Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 8th Feb 2008 20:46 UTC, submitted by irbis
"It's one of the more popular culture wars in the free software community: GUI versus CLI (graphics versus the command-line). Programmers, by selection, inclination, and long experience, understandably are attracted to textual interactions with the computer, but the text interface was imposed originally by technological limitations. The GUI was introduced as a reply to those problems, but has undergone very little evolution from 1973 (when it was invented at Xerox PARC) to today. So why can't we do better than either of these tired old systems?"
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RE[2]: Thoughts on GUIs...
by kokara4a on Mon 11th Feb 2008 00:08
in reply to "RE: Thoughts on GUIs..."
Member since:2005-09-16
RE[3]: Thoughts on GUIs...
by Doc Pain on Mon 11th Feb 2008 00:18
in reply to "RE[2]: Thoughts on GUIs..."
Member since:2006-10-08
You can use Shift-PageUp and Shift-PageDown in Linux virtual console.
Yes, that's common knowledge. :-) The same key combination can be used in an xterm (on any Linux, BSD or Solaris, as far as I've experienced) where the ScrL key does not work (or at least does not have its native function).
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Member since:
2006-10-08
You're right, a good combination of keyboard and mouse (or other pointing devices, such as tablets) can improve a GUI's easyness of use. For example, I'm using WindowMaker as my main window manager, and a Sun type 6 keyboard. I can point into a window - the window gets focus - and press the "Front" key - the window gets into front, or "Back" - and the window goes into background. Rolling up windows, hiding them from the desktop or maximizing them is pssible this way, too, without needing to have several buttons on the title line (-, o, ^, v, x, _, ?).
I've seen bad examples, examples how not to implement a GUI, for example, no access to the menu via the keyboard. This is definitely not how it should be.
Which works in FreeBSD to scroll the console / VT output. :-)
You make me think of a possible alternative reality... interesting thought, interesting implications...