SHULMAN@sdr.slb.com (Jeffrey Shulman) (12/19/88)
Date: Mon 19 Dec 88 08:22:49-EDT
From: Jeff Shulman <SHULMAN@SDR.SLB.COM>
Subject: Delphi Mac Digest V4 #24
To: Delphi-List: ;
Message-ID: <598540969.0.SHULMAN@SDR.SLB.COM>
Mail-System-Version: <VAX-MM(218)+TOPSLIB(129)@SDR.SLB.COM>
Delphi Mac Digest Monday, December 19, 1988 Volume 4 : Issue 24
Today's Topics:
Looking for VI
User Responses Needed (13 messages)
Rhyming Dictionary Program?
RE: Usenet Mac Digest V4 #175
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From: MACWEEKBOS
Subject: Looking for VI
Date: 9-DEC-14:26: User Supported Software
I'm looking for the VI editor for the Mac. Has anyone seen one (it's the
old Unix editor)? Or EMACS with vi macros?
Thakns
Ric
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From: ASMCOR
Subject: User Responses Needed
Date: 12-DEC 21:15 User Supported Software
Everyone -
I've decided to write a little launching utility. With the
announcement that DAs are really going to go away come System 8.0, I
realize that I'll miss the ease of getting to them under the Apple menu.
As long as RAM comes down in price, a small application under
MultiFinder will be just as good as a DA anyway, but launching things
from the Finder is often a pain.
I know there is already one program out that puts applications in a
menu where you can select them, but I haven't actually seen it. If the
menu is permanent, if it's always available, then that might be OK. I'm
sure I can write a background driver that will keep a menu available, or
that can pop one up under the right cirmcumstances, but is that
sufficient? Maybe we need something a little more powerful.
I want to write this as a user-designed product. I can't guarantee
that I'll release it as shareware, but I might. Either way, I want a lot
of input from all you folks out there before I write this thing. I want
it to really reflect the way you work, and I think it should be
user-configurable to the max. So let me know your needs.
What would be the easiest, most convenient way to access applications
and documents? My Oasis program was great in the pre-MultiFinder days,
but I think the window takes up too much screen space now. It's time to
rethink the problem and come up with a more elegant solution. I'm
actively seeking ideas and suggestions at this stage, so let me have it.
What would you like to see?
Please reply via DMAIL so I won't miss your response.
Jan Eugenides
ASMCOR
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From: NWOLF
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27973)
Date: 13-DEC 02:16 User Supported Software
Jan, On Cue is a really neat answer to transferring between files and
bypassing the desktop. If it had a DA capability built in, that would be
all that's necessary. Similarly, PowerStation could easily include
launching DAs but you'd have to quit to the desktop first or keep it
somewhere in MF to access it. Obviously it would be best - and easiest -
to maintain something akin to the current arrangement: access through
the menubar from wherever one happened to be. Why Apple wants to do away
with this concept is beyond me, comceptually. Obviously the demand from
the installed user base is sufficient to ensure the continuation of this
way of dioing things. Granted, the DA has graduated from a useful
utility (i.e., Key CAps, Note Pad, etc.) to more of a full-fledged
concurrent application (ACTA, miniWriter, Mock Chart, etc.). Perhaps
this has given the impression that what users really want is
concurrency. I think that's a mistaken idea, at least in part. Seems to
me that people want access to useful tools not included with programs
used regularly and which enhance the latter's usefulness. Whatever means
is used to facilitate this happening will be successful.
Neil
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From: MACLAIRD
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27977)
Date: 13-DEC 05:56 User Supported Software
One could, I suppose, write a small INIT that displays an Apple menu,
and hacks the OpenDriver() to activate...good old fashioned DA's.
Of course, there are little details like the WindowKind field,
SystemEdit() and SystemClick() to do as well. While older applications,
not to mention any new ones that want to run on, say, a 128K Macintosh,
will still implement those two functions, newer ones will require a
little assist.
"Assist", by the way, Jan, may be a good name for this little project.
"Apple DA", or APDA, might not be.
Laird
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From: ASMCOR
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27977)
Date: 13-DEC 21:00 User Supported Software
Neil -
Yes, perhaps a continuation of the current method is all we want, but
the real question is, is there a better way? I think there must be.
Perhaps a window that pops up with all the available stuff in it. Then
there's the question of how to navigate, and how to install things in
the "launcher." Should it maintain a couple of folders, and anything in
those folders appears in the menu (or list, or whatever)? Or would you
rather leave things where they are on the disk, and install them into
the menu yourself?
Any ideas?
Jan
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From: DDUNHAM
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27973)
Date: 13-DEC 21:27 User Supported Software
Why a menu? I use Finder to keep my favorite progs on the bottom edge
of the desktop. Common folders are along the left edge. I generally
prefer choosing an icon to reading a menu. If you could give me windows
(windoids?) of installable applications and DAs...thin windows, either
vertical or horizontal. Maybe NeXT's icon dock is another example.
If you overrode MultiFinder's shrunken icon behavior, I wouldn't cry.
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From: HALL
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27982)
Date: 13-DEC 21:57 User Supported Software
I'd rather have things installed manually, but an auto open feature
would be OK.
The best of both worlds... The current DA/OnCue style of opening things
is simple and easy to use; plus, it's quick. You click in a certain
place (or, with OnCue, hold down a key combination and click anywhere)
and the window pops up. You drag to the item you want, and it's open.
It's at least as good as switching applications via MultiFinder.
Brian
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From: NWOLF
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27982)
Date: 14-DEC 00:42 User Supported Software
In a way, this calls in the whole question of the (Mac) interface. There
are a few shortcomings with what we're used to. Probhlem is, our
thinking of the future possibilities is often clouded or colored by our
prior experience, as well as our comfort level with making changes.
Obviously Apple is considering some changes to the way we currently
compute on their machines, although not very big ones. Bill ATkinson has
also done this in HyperCard, although I can't say I'm enthusiastic about
his reasoning or his implementation in all cases. The challenge is to
formulate a new (and/or different?) way of doing something we are
already comfortable with. To step back away from it, examine it with a
fresh mind uncluttered with pre(vious) conceptions is no doubt a
valuable process. Of course, each one of us would then come up with a
different vision of how it might be. To those who care, then, a
challenge: In light of the current shortcomings of the Mac interface
(with, or preferably, without the Finder), by what means would you
prefer to implement concurrent activites?
Thus said, let me give it some thought and then respond to your
questions.
Neil
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From: NWOLF
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27983)
Date: 14-DEC 00:54 User Supported Software
What you've described is an OK way to manage things in the finder - but
what about away from the Finder. In fact, on a 9" monitor your method
uses a lot of valuable real estate. I have solved this by having a
folder window open at the bottom of the screen in Small Icon view. Thiss
allows more folders and application icons than in the normal view, plus
it can be easily cleared away when not wanted by closing the folder.
What of people who prefer choosing from a list rather than from among
icons?. Sounds like your Windoids idea would work well within that
context - each of which could be configurable to a certain degree.
The problem we face is that with (any amount of) limited screen space
there's not enough room to make everything visible. Apple solved that
with a menubar. Wouldn't it be possible to create a windoid, menubar,
selection window, etc., to appear on command - using an FKEY or some
combination of keyboard and mouse click. That process could also have
some kind of hierarchical structure, but not necessarily the one which
we're accustomed to: of folders within folders, etc. I'd like to see a
means by which related documents (for instance) always appeared in the
same space (Windoid, menu, etc.)a regardless of where or when they were
created or stored. I know that presents a problem of speed, but maybe in
the future, with faster processors, and co-processors, that won 't be so
much of an issue. Having some capability such as Findswell would also be
a nice feature, but somehow better integrated into the structure of the
thing, instead of tacked on by necessity.
Neil
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From: DDUNHAM
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27987)
Date: 16-DEC 03:32 User Supported Software
I find small icons too ugly to be usable.
I said windoid because they float; it might be possible to have the
windoid in _every_ program (tho tricky to program, but that's Jan's
problem, not mine :-).
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From: ASMCOR
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27983)
Date: 16-DEC 22:24 User Supported Software
Well, it doesn't have to be a menu, of course. That's just the starting
point. I like the ease of the DA menu. Keeping icons along the edge in
Finder is OK, but they always seem to be covered up when I want them. I
want something that pops up and then goes away. I got a message from
Apple (kinda) indicating that there are substantial changes in the
Finder brewing, which may make all of this less necessary. I got no
details, though. Hmmm.
Jan
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From: NWOLF
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27997)
Date: 16-DEC 22:26 User Supported Software
I agree with you about small icons. However, in the case where they are
all likely to look similar - such as documents belonging to one program,
or folders, etc. - they work acmirably. Kinda fun to have floating
windoids, I tyhink. And fun to program, too, eh Jan? (:-)
Neil
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From: ASMCOR
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 27997)
Date: 16-DEC 23:28 User Supported Software
Hmm. A floating windoid. Now that's an intriguing thought, if only
because it would be a challenge. But would it be a nice thing? Would the
windoid get in the way? If you could hide it and show it, that might be
OK. (The sound of rusty gears creaking...)
Jan
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From: NWOLF
Subject: RE: User Responses Needed (Re: Msg 28006)
Date: 18-DEC 18:01 User Supported Software
Obviously, if one were to use a floating windoid approach, one would
need some way of bringing the windoid to the foreground in order to use
it. Three methods come to mind: 1) using a Windows menu - either in the
menubar or in some kind of sub-menubar - either alongside the screen
(left- or righthand edge, using icons!, or at the beck and call of the
user, 2) keeping the windod in the foreground by whatever means
necessary until the user sent it away, 3) installing a symbol in the
menubar calling up either your entire menu or menubar or just the
windoid itself (a command key equivalent would be good, too.
Neil
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From: DSPANGENBERG
Subject: Rhyming Dictionary Program?
Date: 13-DEC 00:13 SIG Business
Hi! Anyone ever hear of a Rhyming Dictionary program for the Mac? A
couple songwriter friends are looking for one.
Thanks, Pooch
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From: DSACHS
Subject: RE: Usenet Mac Digest V4 #175 (Re: Msg 28010)
Date: 18-DEC 17:19 Network Digests
>From: jrb@clyde.ATT.COM (Jon Beck)
>Subject: Use of Coin and Parchment in Quarterstaff
>Date: 9 Dec 88 16:07:32 GMT
>Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Whippany NJ"
To use the coin and parchment, place the coin at the center of the
compass rose of the parchment with the arrow on the coin facing in the
direction as indicated in one of the verses. Then read the proper number
of letters (which alternate between the parchment and the coin) to get
one of the magic words. There are 4 such words, that you need to solve
the game.
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End of Delphi Mac Digest
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