Tips for installing windows and freeBSD both.. anyone??

[Polytropon]

On Sun, 7 Nov 2010 23:17:23 -0700, Chad Perrin <perrin at apotheon.com> wrote:
> So, let's see here -- either I lose efficiency on things that aren't very
> familiar to me, because I have to type `foo --help` or `man foo` or
> something like that, or I lose efficiency on things I do all the time,
> because I have to mouse around a lot.
> 
> Hmm.  I wonder which I should choose.

Why choose? Combine efficiently! :-)



> I
> select and middle click to paste quite a lot. 

This is much better than the ^C/^V approach, as seems to be
supported by every application, no matter which "echosystem"
it comes from.

Every?

Erm... no.

Did I recently talk about bloat? About reduction of functionality?
I did. Allow me to elaborate on an example. It's a Gtk version 2
example. Let's say it's X-Chat 2. It's the channel selection
dialog on startup.

In version 1 (using Gtk), you could select an item from a list
using doubleclick on that item. In version 2, you are forced to
select the item with one click, move the mouse to a button and
then click that. First: t(2cl) > t(1cl + move + 1cl).

Then what happens if you still doubleclick on a list item? It
becomes an input field. Well, hmmm... could be useful. Let's
put some text in there from another program window. Oops, the
window lost focus, and the input field got a list item again!
Okay, not a big deal, we'll be back soon.

After selecting the text (e. g. in a browser, a text editor,
whatever), again clicking the list item, it gets an input field.
Middle mouse... erm, middle mouse... middle mouse... why doesn't
this work? Buffer empty? Check in an xterm... no, text is in
the buffer. WHAT'S WRONG?!

So what did Gtk 2 achieve here?
	1. increased time for selection
	2. inability to use copy / paste
	3. - the most annoying one - FORCING to type (even
	   if this just means ^C/^V)

I really can't stand it when BASIC functionality disappears
with NO understandable effect. Fatter libraries, longer time
until program is up, and then everything gets slower and much
less productive -- that must be bloat.




> I'm not opposed to use of
> the GUI per se; I just use TUIs much more often, because I use them for
> tasks that I perform an awful lot if they happen to benefit (in terms of
> efficiency and productivity) by the use of a TUI.  When they don't, I use
> a GUI instead.

That exactly is an educated standpoint - use whatever tool is
the best - instead of insisting that the tool HAS TO BE a GUI
tool, like saying: "But I WANT the screwdriver to be a drill!
I've ALWAYS used screwdrivers as drills, and EVERYONE uses
screwdrivers as drills! Oh, and it should work as a hammer,
too."

By the way, TUI (text user interface) doesn't imply that is has
to be CLI (command line interface). A famous example from by
daily use is the Midnight Commander, a file manager that DOES
IT CORRECTLY. As many (most?) things you do is a source-target-
opertion (copying, moving, symlinking), the two-panel mode is
the ideal solution. Good keyboard controls and the use of the
very useful function keys is one of its strengths. Still, it
does operate in text mode (defaults to 80x25, but can be used
at any window size), so you can easily work with it over a
serial line or SSH.

GUI usually means abstraction. Abstraction adds layers, in
this way or another. At some point, this is good as you can
"fit things together", but at some point, it gets unusable
because you can't address the things directly you NEED to
address directly.



> I wouldn't be willing to waste the time on little inefficiencies every
> single time I did *anything* with Subversion just for the dubious benefit
> of a one-time efficiency benefit once a year because I didn't remember off
> the top of my head how to branch, though. 

>From computer science, just see what "O notation" means, and
see that constant compexity is traditionally better than linear
complexity: O(1) < O(n). :-)



> I suppose your mileage may vary, though.

It always depends on individual preferences, talents, knowledge
and experience. I'm always impressed by people who are more
advanced than me, who use "minimalistic" environments and can
work faster, more productive, more relaxed. Allthough the tools
they use may look "archaic", "not modern", "old" and "difficult"
to me, given knowledge and experience they DE FACTO are better
for them.




-- 
Polytropon
Magdeburg, Germany
Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0
Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...