From: johnsd2@rs6219.ecs.rpi.edu (Daniel Norman Johnson)
Subject: Re: Why Macs are better (and the others aren't)
Reply-To: johnsd2@rpi.edu
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY.
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 04:55:02 GMT

In article <strobl.717719219@gmd.de>, strobl@gmd.de (Wolfgang Strobl) writes:
|> In <kmhzd9n@rpi.edu> johnsd2@vccnw01.its.rpi.edu (Daniel Norman Johnson) writes:
[deletia- About Cut+Paste]
|> 
|> >Really? What are they under MS-Windows? I udnerstood they were
|> >the the same thing, from the users point of view.
|> 
|> It depends on the user, of course. The main difference is that on the
|> Macintosh, the exact interpretation of *what* is cut is done during
|> cutting time, while on WIndows it can (not must, *can*) be delayed
|> until pasting time. 

I know about that. That's implementation stuff; the user should
not see it. Its supposed to ACT like you were copying something
to a clipboard, then pasting it back somewhere. Unlike Excel,
where "copy" means "select until I do something else"...

[deletia- guidelines for cross-gui porting]
|> What a pity! It really would have interested me to hear their
|> suggestions how to port Macintosh programs to other platforms
|> without violating the Human Interface Guidelines (and a few
|> other things) during that way. :-)

other things? :)

[deletia- documents vs applications]
|> 
|> Of course. But the simple minded one document to one application
|> linkage isn't a good implementation of that idea. OLE 1 and 2
|> seem to get into the near (and I'm sure that Apple has similar,
|> perhaps even better concepts). So we shouldn't waste our time
|> to compare one outdated and bad implementation of a theoretical
|> concept to another one.

Ok, let's not then.

[deletia- Finder vs Font Tool]

[deletia- Apple Menu Arguemnet]
|> 
|> This wasn't my argument. My argument was, that I tried and abadoned
|> that extension, because I had no real use (i.e. need) for it.
|> It was just an unnecessary complication. This disproves the
|> argument that something equivalent to the Apple menu is missing
|> on Windows.
|>

This is much like my saying that CLIs are useless cuz I dont like
using them, and dont find them necessary. Didn't believe me,
did you? :)

Well, I use the apple menu and the desktop all the time.
Lots easier than digging around for something to launch.

[deletia- confusion cleared up]
|> >|> This is perhaps because Windows doesn't use
|> >|> the "single menu bar at the top left of the screen" concept.
|> 
|> >I know; an apple menu as such would be inappropriate. But something
|> >like that. An addendum to the system menu, perhaps?
|> 
|> The extensions I tried do exactly that - they subclass the system
|> menu and use the standard menu editing system calls to add
|> their own stuff.
|> 
|> This doesn't work very well - in a way, the system menue of an
|> application is a system menu for *that* app, i.e. close *that*
|> app, or switch away from *that* app and so on. Application independent
|> functions don't belong there, imo. 

I see. I guess you are right.

|> Adding functionality to clicks to the background are a much better
|> way to get "the systems" attention. Windows itself uses a double click
|> to the background window to activate the task manager. I've used
|> a utility which uses the *right* mouse button click to the 
|> background to launch some kind of launch/switch popup menu, on
|> occasion and found it moderately usefull.

Ah, yes thats better. Of course, being able to have icons there
which you could darg&drop to would be even better. (I know from
personal experience; I keep much of my junk on the desktop juts
for this reason)

-- 
			- Dan Johnson
And God said "Jeeze, this is dull"... and it *WAS* dull. Genesis 0:0

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