Re: X is painful
On Wed, 13 Nov 1996, Bill Bumgarner wrote:
> Maybe I'm just spoiled by years of NEXTSTEP-- but, damnit, NEXTSTEP
> really is the most well-inntegrated user inrface *ever* built.
> Seriously.
i suppose that's a matter of personal preference.
I have to work with nextstep machines and can't stand it. it's bloated
and it's horribly slow and i can't customise it anywhere near as much as
i can X & fvwm (and fvwm derivatives).
I especially don't like the dock stealing an inch or so down the entire
right-hand side of my screen. I much prefer clicking on the root window
and getting a menu up: left-click for a launch menu, middle-click
for window operations, and right-click for list of open windows.
Functionality when i need it *WITHOUT* cluttering up my screen with crap
i dont need all the time.
I also intensely dislike next-style menus. I want menus inside the
application window, not cluttering up the top left hand corner of my
screen.
I am also far from impressed by nextstep's lack of stability - damnit,
unix boxes are *supposed to* stay up for months, not crash randomly for
no apparent reason. It's also extremely fussy about what hardware it
will run on - a big problem when motherboard models change every few
months and it's almost impossible now to get the old pentium boards
which nextstep will run on...newer HX & VX boards either crash randomly
or dont work at all. the latest compatibility problem is the adaptec
2940 driver. cant get the old 2940 cards any more...can only get 2940-AU
cards. The driver notes for NS say that it works on 2940-AU cards. In
practice it doesn't work at all...fails at install time with a message
about "can't get config space".
(note, i've only really worked with intel version of nextstep, so can
make no comment on stability of versions for other architectures except
that black box next stations are slow by today's standards)
All in all, my opinion of nextstep (as a user interface AND as a unix)
can be accurately summed up as "it was fabulous for 1988....however it's
1996 now". Another summary: "i'd rather use linux".
A good user interface should be layered on top of a stable, reliable
operating system....it shouldn't become an excuse for not creating that
stability. Functionality & stability come first. Prettiness second.
I guess you like what you get used to.
Craig
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