ant@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Anthony Murdoch) (08/02/90)
Hi guys & gals, There have been a few things that have been confusing me over this stuff with OW/NeWS/X11. We here have a Sun 4/470 as a standalone machine. On our LAN, we have a fair number of machines running X, rangeing from an NCD X-terminal to the Sun 3/50 that I use (I run xdm on the 470 and simply have the 3/50 as a display, little more than a terminal really). What I want to know basically is "What would OW2.0 do for us ?" Would I be able to run OW/NeWS/X11 stuff on the 470 and have it displayed on an X-terminal or any other X-machine ? This would be wonderfull but I am unsure from what I have read as to whether it is possible. One of the things that would be really usefull in this case would be the ability to run SunView applications on remote X-terminals. On another note, the press release mentions a new version of XView that makes it easy to convert current SunView stuff to X11. How much easier ? I fiddled with XView a month or so ago, and tried to convert mush to use XView. It appeared to me that you would have to have about 5 years of experience in BOTH X11 and SunView to have a hope of converting anything (but maybe I was approaching the problem in the wrong way). Has anyone managed this feat BTW, as I am currently using xmh and long to be able to use "Xmush". Tooltool is another I would love to see converted as I have this wonderfull nntool that I created in my old SunView days. thanx in advance for any info/experience you could forward, ant -- V ant "It's great to be young and insane" \o/ ant@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au - Dream Team -O- Anthony Murdoch Prentice Computer Centre /0\ Phone (07) 3774078 University of Qld
chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano) (08/02/90)
In article <1990Aug2.025858.14871@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au>, ant@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Anthony Murdoch) writes: > What I want to know basically is "What would OW2.0 do for us ?" Would I be > able to run OW/NeWS/X11 stuff on the 470 and have it displayed on an X-terminal > or any other X-machine ? This would be wonderfull but I am unsure from what I > have read as to whether it is possible. One of the things that would be really > usefull in this case would be the ability to run SunView applications on > remote X-terminals. OW 2.0 allows you to do anything you can do with a "regular" X package. Thus, you can run applications on one machine and display their windows on a machine running OW 2.0. However, this only applies to X and NeWS applications. Since SunView is not a networked window system, you can only display SunView apps on the machine on which they are running. Basically, OW 2.0 gives you all of X, all of NeWS, and all of SunView on one machine. This is great for us, since we are slowly migrating from SunView to X, and we don't have to cut straight to X. We can wean ourselves from SunView tools as X versions become available. > On another note, the press release mentions a new version of XView that makes > it easy to convert current SunView stuff to X11. How much easier ? I fiddled > with XView a month or so ago, and tried to convert mush to use XView. It > appeared to me that you would have to have about 5 years of experience in BOTH > X11 and SunView to have a hope of converting anything (but maybe I was > approaching the problem in the wrong way). Has anyone managed this feat BTW, > as I am currently using xmh and long to be able to use "Xmush". I don't put much faith in the XView conversion scripts, but I have heard that some people have had success with them. For simple SunView tools, they probably work rather well. I just ported contool, my Sun console watcher, to X. I retained the basic appliactions code, but rebuilt the interface using GUIDE, Sun's OPEN LOOK interface builder. Anyone doing any development for XView needs to look at GUIDE. I was able to build a base window and six dialog boxes in a just a few hours. Hit a button, and out comes 3,000 lines of source code. Add your application routines, and away you go. And at $295 per unlimited site license, how can you go wrong? I will be releasing contool in the near future, as soon as the XView toolkit makes it to MIT. Here is one small dilemma: where do I post it? Comp.sources.sun, obviously, but what about comp.sources.x? I've seen postings apparently rejected from c.s.x for lack of an imakefile. I don't have an imakefile for contool, and don't know if it needs one or not. Any advice? > Tooltool is > another I would love to see converted as I have this wonderfull nntool that > I created in my old SunView days. Soon, when I get the time, I'll port tooltool to X. Again, here is my dilemma: do I retain SunView look and feel for backwards compatibility, or do I switch to an OPEN LOOK look and feel, making new tools "correct" but breaking old ones? At least under OW 2.0, you can run old tooltool applications until I get the port finished. Chuck Musciano ARPA : chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com Harris Corporation Usenet: ...!uunet!x102a!trantor!chuck PO Box 37, MS 3A/1912 AT&T : (407) 727-6131 Melbourne, FL 32902 FAX : (407) 727-{5118,5227,4004} I'm glad you asked, son. Being popular is the most important thing in the world. -- Homer Simpson
aim@SUN.COM (Amy) (08/02/90)
>>What I want to know basically is "What would OW2.0 do for us ?" Would I be >>able to run OW/NeWS/X11 stuff on the 470 and have it displayed on an X-terminal >>or any other X-machine ? This would be wonderfull but I am unsure from what I >>have read as to whether it is possible. One of the things that would be really >>usefull in this case would be the ability to run SunView applications on >>remote X-terminals. >> One of the main goals of the X design was a sort of "device independence" for displaying appications...so you absolutely CAN run the X client applications (i.e. any tools that come with OW, etc) on the 470 and have them display on virtually any X server (including XTerminals!). HOWEVER! Sometimes tools are written to take advantage of special server resources (especially fonts) which may or may not reside on the particular server you want to display on. Some clients do not deal with these 'missing' resources gracefully. This is particularly true with OW DeskSet Tools - they depend heavily on some special OpenLook fonts. If your server does not have these Openlook fonts, all is not lost, however - these openlook fonts have been included in bdf format on the MIT R4 distribution tape. If you can get these font files then usually there is a way of making them accessible by the server (but these details vary from server to server). Regarding displaying sunview apps on non X11NeWS X server: NO WAY. Sunview is a kernel based window system - it can ONLY display on the machine it is actually running on. Even the sunview compatibility provided by OpenWindows required some very special tweaking (X11NeWS isn't *really* even aware that sunview applications are running). No other X servers provide this sunview compatibility mode (not even MIT X11). >>On another note, the press release mentions a new version of XView that makes >>it easy to convert current SunView stuff to X11. How much easier ? I fiddled >>with XView a month or so ago, and tried to convert mush to use XView. It >>appeared to me that you would have to have about 5 years of experience in BOTH >>X11 and SunView to have a hope of converting anything (but maybe I was >>approaching the problem in the wrong way). Has anyone managed this feat BTW, >>as I am currently using xmh and long to be able to use "Xmush". Tooltool is >>another I would love to see converted as I have this wonderfull nntool that >>I created in my old SunView days. >> The API of sunview and xview is very similar (uses variable length attributes lists, the notifier, many of the same package names, i.e. "canvas", "panel", etc) which is why it is EASIEST to move from sunview to xview than from sunview to an Intrinsics based toolkit (like Motif or Xt+). This does not mean the complete migration of a program is EASY. The UI stuff should map nicely, but if your doing any sort of graphical drawing then it becomes more sticky (pw and pixrect stuff must be converted to Xlib - which requires a complete rewrite). There is a tool shipped with OW called "convert_to_xview" which will actually convert most of the UI code FOR you.... If you have any particular problems I'd be glad to help you further. Regards, Amy Moore aim@sun.com
mark@parc.xerox.com (Mark Weiser) (08/03/90)
I've converted three things so far, none originally written by me. They are a version of the SunView tetris game, the SunView "traffic" tool, and the sunview sparcstation audio tool. Each took me a few hours, using the sun supplied scripts. I know almost nothing about X. I know a lot of sunview. I think the conversion scripts are amazing, and the process was easy. -mark -- Spoken: Mark Weiser ARPA: weiser@xerox.com Phone: +1-415-494-4406
alan@cogswell.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Alan S. Mazer) (08/14/90)
In article <4057@trantor.harris-atd.com>, chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano) writes: > Basically, OW 2.0 gives > you all of X, all of NeWS, and all of SunView on one machine. Unless OW 2.0 is substantially improved in capabilities as well as speed from OW 1.0, some SunView code will not run. In fact, I personally haven't seen any of our SunView code around here that run well under xnews. This isn't a flame; just don't get your hopes up. > I just ported contool, my Sun console watcher, to X. I retained the > basic appliactions code, but rebuilt the interface using GUIDE, Sun's OPEN LOOK > interface builder. Anyone doing any development for XView needs to look at > GUIDE. I was able to build a base window and six dialog boxes in a just a few > hours. Hit a button, and out comes 3,000 lines of source code. Add your > application routines, and away you go. And at $295 per unlimited site license, > how can you go wrong? You can lose $295 :-). We've had two different people here try to use GUIDE and in both cases it was just more trouble than it was worth. GUIDE does generate lots of source code and if you want to generate source code quickly, you can use it. People here found that they could do the same things with much less code simpler and more cleanly outside of GUIDE. -- Alan # My aptitude test in high school suggested that ..!ames!elroy!alan # I should become a forest ranger. Sometimes I alan@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov # wonder if that was not indeed my true calling.
bochner@lange.harvard.EDU (Harry Bochner) (08/14/90)
In article <1990Aug2.025858.14871@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au>, ant@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Anthony Murdoch) writes: > On another note, the press release mentions a new version of XView that makes > it easy to convert current SunView stuff to X11. How much easier ? I fiddled > with XView a month or so ago, and tried to convert mush to use XView. It > appeared to me that you would have to have about 5 years of experience in BOTH > X11 and SunView to have a hope of converting anything. I haven't tried it, but I'm rather suspicious about the robustness of XView, on the following basis. Sun has put a lot of work into their Desk Suite programs, SunWrite, SunDraw, etc. So far these programs are available _only_ in SunView versions. The fact that they haven't released X versions seems to mean that: a) they feel there is some marketing advantage to having only SunView versions (since it means that users have to be on Suns, as opposed to X-terminals, for instance). This would contradict the stated strategy of supporting X. or b) converting from SunView to X is trickier than they'd like us to think, even using XView. or c) XView itself just doesn't work very well yet. This is just speculation: anyone have any information? Harry Bochner bochner@endor.harvard.edu
mlandau@bbn.com (Matthew Landau) (08/14/90)
alan@cogswell.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Alan S. Mazer) writes: >Unless OW 2.0 is substantially improved in capabilities as well as speed from >OW 1.0, some SunView code will not run. Ah, but it IS substantially improved, in almost every respect. I've been running OWN 2.0 on my Sparcstation for a week, and found it quite impressive. It's very fast, it's at least as robust as any other vendor's X11 implementation (and much moreso than either DECWindows or AIXWindows, in my experience), and it's obvious that a lot of work has gone into the desktop tools. In fact, it's the first X-based environment that's good enough to convince me to ditch SunView once and for all. I've also run *many* different SunView programs, including some large (3 MB) applications that tweak colormap segments, interact with the window mangement functions on their own, use fullscreen access, and do other things you might expect to be broken under OWN. Except for the well-documented "SunView windows always sit on top of the OWN display" problem, every single one of them has run flawlessly. -- Matt Landau Rebel without a clue. mlandau@bbn.com
mlandau@bbn.com (Matthew Landau) (08/14/90)
bochner@lange.harvard.EDU (Harry Bochner) writes: >I haven't tried it, but I'm rather suspicious about the robustness of XView, >on the following basis. Sun has put a lot of work into their Desk Suite >programs, SunWrite, SunDraw, etc. So far these programs are available >_only_ in SunView versions. I believe that all of these programs are available for machines running OpenWindows version 2. OWN 2.0 also includes the complete set of "DeskSet" tools (filemgr, printtool, tapetool, calendar, etc.), all of which are written with XView, and all of which leave the vanilla X11 tools to which most of us are accustomed in the dust. (Of course, they have their share of glaring stupidities, like the fact that the tape tool won't deal with remote tape drives and there's no way to quit textedit from the keyboard, but that's not XView's fault.) The new 3-D look on XView is pretty cool, too :-) The longer I use both Open Look and Motif, the more convinced I become that Open Look is the way to go for the future. I can't explain why, but it just "feels" much more natural in almost every respect... perhaps all that human factors work that reportedly went into the design really paid off. -- Matt Landau Oblivion gallops closer, mlandau@bbn.com favoring the spur, sparing the rein.
jback@trine.East.Sun.COM (Joe Backo - PS Mgr Sun Washington) (08/14/90)
In article <3861@husc6.harvard.edu>, bochner@lange.harvard.EDU (Harry Bochner) writes: |> In article <1990Aug2.025858.14871@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au>, |> ant@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Anthony Murdoch) writes: |> > On another note, the press release mentions a new version of XView |> that makes |> > it easy to convert current SunView stuff to X11. How much easier ? |> I fiddled |> > with XView a month or so ago, and tried to convert mush to use XView. It |> > appeared to me that you would have to have about 5 years of |> experience in BOTH |> > X11 and SunView to have a hope of converting anything. |> |> I haven't tried it, but I'm rather suspicious about the robustness of XView, |> on the following basis. Sun has put a lot of work into their Desk Suite |> programs, |> SunWrite, SunDraw, etc. So far these programs are available _only_ in SunView |> versions. The fact that they haven't released X versions seems to mean that: ... stuff deleted... |> This is just speculation: anyone have any information? -- Harry; The "Desk Suite" programs you refer to have been transfered back to Island Graphics, their original creators. I spoke to Island Graphics last week, and they informed me that an OpenWindows (XView) version of SunWrite, SunPaint, and SunDraw is in the works - possible release in 1990. The OpenWindows 2.0 release has the same 14 DeskSet tools that are available in SunView (e.g. tapetool, printool, calendar manager, etc.). As for the "robustness of XView", the source code for XView 2.0 will being appearing on expo soon, why don't you try it? +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= =+=+=+=+ Joe Backo ARPA : jback@sun.com Sun Microsystems Internet: jback@sundc.East.Sun.COM 8219 Leesburg Pike Usenet : ...!uunet!sun!sundc!jback Suite #700 AT&T : (703) 883-0444 Vienna, VA 22180 FAX : (703) 893-0576 +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= =+=+=+=+
mike@BACH.CS.BYU.EDU (Mike Burbidge) (08/14/90)
>> I just ported contool, my Sun console watcher, to X. I retained the >> basic appliactions code, but rebuilt the interface using GUIDE, Sun's OPEN LOOK >> interface builder. Anyone doing any development for XView needs to look at > GUIDE. I was able to build a base window and six dialog boxes in a just a few >> hours. Hit a button, and out comes 3,000 lines of source code. Add your >> application routines, and away you go. And at $295 per unlimited site license, >> how can you go wrong? Sounds like you just tried to slap together a small example. I found that for any realistically complex application guide dictates its architecture. For the small savings up front, I found that using guide was not worth comprimising the overall architecture of my application. Mike Burbidge mike@bach.cs.byu.edu
chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano) (08/15/90)
In article <9008141442.AA04085@bach.cs.byu.edu>, mike@BACH.CS.BYU.EDU (Mike Burbidge) writes: > > [ I talk about porting contool to XView ] > > Sounds like you just tried to slap together a small example. I found that > for any realistically complex application guide dictates its architecture. > For the small savings up front, I found that using guide was not worth > comprimising the overall architecture of my application. I don't understand how GUIDE dictates the application architecture. One could say that GUIDE dictates that my tools will have one or more base windows, and zero or more popup windows, and will use OPEN LOOK widgets. The underlying application architecture is completely independent. The beauty of GUIDE is that I spend only minutes, instead of days, fiddling with gadget layout. Window layout is VERY important to the success of an interface, although to look at most tools available today, most people don't seem to realize this. Refining window appearance by iterative compilation is tedious and error-prone. Using GUIDE is far superior. I have built two tools with GUIDE: contool, and a prototype information management tool. Contool is 5,585 lines of code, 1,890 of which are GUIDE- generated. Contool is a typical tool, with callbacks implementing various features, and uses notifier hooks to track the output of your system console. The management tool is 11,859 lines of code, 3,904 GUIDE-generated. It uses a distributed system of daemons communicating via sockets to manage large distributed databases. Callbacks are used to manage various features, and direct xlib calls are used to render the (mostly) graphical user interface. In either case, how did GUIDE influence the underlying architecture? GUIDE influences part of the look, and most of the feel, of an application, but not the application architecture. In a recent post to the OPEN LOOK mailing list, someone was trying to get two canvases to align in a certain way in a window. He had obviously worked at this for some time, and then took the time to post and wait for a reply. If he had used GUIDE, the problem would have been solved in under ten seconds or so. That's the power of GUIDE. Chuck Musciano ARPA : chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com Harris Corporation Usenet: ...!uunet!x102a!trantor!chuck PO Box 37, MS 3A/1912 AT&T : (407) 727-6131 Melbourne, FL 32902 FAX : (407) 727-{5118,5227,4004} I'm glad you asked, son. Being popular is the most important thing in the world. -- Homer Simpson
fgreco@govt.shearson.COM (Frank Greco) (08/15/90)
Mike Burbidge writes: > >>> I just ported contool, my Sun console watcher, to X. I retained the >>> basic appliactions code, but rebuilt the interface using GUIDE, Sun's OPEN LOOK >>> interface builder. Anyone doing any development for XView needs to look at >> GUIDE. I was able to build a base window and six dialog boxes in a just a few >>> hours. Hit a button, and out comes 3,000 lines of source code. Add your >>> application routines, and away you go. And at $295 per unlimited site license, >>> how can you go wrong? > >Sounds like you just tried to slap together a small example. I found that >for any realistically complex application guide dictates its architecture. >For the small savings up front, I found that using guide was not worth >comprimising the overall architecture of my application. > I've used devGUIDE (silly name...) for reasonably complex applications and like Chuck, had extremely good success. Of course, like any code generation tool we all know about, you lose a little on flexibility...but that's true about most (if not all) mechanical code generators. So, at that point you tweak the code if you don't like it. Of course, your descriptive "complex" is very subjective. I have built what I think are reasonably complex apps within the past year with devGUIDE. Things like market surveillance systems, portfolio management systems, tbl front-ends, database system admin tools... all with devGUIDE. Similar to other GUI builders, there are some nits to pick, but overall I've found devGUIDE to be an extremely useful tool. And like Chuck M. said in his posting, at $295 for an *unlimited* site license... it seems to be a obvious purchase. And, btw, from my teaching experience, its *much* easier teaching non-computer users the Open Look GUI than Motif....by far... Open Look is *very* smooth. Frank G. >mike@bach.cs.byu.edu > >
jlr@eng.sun.COM (Jeff Roberts) (09/11/90)
Harry, Re your mention of "Desk Suite programs", I thought I should clarify the situation with regard to Write/Paint/Draw and DeskSet. I work in DeskSet Product Marketing at Sun. Sun no longer offers SunWrite, SunPaint and SunDraw. Those products have been transferred to Island Graphics, and are now offered as IslandWrite, IslandPaint, and IslandDraw. In fact Island is actively working on X11/NeWS versions of those products, using the XView toolkit. Island has not yet announced a release date. There is a suite of productivity applications called DeskSet, from Sun, that includes File Manager, Calendar Manager, MailTool, and others. DeskSet does exist in an X11/NeWS version, built with the XView toolkit, and it is included in OpenWindows version 2 at no additional charge. The DeskSet applications were ported from SunView using the XView toolkit. Sorry for the long response time - I've had some problems with internet addresses and prior attempts to respond were bounced back to me. Hope this helps, Jeff > From smitad@milagro Tue Aug 14 18:55:39 1990 > Date: Tue, 14 Aug 90 18:21:03 PDT > From: smitad@milagro (Smita Deshpande) > To: jlr@Eng > Subject: fyi - DeskSet Mail > > You may want to clarify what DeskSet is and also provide a W/P/D > status update. > > ----- Begin Included Message ----- > > >From xpert-mailer@expo.lcs.mit.edu Mon Aug 13 18:27:57 1990 > From: lange!bochner@husc6.harvard.edu (Harry Bochner) > Organization: Aiken Computation Laboratory, Harvard University > Subject: Re: Open Windows 2.0 released (Sun press release) > References: <11722@hoptoad.uucp>, <1990Aug2.025858.14871@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au> > Sender: xpert-request@expo.lcs.mit.edu > To: xpert@expo.lcs.mit.edu > > In article <1990Aug2.025858.14871@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au>, > ant@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Anthony Murdoch) writes: > > On another note, the press release mentions a new version of XView > that makes > > it easy to convert current SunView stuff to X11. How much easier ? > I fiddled > > with XView a month or so ago, and tried to convert mush to use XView. It > > appeared to me that you would have to have about 5 years of > experience in BOTH > > X11 and SunView to have a hope of converting anything. > > I haven't tried it, but I'm rather suspicious about the robustness of XView, > on the following basis. Sun has put a lot of work into their Desk Suite > programs, > SunWrite, SunDraw, etc. So far these programs are available _only_ in SunView > versions. The fact that they haven't released X versions seems to mean that: > > a) they feel there is some marketing advantage to having only SunView versions > (since it means that users have to be on Suns, as opposed to > X-terminals, for > instance). This would contradict the stated strategy of supporting X. > or > b) converting from SunView to X is trickier than they'd like us to think, even > using XView. > or > c) XView itself just doesn't work very well yet. > > This is just speculation: anyone have any information? > > Harry Bochner > bochner@endor.harvard.edu > > > ----- End Included Message ----- > > ----- End Included Message ----- ----- End Included Message ----- ----- End Included Message ----- ----- End Included Message ----- ----- End Included Message -----