From: zarthac@bradley.edu (Matthew Simmons)
Subject: Re: More Amiga OS weaknesses and strengths
Organization: J. Random Misconfigured Site
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 01:29:52 GMT
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Evan Torrie (torrie@cs.stanford.edu) wrote:
: mikeh@starnine.com (Mike Haas) writes:
: >But you were the one talking about how you could intermic graphics & text
: >in Apples simple little Teachtext app.  I just pointed out that
: >you were wrong.

:   Well, you can, but TeachText doesn't have an interface to do so.
: There are lots of TeachText files with graphics mixed with text.  They
: just have to be created in a separate app (the shareware Belgian Postcards).
If you try to tell me that you don't think this is a Bad Thing, I think 
I'll have to scream.

: >Here's a mac example, Marc.  Open a small window, Open a big window.
: >Cover the small window with the big window so that it's completely
: >covered.

: >Now... there is no way on the mac to get at the small window without
: >either MOVING or CLOSING the big window... both of those operations
: >are "permanent" i.e. remembered by the mac until you change them again.

:   I see you're not using NextPrev, which lets you cycle through windows
: and applications with a Command-Tab keypress.
Oh, I see... You're supposed to use the KEYBOARD to manipulate stuff in a
WIMP environment... That makes sense... (BTW, there is no K in WIMP, it's 
supposed to be Window, Icon, Mouse, Pointer.  I let you get away with the
cleanup thing, because its just two different ways of doing the same thing,
but this is inexcusable)


: >>   Have you tried loading an icon larger than 80x40 into IconEdit?  The icon
: >>gets truncated.  Commodore is trying to enforce size limits, too.  Good idea,
: >>because the Amiga's rather large icons are the reasons that things like 
: >>automatic feedback during drag&drop can't work very well.  

: >So?  There is still a range of sizess available... not just one like on the
: >inflexible macintosh.

:   Actually, cicns are not limited to 32x32.  It's just that the Finder only
: supports 32x32 icons.
Oh, sure...  So I'll just be Joe Average Computer User and write my own
Finder to load bigger icons.  That's like saying a computer can socket 32 meg,
but can only use 16.  (Unless we soft-switch it.. =)  Anybody but me remember
programming the Apple //e?)

: >>>instead of fixing it, Apple released tech note #14 which lamely tries
: >>>to justify why it's OK for GetNewDialog() to NOT return an error
: >>>code!  (Basically sez if the user has mucked with a programs resources,
: >>>he DESERVES TO CRASH!)

: >But we're talking user-interface here, marc, and USER'S AREN'T SUPPOSED
: >TO MUCK WITH MAC RESOURCE FORKS.

:   What position are you trying to argue for?  You castigate Apple for
: their excuse in one sentence, and then seem to agree with
: their excuse in the next.
This would be an attempt to get Marc to be consistant in an argument for 
once in his life.  Oh, BTW, I can't believe it, but I think I found Marc's
evil twin!  He's on my system, he's as arrogant as Marc, but a liberal..

: >  The fact that they can get themselves into
: >so much trouble doing it is a liability.

:   So, the Amiga handles users binary editing executable files, and
: deleting parts of the data?  That is the analogous situation to the use
: of ResEdit.
Well, Joe Schmoe isn't gonna be able to edit the files..  The editors I've
seen are PD... You kinda have to hunt for them...  But any OS that didn't
allow the editing of the entire file, well..., we won't get into that...

: >And just think about the implications of Apples engineering fiasco of
: >GetNewDialog().  It means that ANYTIME A MAC APPLICATION OPENS A DIALOG,
: >IT MIGHT CRASH AND THE APPLICATION CAN'T DO A THING ABOUT IT.

:   Yes, the application can do a thing about it.  Read the Tech Note.
: If you're really worried about your app crashing when some user
: has hacked out part of your program, then you can use GetResource
: to check whether the dialog is there before displaying it. 
Do you see a problem with this?  You have to call a _second_ function to
see if the first one worked?  Problem?  Uhhhhh, yeah....

: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
: Evan Torrie.  Stanford University, Class of 199?       torrie@cs.stanford.edu 

: "...there is only one thing worse than having marketing people on a project,
:  and that is having no marketing people on a project."  - Larry Tesler.
Except in the case of C=

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Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy