Re: Objective-C 2.0 and other new features in Leopard

[Dr Tomaž Slivnik]

> As to the look, is there a reason why Camaelon still isn't part of  
> the standard GNUstep distribution?  Yes, the default look is clean,  
> but it's clean and very 80s.  Nesedah is clean and modern, and  
> Narcissus is even cleaner.  Using GNUstep apps without Camaelon  
> feels like stepping through a time warp.

For what it's worth, I like the "very 80s" look. What's wrong with  
the 80s look?

User interface is very hard to design well, and NeXT did an  
excellent, and, in my opinion, ever since unsurpassed, job. It is not  
easy to tinker with a good design and make it better.

The NeXT look-and-feel is consistent and minimalist. The (i) simple,  
(ii) square (iii) gray (iv) static GUI elements remain subdued in the  
background, and do not compete with the user's own data for the  
user's attention. The design looks as if it was carefully designed by  
a single brain who understood the design from a holistic point of  
view, had considered every angle of it, and trimmed out all the fat.

I contrast this with Apple's gummy, although similar considerations  
apply to other "modern" GUI designs which claim to be better.

Apple's GUI is an inconsistent hodge-podge of elements and looks like  
it was put together by a series of disjointed patches contributed by  
a battalion of summer job trainees, each staying on the job for a  
couple of months without understanding properly the design he was  
modifying and adding his own pet idea of an improvement without  
anyone ever thinking through its effect on the overall design.

Consider this:
  - one kind of close button on regular windows, another kind of  
close button on Dashboard widgets, and other apps (e.g. VLC) use yet  
other kinds of windows with yet other kinds of close buttons; Java  
applets, Flash animations etc. seem to have yet their own).
  - plasticky striped background on some aqua windows; brushed metal  
on others; and yet another "Leopard-style" background in iTunes and  
other apps
  - 3D, transparent, often bouncy user interface elements which  
distract the user from what he's doing. Should the Mail program's  
icon bounce irritatingly when it's temporarily lost 'net connection  
which will come back in a minute on its own and distract me from  
doing something more important I'm doing at the time?
  - one kind of spinning rainbow wheel in regular apps; seemingly  
another one in Carbon apps; etc.
  - colourful, animated gummy close/maximize/minimize buttons and  
scoll bars. Do I want to focus on my work or on playing video games  
with my ray-traced 3D animated GUI?
  - bloated: why is the maximize button there at all, for example?
  - non-ergonomically designed: why are the minimize and close  
buttons next to each other?

The input side is not much better:
  - horrendous time dependencies in the GUI (which NeXT thankfully  
lacks), e.g.
    - spring-loaded folders, fast-double-click-to-open/slow-double- 
click-to-rename in Finder,
    - time-dependent help balloons,
    - etc.

I can see advantages of themability - I'd certainly like to have it  
on my Apple. But only to make it look, feel, and work more like my NeXT.

Themability also comes with some pitfalls:

- it potentially makes the GUI design more complex, which means  
buggier and more time-consuming/expensive to develop;

- there is a risk that, if not properly used, developers will develop  
apps which only work / only work well with a particular theme - and  
possibly different apps working well with different themes.

I'd be more conservative in making claims we can so easily improve on  
the NeXT original design. I've looked at some of the themes offered  
in Camaeleon. They look interesting/OK. I personally prefer the NeXT  
design.

I think a theming engine is useful; but I'm not convinced it's such a  
great priority and I can see good reasons not to have it a part of  
the standard distribution (see pitfalls above).

Tomaž