From: jprad@faatcrl.faa.gov (Jack Radigan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Screenshots: Results:
Date: 17 Dec 1992 17:53:42 -0500
Organization: FAA Technical Center, Pomona, NJ
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: faatcrl.faa.gov

das9674@usl.edu (Stephenson Daniel A) writes:

>Well, OS/2 2.0's WorkPlace Shell has proprtional scrollbars.  I happen to
>think think they look better than the WorkBench's, but that's my opinion.
>On OS/2, they're 'squishy' in a 3D fashion.

  If the application uses the "newlook" propgadget it will have a 3-D look
to it on the Amiga, else it has the older 2-D look to it.

>I can see the merits of have the scroll up/down buttons close togather.  I'm
>just not used to it.

  It doesn't take too long to get used to them, more convienent once you have
too.

>Also, with the Workbemch, when an apps dispalys text, when you click and hold
>to the proportional scrollbar, and MOVE it up and down to view text, does the
>text actively move up and down at the same time?  That's something Windows don
>have and should, and OS/2 does.

  Synchronized text scrolling is a function of the application, not the OS, so
long as there is realtime feedback from the GUI as the user slides the knob.

  There are plenty of Amiga apps that do this just as there are OS/2 apps that
do not scroll as you move the knob, like the System Editor (not the Enhanced
Editor).

>Another thing which, IMO, would really help out the WorkBench.  That would
>be the ability to change the windows size by grabbing onto ANY side of the 
>window and dragging it, like yo can do in OS/2, Windows, and X.  The WorkBench
>is Macintish-esque like this.

  I think that someone who is handicapped with less functional motor skills
would argue that having to place the mouse pointer exactly on the rather narrow
borders to resize a window is less desirable than the way the Mac and the Amiga
does it.

>Do the WorkBench gadgets 'squish' down like in OS/2 or X?  While it is not too
>super important, it is nice.

  What the hell does "squish down" mean?  If you mean visual feedback when it
is selected, you have several highlighting options, color complimenting as well
as alternative images to represent "pushed in" buttons, "toggled" switches and
so on.

>Can the WorkBemch gurus out there try to comment on the really whiz-bang
>aspect to custmization of the workbench?

  Yes!  the single most positive aspect of the Amiga is the absolutely painless
ability to switch screen resolutions.  Just open a requester (a dialog in OS/2
parlance), select the desired resolution and off you go.  There's none of this
simply horrific bullshit of having to boot off of a different paritition, or
worse yet, a floppy, in order to copy over the appropriate .DLL files to change
SVGA resolutions.

  Another thing is the pleasant lack of this whole nonsense with a CONFIG.SYS 
file.  

  Not only is the whole edit, shut-down, reboot cycle a chore, it can become a
maddening experience if a critical error is committed in the CONFIG.SYS file
and your OS/2 boot partition is an HPFS GA+SP one.  If you've not updated
the HPFS.IFS file on your GA floppy you're completely sunk and won't be able
to access the partition to fix the CONFIG.SYS file.

>Also, you hires WorkBench people have GOT to get some decent icons!!  Man,
>lots of Skip's icons looked all flattened-out like!

  Yeah, the Amiga lacks a rigid icon system, there's no conformity there at
all.  It doesn't make it unusable though.

  -jack-
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy