[UI] Re: MenuMorph hand weirdness

Tue Nov 20 14:44:27 UTC 2007

Gary,

In terms of describing an interface, I immediately zoom out to the two
ways one might approach it: graphical editing, and writing code.  The
nature of the GUI editor and the language are "just details."  IMHO,
both methods are essential for happy programmers.  I have some GUI
generating/translating tools that I would expect to port to whatever
Smalltalk system I end up using; they speak MVP.  If I land in Squeak,
it will have an MVP framework, if only because I will write one out of
frustration :)

As I have mentioned before, I am concerned that any MVP work I do would
be tainted with Object Arts' intellectual property.  However, if I
create a framework (tainted) and my own tests for it (by definition
clean - right???), then the tests could be the basis for a clean MVP
framework for Squeak.  Any flaws?  It is a lot of wasted work to write
and then have someone else rewrite a framework, but it might solve the
problem.  At least the rewrite would occur with the benefit of tests.

With some cleverness, Morphs as views, native widgets, SVG, etc., are
hopefully just different types of views in the framework.

As a practical matter, I have a few too many Squeak images for my own
good.  I need to archive them all, mine code out of them, and create one
image that will move back and forth between Linux and Windows.  Any
thoughts on 3.9 vs. 3.10?  For 3.9, I would want the
delay/queue/semaphore fixes; IIRC, those are included in 3.10??

Bill

Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D.
University of Florida
Department of Anesthesiology
PO Box 100254
Gainesville, FL 32610-0254

Email: bschwab at anest.ufl.edu
Tel: (352) 846-1285
FAX: (352) 392-7029

>>> gazzaguru2 at btinternet.com 11/19/07 8:50 PM >>>
Will try that as a (feel) start...
As for other efforts, I'm game for it...
Just the (maybe last) uncharted territory in themeability...

-------

This was a question to gauge the importance of having menus themed as
standard, in the general IDE sense... more of fixing what we have rather
than the new big thing.

In terms of "the new big thing" I think we have to become very much more
focussed. That means really working together. Perhaps everyone could
make a
prototype system to demonstrate to us all... then work together with the
best bits?

As a start, we should be able to easily conform to any particular "look
and
feel"... take the Java abstraction classes as an example. We could also
incorporate "native" (Win32/GTK) as part of the framework (different to
the
"emulated" Java). I'd really like anything we do to be non-exclusive and
all-encompassing, both potentially attainable goals.

Might sound a bit "bloaty" but a framework that can plug-and-play our
concepts would be nice...

I think it comes down to the way(s) you want to be able to describe a
user-interface. Need to be able to express the intention of the ui in a
flexible manner but, also, for some applications, have exact control
(plus a
lot of in-betweens). ToolBuilder does a lot of that, but is not yet rich
enough to do the latter...

There is no easy answer, however... yet. All speculation welcomed!

> -----Original Message-----
> From: ui-bounces at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> [mailto:ui-bounces at lists.squeakfoundation.org]On Behalf Of Matthew
> Fulmer
> Sent: 19 November 2007 8:38 PM
> To: ui at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> Subject: [UI] Re: MenuMorph hand weirdness
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 19, 2007 at 02:17:47PM -0500, Bill Schwab wrote:
> > Gary,
> >
> > Obviously, it is your call.  I will admit that Squeak's menus could
use
> > a face lift, but I am much more concerned about Morphic/hand
weirdness
> > (feel) than the appearance (which has improved over time).  So, if
they
> > look and work better, I won't complain.  If you decide that there
are
> > more important battles to fight with the required effort, so be it.
>
> I fixed the Menu hand weirdness in
> http://bugs.squeak.org/view.php?id=6687
>
> Load MenuMorph-BetterMouseHandling.2.cs. I don't know if this
> should go in UI enhancements or base Morphic. I use this change
> set in all my images (and can't live without it anymore). I
> haven't tried to push it other than by announcing it here (on the
> UI list) once before.
>
> --
> Matthew Fulmer -- http://mtfulmer.wordpress.com/
> Help improve Squeak Documentation: http://wiki.squeak.org/squeak/808
> _______________________________________________
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> UI at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/ui

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