ccc_ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) (07/07/90)
I like the "Apple menu folder" idea. Just one suggestion: do the names of aliases in the menu have to be in italics? It makes sense to italicise the names of the actual file icons, but is this information relevant in the menu? Lawrence D'Oliveiro fone: +64-71-562-889 Computer Services Dept fax: +64-71-384-066 University of Waikato electric mail: ldo@waikato.ac.nz Hamilton, New Zealand 37^ 47' 29" S, 175^ 19' 16" E, GMT+12:00 Now that Intel has set its feet firmly on the 32-bit path, it remains to persuade its customers to abandon its old mistakes and adopt some new ones.
philip@Minnie.Stanford.EDU (Philip Machanick) (07/08/90)
In article <956.2695f9be@waikato.ac.nz>, ccc_ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes: > I like the "Apple menu folder" idea. Just one suggestion: do the names > of aliases in the menu have to be in italics? It makes sense to italicise > the names of the actual file icons, but is this information relevant > in the menu? I'd vote for keeping them italicized at all times. Symbolic links in unix are great when they work, but (for example) if the file system one points to is unmounted, it can cause errors that are hard to track down. If you always _know_ something is an alias, you are more likely to think of trying to track down this kind of problem. Philip Machanick philip@pescadero.stanford.edu
alexr@ucscb.ucsc.edu (Alexander M. Rosenberg) (07/10/90)
In article <956.2695f9be@waikato.ac.nz> ccc_ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes: > I like the "Apple menu folder" idea. Just one suggestion: do the names > of aliases in the menu have to be in italics? It makes sense to italicise > the names of the actual file icons, but is this information relevant > in the menu? I brought this up, once upon a time. It turns out to be an issue of consistancy. Now that I have thought about it a bit, I agree with it. If you really dislike it, you could patch the menu definition to not display italics in the Apple Menu. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Alexander M. Rosenberg - INTERNET: alexr@ucscb.ucsc.edu - Yoyodyne - - 330 1/2 Waverley St. - UUCP:ucbvax!ucscc!ucscb!alexr - Propulsion - - Palo Alto, CA 94301 - BITNET:alexr%ucscb@ucscc.BITNET- Systems - - (415) 329-8463 - Nobody is my employer so - :-) - - - so nobody cares what I say. - -
gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu (07/13/90)
> It would be nice if System7 had a Spelling Manager with a standard > dictionary and the ability to add specialized dictionaries > (Engineering, Medical, etc.). Better yet, system 7.0 needs a "word-stream" manager -- a program that lets you pipe text through a processing program. Especially: (1) spelling checkers. (2) grammar checkers. (3) machine translation programs. The piping should be sufficiently general that it does the right thing with tables, PICTs, and equations. I can't stand MS-Word, which tries to spell-check variable name (x1, x2a2, ...) in my mathematical papers. The program should also allow you to pipe a PICT through the manager. Then we could (1) spell-check pictures (2) check for outrageous mistakes in pictures, such as (a) two points that differ by some small epsilon (the user would probably like to make them the same point) (b) objects smaller than a certain size (garbage) (c) invisible objects (completely obscured by others, or filled by nothing) (d) lines at non-standard angles. (e) etc. etc. etc. etc.
dwal@midway.uchicago.edu (David Walton) (07/14/90)
In article <70500015@m.cs.uiuc.edu> gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes: > >> It would be nice if System7 had a Spelling Manager with a standard >> dictionary and the ability to add specialized dictionaries >> (Engineering, Medical, etc.). > >Better yet, system 7.0 needs a "word-stream" manager -- a program that >lets you pipe text through a processing program. Especially: > >(1) spelling checkers. >(2) grammar checkers. >(3) machine translation programs. > >The piping should be sufficiently general that it does the right thing >with tables, PICTs, and equations. I can't stand MS-Word, which tries >to spell-check variable name (x1, x2a2, ...) in my mathematical papers. > >The program should also allow you to pipe a PICT through the manager. >Then we could >(1) spell-check pictures >(2) check for outrageous mistakes in pictures, such as > (a) two points that differ by some small epsilon > (the user would probably like to make them the same point) > (b) objects smaller than a certain size (garbage) > (c) invisible objects (completely obscured by others, or filled by nothing) > (d) lines at non-standard angles. > (e) etc. etc. etc. etc. There's really no need for something that specific: System 7.0's InterApplication Communication model already provides a foundation for doing this sort of thing. Process-to-process communication, especially in the form of AppleEvents, is designed for sending information and commands between programs to do exactly the type of thing you're suggesting. Apple hasn't actually designed a stream Manager with the functions that you describe, probably because they wanted to leave something for the developers to do. I also suspect that Apple System Software Engineers probably have better things to worry about than standardizing a Spelling dictionary. In a previous message, somebody mentioned Feature Creep, and I think it applies very well. I'm curious, too, about the possible features which you mentioned. Do you really want software that second-guesses your intent to the extent of weeding out objects smaller than an arbitrary size, or 'fixing' your angles because they're improper? I'd sure want to have a backup copy before I submitted my work to software like that...:-) -- David Walton Internet: dwal@tank.uchicago.edu University of Chicago { Any opinions found herein are mine, not } Computing Organizations { those of my employers (or anybody else). }
gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu (07/16/90)
> I'm curious, too, about the possible features which you mentioned. Do > you really want software that second-guesses your intent to the extent > of weeding out objects smaller than an arbitrary size, or 'fixing' > your angles because they're improper? I'd sure want to have a backup > copy before I submitted my work to software like that...:-) The program would not be much different from "Align Objects" in most draw programs, and UNDO would of course be enabled by the application program. And it would be configurable, much like Align Objects is in most programs. In my opinion, many draw programs could benefit from more powerful semantic checking of the pictures produced. I have sketched approximately 200 pictures on the macintosh, mostly using MacDraw II and Canvas, and I find that these programs need to provide much more constraint-enforcement and result-checking in order to support efficient sketching. Grid on/off just doesn't hack it, in my opinion.
kent@circus.camex.com (Kent Borg) (07/20/90)
In article <70500015@m.cs.uiuc.edu> gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes: > >> It would be nice if System7 had a Spelling Manager with a standard >> dictionary and the ability to add specialized dictionaries >> (Engineering, Medical, etc.). > >Better yet, system 7.0 needs a "word-stream" manager -- a program that >lets you pipe text through a processing program. Especially: > >(1) spelling checkers. >(2) grammar checkers. >(3) machine translation programs. First, it is far too late to add anything this major to 7.0. 7.0 is supposed to hit the streets in just a few months (though we shall see). Second, 7.0 already has features which might help along these lines. Interapplication Communication through AppleEvents could make generic spell checkers possible. The spell checker could drive the word processor (scroll to such-and-such a word so the use can see the context and so on), or the word processor could just submit a batch of text, request faceless processing, and itself tell the user about it. It will be interesting to see how the standard set of AppleEvents turnout. If they are well done it might be easy for spell checkers to offer all sorts of dictionary services. -- Kent Borg internet: kent@camex.com MacNet: kentborg H:(617) 776-6899 W:(617) 426-3577 "If 2 + 3 is always going to be 5, why do they keep teaching it to us?" - 5-30-90 New York Times quoting a first grader
carsup@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU (Fisher Library support) (08/02/90)
In article <70500015@m.cs.uiuc.edu> gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes: > >> It would be nice if System7 had a Spelling Manager with a standard >> dictionary and the ability to add specialized dictionaries >> (Engineering, Medical, etc.). > >Better yet, system 7.0 needs a "word-stream" manager -- a program that >lets you pipe text through a processing program. Especially: > >(1) spelling checkers. >(2) grammar checkers. >(3) machine translation programs. One thing that worries me is the size of the Mac system. It is already very large ( I have one that does not fit onto a 800k floppy !), Imagine how large it would be if a grammar checker was added ! Oh well, the price of Hard Disks are dropping ! ;-) (600Meg here we come ...) ================================================================================ ^__^ | Christopher Albone Catch Ya (- 0) | Later !! | \/ | | e-mail : carsup@extro.ucc.su.oz.au or \ / | 8837832@mango.cs.su.oz.au ====^^=== | "So this is it! We're all going to die !!!" \/ | "Will you stop saying that !!!!" - Douglas Adams ===============================================================================