On 10/15/2013 11:06 AM, Esteban
Lorenzano wrote:
But the change is away from proportional to monospace. I think the sale must be made as to what does that actually buy us. How does this improve our experience, pharo coherence? It seems that many of us here don't believe that it provides that coherence of UI/UX that your hoping to move us towards. So when changing from what we have, it seems that it needs to demonstrated that the change is for the better and not neutral or worse. I personally don't buy the it is less foreign to non-Smalltalkers argument. non-Smalltalkers would just move their distaste of Smalltalk somewhere else. Why do we have to use the image? Why can't I use Emacs, vim, Eclipse? Its all very personal and sometimes very visceral. I have seen some visceral comments from Igor regarding Python. I could make some from the C++ I've been looking at. We need to be the best open source Smalltalk-like experience. And not be constrained to other languages/editors/environments constraints and views on the world. So those who choose to advocate for a change. Advocate. Make the sale. Or else lets not make the change. Jimmie |
In reply to this post by Sven Van Caekenberghe-2
Pushing the newcomers argument: if newcomers are used to using if then else and switch case, why did you deprecate usage caseOf:? If newcomers argument counts, shouldn't we remove text editing, browser, etc..., go back to file based development and create an eclipse (or emacs) plugin? I saw very good arguments for proportional: more readable/natural/more text on the line... So I'm inlne with Pavel, Is there any argument for fixed space (but the hypothetical newcomer). There are some times when we must educate rather than imitate.2013/10/15 Sven Van Caekenberghe <[hidden email]>
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> If newcomers argument counts, shouldn't we remove text editing, browser, > etc..., go back to file based development and create an eclipse (or emacs) > plugin? we're on our way, github we're coming. In return, smalltalk is not defined by monospaced nor proportional fonts. So dear list, I am happy that you join this discussion, though invest your energy wisely: - have you fixed a bug today? - have you corrected a typo today? - have you reviewed a bug yet? If no, please have a look here: https://pharo.fogbugz.com/f/filters/45/Review signature.asc (457 bytes) Download Attachment |
In reply to this post by Nicolas Cellier
Sorry, not been following the thread but is there
really a problem?
Code font is specifiable in settings. Guess we are
all just arguing about what the default may be...
Regards, Gary
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In reply to this post by Camillo Bruni-3
If that's some sort of intimidation: contribute or shut up, then I'll shut up. Ciao2013/10/15 Camillo Bruni <[hidden email]>
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In reply to this post by Camillo Bruni-3
On 15 oct. 2013, at 14:46, Camillo Bruni wrote: > processing.org uses monospaced font, these are the art guys that have more sense graphics > than any one this mailinglist > (BTW, how many of you have visited an art school?) Me, many times. And surprisingly, most people there will tell you that (today's) art is not concerned with aesthetics :) > > Besides Smalltalk, I don't know any other language that would use proportial fonts. > > After that, anybody who really knows how to use Pharo can modify it. > The newcomer is the only one you target... > > On 2013-10-15, at 13:57, Goubier Thierry <[hidden email]> wrote: >> Interesting discussion. I'll raise a few issues. >> >> Le 15/10/2013 13:29, Esteban Lorenzano a écrit : >>> well... fonts and UX in general are two different (yet related) issues. >>> >>> UX is a huge an complicated task, and has to be taken very seriously if we want to succeed. To allow the appropriate/productive/happy flows in an environment requires a lot of effort and to put all the pieces together. >>> Yes, I know, that sounds so general that is like not saying anything :) >>> Here is the concrete: Put all the UX pieces together requires a lot of effort usually not taken into account. That's how the UX evolved more or less the same way as morphic: a patch over a patch without much thinking about the issue, just takign what is there and parching/extending as needed. As morphic, the current UX in pharo is broken: there is no coherence between tools and sometimes even inside the same tool (for example nautilus has different behavior inside the code panel than in the list panels on top). >>> This is not the fault of any tool, just a consequence of how evolution was managed until now. >> >> Some of the thing most forgot is that when you do a GUI, what takes time is not doing it, it's polishing it. Making sure all small things play together nicely, and that you've spent days trying to get that drag and drop to work in the perfect way, with the right feedback and all (and focus navigation, and...). >> >>> So, we wanted a better UX for Pharo3 that included: a new Theme, new Icon set, and new tools that worked well together. But task demonstrated to be a hard to beat beast, and we just moved forward in small areas (there is for example a new centralized menu coming along with a new spotlight). >>> And there is a prototype of a new theme and also some icons that where thought specially and that will fit nicely. But they will not be ready this year and after thinking a while (and getting feedback of people in community), we decided, for Pharo3: >>> >>> - adopt the glamour theme. This is a step forward our current one because glamour guys (specially Doru) continued working on it to have a really clean and simple theme. >> >> Is it the default theme coming with the latest 3.0, with that flat look? Hate it because it breaks one HCI guideline visual cue: feedback when pressing on a GUI element (scrollbars, buttons); there is none in that theme. >> >> There it looks like a step backward, coming back to the squeak look (which turned me away from squeak for many years: yes that's not rational but can't get over it. Pharo was the first to give me back the feedback at the GUI level) >> >>> - adopt the EclipsePack theme because is an iconset specially thought for programming that plays very well together. No matter if you do not like Eclipse (even if I think you are missing the relevance of Eclipse and a lot of good ideas that we could take from them), is about creating a unified vision. The old icon set (famfam) was not intended for programming environment and also there were a lot of different icons incorporated anarchically. >> >> Iconset are hard. But some of the Eclipse iconset are downright ugly (packages). >> >>> - adopt a monospaced font for coding (right now Source Code Pro) and a non-monospaced for the rest (right now Open Sans). >> >> Hum. Once you're set on a non-monospaced font for coding, as most smalltalkers have, going back to a monospaced font will hurt... I'm not even using a monospaced font for coding in C :( >> >>> The objective is to offer a L&F that where visual elements plays well together. >> >> Work on that is the real key. Not sure the theme changes are part of it, however. >> >> I value more a drive to get everything Spec-iffied: tends to create a lot of common look and feel because applications tend to behave in the same way. >> >>> And there is another more important (IMHO) objective: to offer newcomers an environment easier to approach. Pharo (and all Smalltalk-inspired environments) is already very alien for newcomers. We get a lot of power in exchange of that alienish stuff, but very often the curve of learning or acceptance is too high and people that could step closer to us are pushed away. So, my idea is to keep been as alien as possible in the things that make us Pharo and be the less alien possible in the rest: A nice L&F that can be feel as "some kind" familiar, is part of it. >> >> It's a good objective, but... There is something there; Pharo is different enough in it's approach that trying to match Eclipse won't work and may even disrupt more, because you will make it alike where it is not. >> >>> Said so... well you still can switch back to the old and ugly (IMO) L&F executing some lines of code in your workspace. >> >> Or a setting somewhere :) >> >>> Same to fonts: monospaced fonts is the worldwide accepted way of present source code. Why should we stay different? >> >> I wouldn't be so sure of that. >> >>> In any case, please give it a chance before drop it (once I can actually see why the fonts are not really applied) and we'll see how it works. >> >> I will :) But, I'd be frank, here none of us is a HCI specialist, and it shows. Sorry, but it does. No usability testing, no look into HCI guidelines, but, at the same time, probably the most advanced GUI toolkit available (Morphic), some of the best mind when it comes to architecturing GUI code (and code on average), and the most productive environment around. >> >> If you want to make it familiar, look into Dolphin and VisualWorks and copy that :) >> >> Thierry >> -- >> Thierry Goubier >> CEA list >> Laboratoire des Fondations des Systèmes Temps Réel Embarqués >> 91191 Gif sur Yvette Cedex >> France >> Phone/Fax: +33 (0) 1 69 08 32 92 / 83 95 >> > |
OT: Call for politeness.
Please people, keep the discussion constructively, I'm the first of apologies for/whe crossing the line. All opinions are relevant, every disagreement can put us a step closer to a consensus if we try to stay cool :) On Oct 15, 2013, at 7:37 PM, Camille Teruel <[hidden email]> wrote: > > On 15 oct. 2013, at 14:46, Camillo Bruni wrote: > >> processing.org uses monospaced font, these are the art guys that have more sense graphics >> than any one this mailinglist >> (BTW, how many of you have visited an art school?) > > Me, many times. > And surprisingly, most people there will tell you that (today's) art is not concerned with aesthetics :) > >> >> Besides Smalltalk, I don't know any other language that would use proportial fonts. >> >> After that, anybody who really knows how to use Pharo can modify it. >> The newcomer is the only one you target... >> >> On 2013-10-15, at 13:57, Goubier Thierry <[hidden email]> wrote: >>> Interesting discussion. I'll raise a few issues. >>> >>> Le 15/10/2013 13:29, Esteban Lorenzano a écrit : >>>> well... fonts and UX in general are two different (yet related) issues. >>>> >>>> UX is a huge an complicated task, and has to be taken very seriously if we want to succeed. To allow the appropriate/productive/happy flows in an environment requires a lot of effort and to put all the pieces together. >>>> Yes, I know, that sounds so general that is like not saying anything :) >>>> Here is the concrete: Put all the UX pieces together requires a lot of effort usually not taken into account. That's how the UX evolved more or less the same way as morphic: a patch over a patch without much thinking about the issue, just takign what is there and parching/extending as needed. As morphic, the current UX in pharo is broken: there is no coherence between tools and sometimes even inside the same tool (for example nautilus has different behavior inside the code panel than in the list panels on top). >>>> This is not the fault of any tool, just a consequence of how evolution was managed until now. >>> >>> Some of the thing most forgot is that when you do a GUI, what takes time is not doing it, it's polishing it. Making sure all small things play together nicely, and that you've spent days trying to get that drag and drop to work in the perfect way, with the right feedback and all (and focus navigation, and...). >>> >>>> So, we wanted a better UX for Pharo3 that included: a new Theme, new Icon set, and new tools that worked well together. But task demonstrated to be a hard to beat beast, and we just moved forward in small areas (there is for example a new centralized menu coming along with a new spotlight). >>>> And there is a prototype of a new theme and also some icons that where thought specially and that will fit nicely. But they will not be ready this year and after thinking a while (and getting feedback of people in community), we decided, for Pharo3: >>>> >>>> - adopt the glamour theme. This is a step forward our current one because glamour guys (specially Doru) continued working on it to have a really clean and simple theme. >>> >>> Is it the default theme coming with the latest 3.0, with that flat look? Hate it because it breaks one HCI guideline visual cue: feedback when pressing on a GUI element (scrollbars, buttons); there is none in that theme. >>> >>> There it looks like a step backward, coming back to the squeak look (which turned me away from squeak for many years: yes that's not rational but can't get over it. Pharo was the first to give me back the feedback at the GUI level) >>> >>>> - adopt the EclipsePack theme because is an iconset specially thought for programming that plays very well together. No matter if you do not like Eclipse (even if I think you are missing the relevance of Eclipse and a lot of good ideas that we could take from them), is about creating a unified vision. The old icon set (famfam) was not intended for programming environment and also there were a lot of different icons incorporated anarchically. >>> >>> Iconset are hard. But some of the Eclipse iconset are downright ugly (packages). >>> >>>> - adopt a monospaced font for coding (right now Source Code Pro) and a non-monospaced for the rest (right now Open Sans). >>> >>> Hum. Once you're set on a non-monospaced font for coding, as most smalltalkers have, going back to a monospaced font will hurt... I'm not even using a monospaced font for coding in C :( >>> >>>> The objective is to offer a L&F that where visual elements plays well together. >>> >>> Work on that is the real key. Not sure the theme changes are part of it, however. >>> >>> I value more a drive to get everything Spec-iffied: tends to create a lot of common look and feel because applications tend to behave in the same way. >>> >>>> And there is another more important (IMHO) objective: to offer newcomers an environment easier to approach. Pharo (and all Smalltalk-inspired environments) is already very alien for newcomers. We get a lot of power in exchange of that alienish stuff, but very often the curve of learning or acceptance is too high and people that could step closer to us are pushed away. So, my idea is to keep been as alien as possible in the things that make us Pharo and be the less alien possible in the rest: A nice L&F that can be feel as "some kind" familiar, is part of it. >>> >>> It's a good objective, but... There is something there; Pharo is different enough in it's approach that trying to match Eclipse won't work and may even disrupt more, because you will make it alike where it is not. >>> >>>> Said so... well you still can switch back to the old and ugly (IMO) L&F executing some lines of code in your workspace. >>> >>> Or a setting somewhere :) >>> >>>> Same to fonts: monospaced fonts is the worldwide accepted way of present source code. Why should we stay different? >>> >>> I wouldn't be so sure of that. >>> >>>> In any case, please give it a chance before drop it (once I can actually see why the fonts are not really applied) and we'll see how it works. >>> >>> I will :) But, I'd be frank, here none of us is a HCI specialist, and it shows. Sorry, but it does. No usability testing, no look into HCI guidelines, but, at the same time, probably the most advanced GUI toolkit available (Morphic), some of the best mind when it comes to architecturing GUI code (and code on average), and the most productive environment around. >>> >>> If you want to make it familiar, look into Dolphin and VisualWorks and copy that :) >>> >>> Thierry >>> -- >>> Thierry Goubier >>> CEA list >>> Laboratoire des Fondations des Systèmes Temps Réel Embarqués >>> 91191 Gif sur Yvette Cedex >>> France >>> Phone/Fax: +33 (0) 1 69 08 32 92 / 83 95 >>> >> > > |
In reply to this post by Gary Chambers-4
<base href="x-msg://9588/">
On Oct 15, 2013, at 6:53 PM, Gary Chambers <[hidden email]> wrote:
exactly :)
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In reply to this post by Nicolas Cellier
well... I already said it: being welcoming does not means becoming another language.
The proposal is to remove non-sense differences, not to remove the ones that actually matters (and syntax matters a lot). And yes, sometimes (like when we deprecated #caseOf:) we need to enforce differences, just because we are another environment, another language, another libraries (and #caseOf: like the abuse of ifs is procedural programming... or encourages procedural programming). On Oct 15, 2013, at 6:42 PM, Nicolas Cellier <[hidden email]> wrote:
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In reply to this post by Pavel Krivanek-3
Thanks Pavel. I don't have a strong philosophical opinion either way, so its good to have a concrete example to compare. Monospacing aside, I like the proposed font. It is strong and very readable. However I think actually you need to compare using "setSourceCodeFonts: 9." since otherwise you only get 80% of the line length with the proposed font, which would be a point against your specific example above. I generally advocate making things more attractive to newcomers who come for a taste-test. After all you do want those taste-test newcomers to stick around to grow the community. However this needs to be balanced against the burden for the older community. So I have a new related proposal based on three points: 1. Emotive issues such a familiar font-spacing do affect people's decision making. So it is good to eliminate these emotive blockers so they don't unreasonably deter people before they discover the technical advantages of Smalltalk. 2. Jimmy makes a good point that: "A beginner will often stay with what they start with for a very long time." Yet once newcomers get familiar with Smalltalk, you likely have them hooked. Then fonts are less of an issue. So while you want to cater to a newcomers (possible) preference for monospaced fonts, you want to encourage them to adopt our community standard for proportional fonts. 3. Eliot made the point that other languages are "orthogonal to fonts." This made me consider that any community might standardize on a particular font, but the developers of the C stdlib can use one font, while the developers of GTK and python can each use different fonts, while the developers of an end-user application using all those can use yet another font. In contrast, "in practice" Pharo is restricted to only one font across a broad range of different packages. So that got me wondering... could it be useful for different packages(or categories) be able to specify their standard font. While the disadvantage is increasing the size of the task, but the advantages are: a. Infrastructure packages delivered with the image where the existing community do a lot of work remains proportional with having the fiddle with any preference systems. b. Newcomers don't have much to do with editing that infrastructure, so they are unaffected by this. By the time they consider changing things, they are no longer newcomers and btw you already have them hooked if they are even considering updating that code. c. Newcomers get the make the CHOICE for their OWN code. This choice eliminates proportional/monospace as an emotive "reason" to reject Smalltalk. d. Over time as newcomers debug their code, they are inherently exposed to the proportional font of the infrastructure code. From this they become familiar with and subsequently more comfortable with proportional fonts, and over time hopefully tend to align with the general community. Regarding the added complexity of different fonts per package. Previously raised was the idea that packages have custom lists of disabled code-critics, so perhaps it links in with that part of the UI. anyway, just brainstorming... there are probably lots of holes in that proposal I haven't stopped to think about. Have fun chopping it up. cheers -ben |
In reply to this post by EstebanLM
And can I have a setting with the
- Pharo theme (not pharo3) - and the eclipse icon set ? :) (Of course I should set an issue and write a Slice, otherwise Camillo will get angry at me ;)) Thierry De : Pharo-dev [[hidden email]] de la part de Esteban Lorenzano [[hidden email]]
Date d'envoi : mardi 15 octobre 2013 20:07 À : Pharo Development List Objet : Re: [Pharo-dev] default monospaced code font On Oct 15, 2013, at 6:53 PM, Gary Chambers <[hidden email]> wrote:
exactly :)
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In reply to this post by Nicolas Cellier
However there are some points worth discussing. My earlier proposal tries to find some middle ground. cheers -ben Nicolas Cellier wrote: If that's some sort of intimidation: contribute or shut up, then I'll shut up. Ciao 2013/10/15 Camillo Bruni [hidden email]If newcomers argument counts, shouldn't we remove text editing, browser, etc..., go back to file based development and create an eclipse (oremacs)plugin?we're on our way, github we're coming. In return, smalltalk is not defined by monospaced nor proportional fonts. So dear list, I am happy that you join this discussion, though invest your energy wisely: - have you fixed a bug today? - have you corrected a typo today? - have you reviewed a bug yet? If no, please have a look here: https://pharo.fogbugz.com/f/filters/45/Review |
In reply to this post by Goubier Thierry
<base href="x-msg://10065/">theme and iconset are decoupled, so yes you can :)
problem is that I still didn't added the preference for choosing iconsets (my bad, didn't have the time yet).
On Oct 15, 2013, at 8:19 PM, GOUBIER Thierry <[hidden email]> wrote:
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It's just that changing the theme also changes the iconset in the settings at the moment, that's all. Nothing much, really.
I do like what you're trying to do, and I like to see this being discussed. I do think this is an important issue and I'd like to see a more unified GUI, for one. Would make it a lot simpler to describe to newcomers instead of describing half a dozen different GUIs for doing more or less the same thing: system browser, message browser, finder, change set, packages browser, spotlight. I'm half-way through that with my Alt Browser, but it starts to take its toll on my ability to invest in it (and its complete enough for me not needing to work on it much; no itch to scratch anymore :)). Thierry De : Pharo-dev [[hidden email]] de la part de Esteban Lorenzano [[hidden email]]
Date d'envoi : mardi 15 octobre 2013 20:31 À : Pharo Development List Objet : Re: [Pharo-dev] default monospaced code font theme and iconset are decoupled, so yes you can :)
problem is that I still didn't added the preference for choosing iconsets (my bad, didn't have the time yet).
On Oct 15, 2013, at 8:19 PM, GOUBIER Thierry <[hidden email]> wrote:
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<base href="x-msg://8009/">Well…
I'm for monospaces font because you can make your code look nice at last. And yes you are writing code, instructions for one of the most stupid things in the world: a computer. And no, it's not meant for people. It's good that we can make it more understandable for ourselves by giving items appropriate names, and it's good that pharo has not a lot of rules that we have to follow (language grammar). Ruby has something that makes you read a code like a prose, but when it comes to understanding you don't have any idea what of the special cases took place in that part of code. Please, don't tell that you want to read code like a newspaper. News paper is for humans only, code is used by computer. uko P.S. don't be mad, it's just my humble opinion On Oct 15, 2013, at 8:59 PM, GOUBIER Thierry <[hidden email]> wrote:
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Hi uko,
I'd disagree with you :) simply because I spend a lot of time reading code... readable code, recognizable code (I use my memory when scanning code, recognizing shapes is much faster than literal reading). So I'd take seriously anybody who tells me than the switch to a monospaced font disturbs its ability to read Smalltalk code... That is per essence a usability issue and should come to no surprise to anybody of that field. And yes, I find reading github diffs (monospaced font) on my own code painfull. For one, my web browser isn't wide enough for long lines :) Regards, Thierry De : Pharo-dev [[hidden email]] de la part de Yuriy Tymchuk [[hidden email]]
Date d'envoi : mardi 15 octobre 2013 21:12 À : Pharo Development List Objet : Re: [Pharo-dev] default monospaced code font Well…
I'm for monospaces font because you can make your code look nice at last. And yes you are writing code, instructions for one of the most stupid things in the world: a computer. And no, it's not meant for people. It's good that we can make it more understandable
for ourselves by giving items appropriate names, and it's good that pharo has not a lot of rules that we have to follow (language grammar). Ruby has something that makes you read a code like a prose, but when it comes to understanding you don't have any idea
what of the special cases took place in that part of code. Please, don't tell that you want to read code like a newspaper. News paper is for humans only, code is used by computer.
uko
P.S. don't be mad, it's just my humble opinion
On Oct 15, 2013, at 8:59 PM, GOUBIER Thierry <[hidden email]> wrote:
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In reply to this post by Sven Van Caekenberghe-2
OK, so with Pavel's code I got my 3.0 image capable of showing the new fonts. Since I do respect those arguing in favour, I will give it a try - but I am still not sure why it had to change in the first place.
I think the progression from Small to Medium is skipping at least one step (10 -> 13), here is my setup for now: On 15 Oct 2013, at 18:28, Sven Van Caekenberghe <[hidden email]> wrote:
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I like those fonts, and are actually my default setup (+ the new plain them also) :) On Tue, Oct 15, 2013 at 9:29 PM, Sven Van Caekenberghe <[hidden email]> wrote:
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In reply to this post by Sven Van Caekenberghe-2
Nice wall of (mono|proportional) text guys... Just ship a couple of preferences files and be done with this, no?
As we are talking about usability, let me tell you that having a proper dark theme (and not the Moose Retina Burner (tm) one - whiter than white, kill the remaining cells style) would do marvels.
I got eye surgery in both eyes and enough white, it hurts and shows shadows with floaters, which, no matter how proportional or fixed font, makes the chars unreadable as they are behind the shadow.
Here are some useful pointers to what they do at JetBrains: http://blog.jetbrains.com/blog/2013/06/11/inside-darcula-look-and-feel-an-interview-with-konstantin-bulenkov/
Theming Pharo dark is a major undertaking (as colors are all over in the most erratic possible way - for fun, turn the background of controls to nuclear green and see where that shows). And trying to lake one proved to be non useful on 2.0 as 3.0 has everything changed already (as Ben showed me at one point).
But if one manages to do that, it would mean that the themes are somewhat more under control. So, WTF about fonts, what matters to me is dark stuff. (some more fuel to the fire, sorry couldn't resist).
Phil |
In reply to this post by Eliot Miranda-2
I kindly disagree :).
I answered the request of Sven because I felt the discussion was highly unfair towards Esteban and I just offered my relaxed support. I see little constructivism in this discussion and my actual arguments would likely not add any value at this point. Doru On Tue, Oct 15, 2013 at 5:47 PM, Eliot Miranda <[hidden email]> wrote:
"Every thing has its own flow"
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