[ge-talk] Vision for a usable commandline

[Niklas Nisbeth]

Learning curve is not bad!

Sometimes you need it to make a good tool that's nice to use.

If leaning curve is such a priority, there's one thing that needs to be 
changed before all others: C++!

> Well, if the Wii is common inspiration, then we're on the same page. 
> It
> changed the way people play video games, and you can still play every
> Nintendo game ever made on the one console.
> 
> The cygwin approach sounds like a good one. VMS? I'm using its 
> bastard
> grandchild right now (XP Pro).
> 
> The original BeOS seems like the best inspiration as far as app
> compatibility goes. Porting posix apps was a possibility, but there 
> were
> many advantages and incentives to writing native apps. The result was 
> many
> native apps that were nicer to use, and in many ways superior to the
> Windows/UNIX competition.
> 
> I don't want to say we must do any one thing or another, but I used
> Alphagrip as an example for a reason. Great idea + great product + 
> HUGE
> learning curve = Limited sales.
> 
> Of course, the Wii is the perfect example, because it demonstrated 
> that
> revolutionary changes in design don't have to result in a huge 
> learning
> curve.
> 
> --Adrian
> 
> On 1/10/07, Ari Haviv <arielbhaviv at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> > On 1/10/07, Adrian Sanabria <adrian.sanabria at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > I don't see any reason why you can't do both with the command 
> > > line.
> > > Start with a UNIX-based command-line, keeping backwards-
> > > compatibility with
> > > the UNIX commands that many of us are already familiar with from 
> > > using
> > > Linux, UNIX, and even BeOS. Then build on it. I don't see 
> > > anything wrong
> > > with having more than one way to do something on the command 
> > > line. You can
> > > please the old hackers and UNIX crowd, while competing with new 
> > > tech like
> > > Powershell. Command line apps are generally small, so having 
> > > extra
> > > functionality shouldn't result in much (if any) bloat in the OS.
> >
> >
> > What about VMS? Sorry mom :)
> > I'm in favor of maybe something like cygwin or perhaps a parallel 
> > "made
> > for haiku" cli alongside bash/terminal
> >
> > As far as POSIX compatibility, I don't see any other way to go. 
> > That was
> > > always a great benefit of the original BeOS, that it (usually) 
> > > didn't take a
> > > lot of effort to port a UNIX app over to it. The benefit of POSIX 
> > > vs. Win32
> > > porting is that all the OS-side stuff is open, published and 
> > > available with
> > > a huge amount of open source apps just waiting to be ported over. 
> > > Most of
> > > the software on the Windows side that is open source was ported 
> > > from Linux
> > > anyway, and usually uses Cygwin libraries to run on Windows.
> >
> >
> > ported apps are good to begin with but there is a danger you end up
> > looking like another linux distro with gtk+ apps like gimp.
> > That is why i speak of a vision...to get people to think of new 
> > ideas now
> > and possibilities for the future.
> >
> > We need to get off the ground but once we're secure, we shouldn't 
> > be
> > scared to change. Apple and linux *must* be unix so we have a 
> > unique
> > opportunity that they don't. But that doesn't mean we have to 
> > change right
> > away. We just shouldn't say we *must* be like unix or any other OS
> >
> > Bottom line is that you don't want to create huge learning curves, 
> > and
> > > incompatible APIs while trying to create the perfect OS. You'll 
> > > end up with
> > > a great idea that no one will use. You were pointing out the 
> > > strategic
> > > placement of BeOS back in the MacOS9 days. The important 
> > > difference back
> > > then was that people cared about the OS. Nowadays, people care 
> > > about their
> > > apps. THAT's the first thing they want to know when they use an 
> > > OS, "Where's
> > > Firefox? Does it run on this OS? Why not?". You don't want to 
> > > start from
> > > scratch on monolithic apps, like a web browser. Netpositive was 
> > > great back
> > > then, when we were viewing the equivalent of webpages written on 
> > > stone
> > > tablets, but these days, everyone expects their Web 2.0 sites to 
> > > work
> > > flawlessly, or they go somewhere else.
> >
> >
> > yes, firefox is probably the strongest argument for posix. It's not 
> > easy
> > to make a browser compatible with the world wide wild web and it 
> > has the
> > best real world compatibility of any non-IE browser. Still, people 
> > complain
> > it's slow, bloated and not multi threaded.
> >
> > The mac people care about their OS. We need some of that. For 
> > example,
> > they know that firefox isn't doing something right when it uses its 
> > own
> > spell checker instead of the macos spell checker.
> >
> > Our OS isn't just a place to have the same old apps run a bit nicer 
> > but
> > also pushes people to consider new ways of how apps should work. 
> > and look
> > like.
> >
> > I agree that we shouldn't implement a broken idea in favor of 
> > backwards
> > > compatibility, but at the same time, we don't want huge learning 
> > > curves to
> > > kill public interest. 99% of people are too scared to try 
> > > something new that
> > > is too different.
> >
> >
> > Are you talking about Windows users ? They will be scared by haiku 
> > being
> > too unix like. At least I believe the deskbar should be on the 
> > bottom and
> > control-c should be default for copy :)
> >
> > Just for the record though, should we go the "all new" route, I'll 
> > still
> > > be one of the %1 plugging my Alphagrip <http://www.alphagrips.com
> > > > into
> > > Haiku.
> > >
> > > --Adrian
> >
> >
> > This is glass elevator and I hope we can discuss even crazier far 
> > out
> > ideas. look at the Nintendo Wii. Lower specs and even the die hard 
> > halo fans
> > want it because it completely changes the way people play video 
> > games.
> >
> >
> >
> >
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> >
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> >