Hi all--

     Tim writes:

> ...it would be nice if we could provide an option for saving an image
> outside the current home directory.

     Indeed. As a new user I would expect the host platform's
file-saving dialog to open at that point, especially since the host
platform's file-opening dialog opens on system start, in situations
where the system doesn't know which image to open.

> ...after saving an image, extracting it + changes to where I wanted
> it to live, the system reported finding no sources file because it
> was expecting to find it at ‘directory containing all-in-one package’
> and it was buried deep in the package bowels.

     Hm, I don't see those words in the dialog that the system opens.
Rather, it said it was expecting to find the sources file either in the
same location as the image file, or as a sibling to the app folder.

     Now that the all-in-one structure has settled down, I would change
the virtual machine to check instead for the sources file where it
probably is (<app>/Contents/Resources instead of <app>). I don't see
much point in checking to see if it's in the same location as the image
file. In any case, there's no host-dependent bundle magic involved; we
just happen to have an all-in-one structure that satisfies the union of
our host platform constraints. I think the all-in-one format can be
useful generally, not just for initial tryouts as Chris suggests.


-C

p.s.

     Of course, in addition to getting the above right, I'll take this
opportunity to advocate again for launching the system from a web
browser. Make a host-dependent app which just starts a headless web
server, and opens the user's preferred web browser on a site served by
that server. On that site you can have good descriptions of available
images, controls for starting and stopping them, what Squeak is in the
first place, links to other sites for background, etc. This can be done
as a host-dependent app that is one more layer around the all-in-one.
I'm doing it for the Context distribution of Squeak.

     We'd get a lot of value from accommodating the new user's Favorite
Web Browser and Favorite Text Editor.

--
Craig Latta
netjam.org
+31   6 2757 7177 (SMS ok)
+ 1 415  287 3547 (no SMS)