Re: project goal Re: Release schedule

[Jeff Teunissen]

Chris Hanson wrote:

> At 4:32 AM -0400 4/14/03, Jeff Teunissen wrote:
> >PB is decent for one-offs, or for people who are new to this whole
> >programming thing. For that reason alone, it's good to have...but it's
> >not a replacement for a proper shell environment.
> 
> I suspect you're actually referring to GNUstep ProjectCenter (PC)
> above and not Apple/NeXT Project Builder.

I certainly am referring to Project Builer.

> Project Builder is a development environment that thousands of very
> experienced developers spend their daily professional lives using.

Not relevant. Hundreds of thousands professional developers spend their
daily professional lives using Visual Studio too, and that's bat
excrement. There's nothing particularly special about PB.

The difference is that I have an easy choice, while on OS X you virtually
*have* to use Apple's tools. On my OPENSTEP box, I have the choice between
PB and makefiles, and on my GNUstep/Linux machine I have an easy choice
between PC and direct makefile editing.

[snip]

> Have you used Project Builder on Mac OS X?  Its power isn't nearly so
> limited as you seem to think it is.  After all, you can create
> arbitrary shell script and AppleScript build phases for arbitrary
> phases of your build -- this puts it on par with makefiles when it
> comes to common use.
                                      ^ almost

> Using makefiles instead of a good IDE is like hard-coding an
> application's human interface instead of using Interface Builder or
> its equivalent.

No, it's like writing makefiles instead of using an IDE. There is no
connection to be made between the two.

> (Though I can understand why people whose only exposure to such tools
> has been Microsoft Visual Studio might think otherwise, on both
> counts.  I don't know if that describes you, but I know it describes
> a lot of the knee-jerk anti-IDE sentiment seen in the Unix community.)

It certainly does not describe me. I *have* used many different IDEs,
including Project Builder. I prefer writing makefiles...it's easier.

There's nothing knee-jerk about any of my sentiments.

> >There's a (slight) benefit in file management within a project, but if
> >I'm editing my Makefiles with a text editor anyway, I'll already have a
> >shell running.
> 
> There's a substantial benefit to many professional users, at least
> with the modern Project Builder, because it doesn't just do file
> management.  It does a lot of dependency tracking and management for
> you too -- and you don't have to do a bunch of work up front to set
> it up like you do with most makefile-based systems.

A "bunch of work up front"? What, pray tell, would that work be? Copy a
couple of files into a directory and do some trivial editing.

Maybe you're not familiar with the NeXT makefile package, or the GNUstep
makefile package. They make it trivial to set up a new build system, and
all the power of make and the shell are right there for you to use without
changing thought modes.

I stand by my statement. PB is no replacement for a proper shell
environment.

-- 
| Jeff Teunissen  -=-  Pres., Dusk To Dawn Computing  -=-  deek @ d2dc.net
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| Core developer, The QuakeForge Project        http://www.quakeforge.net/
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