Re: [9fans] Re: Building GCC

[Pietro Gagliardi <pietro10@mac.com>]

I'm also saying that if and when Plan 9 does gets this layout feature  
that works like Oberon (which I tried, but never managed to get  
installed, so I have no first-hand experience - more of Wirth's junk  
in the trunk), people might be reluctant to leave Microsoft Word for  
it. acme does not need to support .doc. However, I don't think people  
would want to have a windowing environment where your commands are  
not accessed via a Start menu or Dock, where you use the right mouse  
button to create windows, and where there is no readily visible close  
button in a familiar place. For Plan 9, it's what we, its users,  
want, not what they, the rest of them that don't see us, want. If  
they do Plan 9, they'll probably get the QEMU module from somewhere  
in /n/sources/contrib to install Windows or go right to Inferno's wm/ 
wm (and Inferno's acme would need to be updated too) and skip all of  
Plan 9's glory.

On Jan 24, 2008, at 1:52 PM, erik quanstrom wrote:

>> Unfortunately, we're about 20 years too late. People have Microsoft
>> Word and they don't need an operating system with useful features,
>> automated backup at no additional cost, and a wealth of
>> documentation. I doubt I'll purchase Office:mac 2008 for my iMac, as
>> I use troff now. If you disagree, raise your virtual hands.
>
> it's quite a stretch to go from acme being able to handle layouts
> to microsoft word.  the oberon system had something like layouts,
> but layouts were part of the text module.  thus there was no such
> thing as plain text.  the next station had display postscript. but
> that's a quite complicated model.   i think text should be text and
> images should be images.
>
> but you just can't do graphics or html layout with just text.
> you need something to glue (sorry) things together.  it's
> fairly annoying that proof text is not selectable and doesn't
> work inside acme.
>
> i realize there are holes around the edges.  i don't see how to
> edit or select a layout, just the text within layouts.  maybe
> select skips non-text bits.
>
> what's so wrong about this idea?
>
> - erik