briand@tekig4.TEK.COM (Brian Diehm) (11/26/87)
A few weeks ago, I posted some comments on Interleaf, and what it might be like
on the Macintosh. My comment was that the product was powerful but that the
human interface left a lot to be desired. Also, that Interleaf people in
general seemed to be more experienced with the technology in which they were
implementing than with the publishing environment that they were marketing to.
Since that time I have seen a demo of the Mac II implementation of Interleaf.
I got some hands-on time with it.
It is MUCH faster than the Sun-based version of the product I have been working
with.
It is NOT a simple unix-to-unix port. They have ported directly to the toolbox
and System environment.
They have preserved all the functionality of Version 3.0 Interleaf, with the
exception that they do not support contone (continuous-tone image) editing,
which is an option to standard Interleaf.
They have made many concessions to the Macintosh world, understanding that if
it isn't somewhat Mac-like, they haven't a prayer. They have included go-away
boxes in all their windows, their scroll bars operate like Macintosh scroll
bars (the standard Interleaf scroll bars are terrible), and windows can be
moved and resized in standard Mac ways. Double-clicking a word of text will
select that word, though subsequent dragging adds to the selection by character,
not by word units.
They of course use the Mac single-button mouse. Clicking the mouse is the same
as clicking the normal Interleaf left button. Shift-click operates like the
normal Mac shift-click, and is equivalent to the normal Interleaf right button.
These have always been parallel operations. The normal Interleaf middle button
is invoked using command-click. This brings up the Interleaf dynamic menus, and
is totally foreign to Mac users. The only menus that are in the menu bar are
the apple, FILE, and EDIT.
The real problem with their implementation is that they don't use the normal
Mac Cut, Copy, and Paste, and in fact the EDIT menu is simply there because
that is a Mac standard; it is actually disabled. The dynamic Interleaf menus
have their own Cut, Copy, and Paste, and you cannot use the Mac menu or key
equivalents as substitutes.
Most frustrating to Mac users is Interleaf's use of Paste, which deletes the
source from the clipboard after pasting. Also, paste does not replace the
selected text, it pastes in front of any current selection. They still do these
non-Mac things in the Mac implementation. To some extent, deleting the object
from the clipboard upon paste can be worked around; their menus try to remember
what you were doing so that you can set up a Paste Copy Select sequence that
functions similarly. However, in my view, the remembering of the last menu
selection (when they actually DO it - they are inconsistent) is a sometimes
win, sometimes lose situation.
Overall, the comments above do NOT mean that anybody is right or anybody is
wrong in their implementation. It simply means that Interleaf has come from
a different environment, and they are trying to maintain compatibility across
a broad base of platforms.
The product is VERY powerful, and should be seriously examined by anyone who
feels that they have outgrown PageMaker or RSG (though I'm not familiar with
the latter). It is a product designed for very large, very long, or very
complex documents. It also has graphic support that blows away the capabilities
of QuickDraw-based drawing packages.
Interleaf will soon be bringing out Version 4.0 of their product, but it appears
that these features will not soon make their way into the Mac II offering. This
is not a major problem; the product is powerful. You may have some trouble
getting used to the user interface, and you may object that it isn't Mac-like,
but if you think of this as a prejudice rather than an end in itself, you will
be able to see the power of this system.
--
-Brian Diehm (SDA - Standard Disclaimers Apply)
Tektronix, Inc.
briand@tekig4.TEK.COM or {decvax,cae780,uw-beaver}!tektronix!tekig4!briand