[squeak-dev] [Tools] (Object >> #inspect) now returns the tool instead of the object

Chris Muller asqueaker at gmail.com
Tue May 19 16:21:56 UTC 2015


That logic is sound except from one POV:  which is that #inspect and
#explore are used as a debugging tools for _users_.  For years, I've
been able to simply put one word "inspect" in a strategic place in my
application code to help me debug it.  Now, I'm forced to add
parentheses, cascades and, in some cases, even temp vars (!!) just to
avoid getting a SystemWindow tangled up into my domain model.

For you as a UI-framework developer, I can understand there might be
case or two where you would want to debug SystemWindow stuff.  But
that is the 0.1% usage case.  The 99.9% usage case is Squeak users are
interacting with their own domain model and they want to use #inspect
as a debugging tool.

What do other Smalltalks return from #inspect?  If you want to be
consistent how about we be consistent with them?

On Tue, May 19, 2015 at 3:50 AM, marcel.taeumel <Marcel.Taeumel at hpi.de> wrote:
> Hi, there! :)
>
> I just want to mention and explain, why (Object >> #inspect) now returns the
> tool window instead of the object as in 4.5.
>
> The Tools package adds several convenient methods to the base system:
>
> Object >> #explore
> Object >> #inspect
> Object >> #browse
> Behavior >> #browse
>
> All but #inspect returned the created tool. So I went for consistency. But
> in particular, those methods should return the tool because because
> otherwise the programmer has no simple means to access the created
> window/tool programmatically. Model and object are, however, always
> accessible (via #model or just #self).
>
> So if you got code like this:
>
> self someObjects add: myObject inspect.
>
> Please change it to:
>
> self someObjects add: myObject inspect; yourself.
>
> Or even better to:
>
> myObject inspect.
> self someObjects add: myObject.
>
> I think that it is good practice/style to use #yourself if you want to get
> the receiver back in a chain of calls:
>
> self myMorphs add: (MyMorph new color: Color yellow; yourself).
>
> Best,
> Marcel
>
>
>
> --
> View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Tools-Object-inspect-now-returns-the-tool-instead-of-the-object-tp4827263.html
> Sent from the Squeak - Dev mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
>


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