
>> me to consider Squeak as our platform of development.
>
> Elaborate?

Please, Igor and I have talked a little bit about this. He will
certainly bring that on board's table. Anyway, Göran, I hope to be
able to share a complete list at later time. I am not done reviewing
the requirements. It's also challenging to know the status of projects
in Squeak and what has to be done.


>> Squeak doesn't need a killer app. It needs to be spruced up and put
>> back on track. Honey moon is over, it's time to get real.
>
> Hehe, I really don't agree. :)
>
> Squeak *is* real. We already have our killer app (Seaside). We do need to
> clean shit up though (and I am not talking about UI primarily) and get the
> improvement process working. Currently Squeak.org is getting smashed (again,
> I don't have hard numbers, but I think I am right) by Pharo when it comes to
> hard, concrete, nitty gritt work getting done.

Squeak has a killer app named Seaside.
Ruby has a killer app named Ruby On Rails.
Both are web frameworks, which kills which?

It doesn't really matter. It's not even about merits. Ruby is still
more approachable language and better documented. And I find it almost
amusing to have a killer app for the web, when one of the strength of
Squeak is multimedia. No, no, I am not trying to flame war here...
just trying to expose few things in order that we can openly discuss
about them.

Whether you agree or not, Squeak doesn't seem to gain in popularity
and people are flocking out to other forks. That means Squeak is doing
something wrong. Wrong enough to overcome all the "done right". =)

Regards,
Ian

-- 
http://mecenia.blogspot.com/