Status of ToolBuilder
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I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo.
Are there any users? Are there any plans to update it to match the version of Squeak? Is it encouraged to build UIs with ToolBuilder? Lukas -- Lukas Renggli www.lukas-renggli.ch |
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On Tue, Nov 15, 2011 at 4:47 PM, Lukas Renggli <[hidden email]> wrote:
> I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo. > > Are there any users? Are there any plans to update it to match the > version of Squeak? Is it encouraged to build UIs with ToolBuilder? > > As much as I remember we removed it? Maybe in 1.4, though. -- Marcus Denker -- [hidden email] http://www.marcusdenker.de |
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In reply to this post by Lukas Renggli
On Nov 15, 2011, at 8:47 PM, Lukas Renggli wrote: > I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo. where? Because we removed it. > Are there any users? Are there any plans to update it to match the > version of Squeak? Is it encouraged to build UIs with ToolBuilder? no :) We were brainstorming on valueHolder, Spec and UIBuilder a la VW with Benjamin and we got the conclusions: Specs are cool because the same application Model can propose multiple spec valueHolder are the building brick to be able to reuse the application model UI logic (and not just the UI widgets). placing widgets on the screen is just a part of the story but the least interesting one because point 2 is more important. Now This is a brainstorming > > Lukas > > -- > Lukas Renggli > www.lukas-renggli.ch > |
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>> I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo.
> > where? > Because we removed it. It is contained in the Polymorph packages in Pharo 1.3, but it missing some and has additional other features compared to the version in Squeak. I was asking because OmniBrowser in Squeak is now using ToolBuilder, the code works with a few changes in Pharo 1.3 too. >> Are there any users? Are there any plans to update it to match the >> version of Squeak? Is it encouraged to build UIs with ToolBuilder? > > no :) > We were brainstorming on valueHolder, Spec and UIBuilder a la VW with Benjamin and we got the > conclusions: > Specs are cool because the same application Model can propose multiple spec That has nothing to do with specs though, there are many other ways of how multiple views can work with or provided by the same model. In my experience specs often lack the necessary dynamics to build useful UIs. So a lot of glue code is necessary to assemble the different parts. In the end I find it more convenient to just use the glue code (like in Seaside or ToolBuilder). > valueHolder are the building brick to be able to reuse the application model UI logic (and not just the UI widgets). I do not understand that point. Lukas -- Lukas Renggli www.lukas-renggli.ch |
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In reply to this post by Stéphane Ducasse
On Nov 16, 2011, at 6:31 PM, Lukas Renggli wrote: >>> I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo. >> >> where? >> Because we removed it. > > It is contained in the Polymorph packages in Pharo 1.3, but it missing > some and has additional other features compared to the version in > Squeak. > > I was asking because OmniBrowser in Squeak is now using ToolBuilder, > the code works with a few changes in Pharo 1.3 too. Does Toolbuilder make sense? To me it looked like yet another compatibility layer that does not bring anything (other than forcing anyone to use something that has to be compabtible to MVC). Marcus -- Marcus Denker -- http://marcusdenker.de |
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On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 1:53 PM, Marcus Denker <[hidden email]> wrote:
In general it abstracts away the specific UI used to present a tool and I'd say that was generally useful. Anyone wanting to experiment with a novel UI could benefit from ToolBuilder. In Squeak trunk there's even the ability to test it against Morphic and MVC. MVC is still useful for those trying to build minimal images.
best, Eliot |
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On 16 November 2011 21:58, Eliot Miranda <[hidden email]> wrote:
> > > On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 1:53 PM, Marcus Denker <[hidden email]> > wrote: >> >> On Nov 16, 2011, at 6:31 PM, Lukas Renggli wrote: >> >> >>> I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo. >> >> >> >> where? >> >> Because we removed it. >> > >> > It is contained in the Polymorph packages in Pharo 1.3, but it missing >> > some and has additional other features compared to the version in >> > Squeak. >> > >> > I was asking because OmniBrowser in Squeak is now using ToolBuilder, >> > the code works with a few changes in Pharo 1.3 too. >> >> >> Does Toolbuilder make sense? To me it looked like yet another >> compatibility >> layer that does not bring anything (other than forcing anyone to use >> something >> that has to be compabtible to MVC). > > In general it abstracts away the specific UI used to present a tool and I'd > say that was generally useful. Anyone wanting to experiment with a novel UI > could benefit from ToolBuilder. In Squeak trunk there's even the ability to > test it against Morphic and MVC. MVC is still useful for those trying to > build minimal images. It's also really useful for someone who knows just enough about Morphic to not want to know anything more about Morphic to still knock up a half-decent UI. I've found ToolBuilder useful for constructing new UIs, editing existing ones and being able to follow actions without needing to know much about about Morphic. frank >> >> Marcus >> >> >> -- >> Marcus Denker -- http://marcusdenker.de >> >> > > > > -- > best, > Eliot > |
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In reply to this post by Marcus Denker-4
>>> where?
>>> Because we removed it. >> >> It is contained in the Polymorph packages in Pharo 1.3, but it missing >> some and has additional other features compared to the version in >> Squeak. >> >> I was asking because OmniBrowser in Squeak is now using ToolBuilder, >> the code works with a few changes in Pharo 1.3 too. > > Does Toolbuilder make sense? To me it looked like yet another compatibility > layer that does not bring anything (other than forcing anyone to use something > that has to be compabtible to MVC). It is quite powerful given that it can run OmniBrowser. And the extra layer makes UI building trivially testable. This is not possible when directly using Morphs. For Pharo I will rewrite the OB UI builder to directly generate an optimized Polymorph GUI. This buys more us more flexibility. Lukas -- Lukas Renggli www.lukas-renggli.ch |
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In reply to this post by Marcus Denker-4
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> In general it abstracts away the specific UI used to present a tool and I'd say that was generally useful. Anyone wanting to experiment with a novel UI could benefit from ToolBuilder. In Squeak trunk there's even the ability to test it against Morphic and MVC. MVC is still useful for those trying to build minimal images. > MVC was removed in Pharo in 1.1... Why not make Morphic compact instead of keeping MVC? There is quite a lot of code everywhere in Squeak dealing with MVC compatibility.. very hard to clean up anything. E.g we removed Paragraph... and merged all multiple Paragraph classes of Morphic into one (called, ahh... Paragraph). E.g. getting a new Canvas would for shure be much harder if we would have kept MVC. > I've found ToolBuilder useful for constructing new UIs, editing > existing ones and being able to follow actions without needing to know > much about about Morphic. Why not make Morphic easy to use instead? Wasn't it supposed to be easy? Marcus -- Marcus Denker -- http://marcusdenker.de |
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On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 2:13 PM, Marcus Denker <[hidden email]> wrote:
Thta's not the point. ToolBuilder has backends for Morphic and MVC but one could add e.g. a backend for a native window/widget set, etc. The point is that it abstracts away from the specific widget/window set used to build a tool allowing one to experiment and evolve the system.
That's not the alternative, nor is it the rationale for ToolBuilder. A compact, easy-to-understand Morphic is orthogonal to the utility of ToolBuilder.
best, Eliot |
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In reply to this post by Marcus Denker-4
On Nov 16, 2011, at 7:09 PM, Lukas Renggli wrote: >>>> where? >>>> Because we removed it. >>> >>> It is contained in the Polymorph packages in Pharo 1.3, but it missing >>> some and has additional other features compared to the version in >>> Squeak. >>> >>> I was asking because OmniBrowser in Squeak is now using ToolBuilder, >>> the code works with a few changes in Pharo 1.3 too. >> >> Does Toolbuilder make sense? To me it looked like yet another compatibility >> layer that does not bring anything (other than forcing anyone to use something >> that has to be compabtible to MVC). > > It is quite powerful given that it can run OmniBrowser. Of course Omnibrowser makes it easy by not allowing anything else than what is in MVC (e.g, Trees). > And the extra > layer makes UI building trivially testable. This is not possible when > directly using Morphs. > What we need is a seperation between Morph and the Widgets on top of Morphic. This than will likely include some layer, too. But keeping Toolbuilder if you have no MVC and Tweak is not really useful. > For Pharo I will rewrite the OB UI builder to directly generate an > optimized Polymorph GUI. This buys more us more flexibility. > .. like trees. -- Marcus Denker -- http://marcusdenker.de |
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>>> Does Toolbuilder make sense? To me it looked like yet another compatibility
>>> layer that does not bring anything (other than forcing anyone to use something >>> that has to be compabtible to MVC). >> >> It is quite powerful given that it can run OmniBrowser. > > Of course Omnibrowser makes it easy by not allowing anything else than what is > in MVC (e.g, Trees). For sake of correctness: ToolBuilder supports trees since at least Squeak 3.9, but probably earlier. Lukas -- Lukas Renggli www.lukas-renggli.ch |
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In reply to this post by Lukas Renggli
Just to summarize it.ToolBuilder did not support the widgets of Polymorph like tab, drop boxes and others.
We removed it (it was discussed at ESUG in Barcelona). We discussed with esteban which was one of the few users. Now there is no tool builder in pharo. Toolbuilder was nice to get a minimal support for a limited set of widgets but it hampered new UI construction. We need to have better way to build and reuse widget logic. Lukas about the glue (and the spec) we will see. Right now we are trying to understand what we want. Ben will clean his 5 classes code so that we can think together. Stef > I was kind of surprised that ToolBuilder is still part of Pharo. > > Are there any users? Are there any plans to update it to match the > version of Squeak? Is it encouraged to build UIs with ToolBuilder? > > Lukas > > -- > Lukas Renggli > www.lukas-renggli.ch > |
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