World: r3wp

New MS Word is missing the File, View, and Insert menus.... that'd 
take forever to get used to...

Are there any widgets that have transformed the online habits of 
anyone here?


1) Customizable real-time stock price monitor ... significantly faster 
and more versatile than traditional website equivalents.

2) Broadband usage monitor - aggregates several metrics into a simple 
display.


Widgets that are well-designed focus on solving a specific [informational] 
need. The advantages they have over traditional websites with the 
same content are:

a) Immediacy
b) Conciseness
c) Customizable

Could those examples be better addressed with an appropriately designed 
Reblet?  (I guess I make the reblet/widget distinction as 'reblet' 
= 1. behaving as a traditional application within the OS, in that 
it appears in the taskbar/dock and can be alt/cmd-tabbed to and 2. 
contained within an OS window, opaque though perhaps containing custom 
styling)

Again, not a rhetorical question -- I see both as filling a similar 
space, I think Carl described it as 'disposable applications', easy 
to author, easy to use.  Widgets look good, but break the windows 
metaphor, substituting gimmicky aesthetics for consistent user experience. 
 I'm not sure there is value in the effort to emulate them over 1. 
making it easier to communicate with the services that drive them 
(better XML handlers, more flexible HTTP protocol, I18N, whatever), 
2. making reblets more accessible (within the OS, not the browser), 
3. providing an effortless base for making reblets look and feel 
good (still a chore, despite the capability of the view engine).

On point 3, I know that is a goal of RebGUI, but the project underlines 
that it is not trivial to set up a UI of OS/typical Ajax quality 
out of the box.

Ah. But the windows metaphor may get on your way, wasting pixels, 
could you imagine an airplane control with windows interface? I think 
widget are good as Ashley pointed out. The approach apple took seem 
appropiate too.

I think that Viewtop was not bad idea - but when you look at public 
section, you see rather static/dead/non-live section .... it is like 
with rebol site Reichart was working on .... it needs to show evidence 
of life ...

it is not in widgets itself, but in categorisation per author, per 
theme, newest, most popular, etc etc. We have kind of categorisation 
experience with our librarian team ...

Chris - rebgui looks old, dull to me. Look at ad-aware look for e.g. 
There are two things - typical application, as db-stuff, etc., you 
want them to be system friendly. But I don't want my cool widget/reblet 
to look like W9X app ...

my long time experience - since the times of amiga, is, that if it 
catches your eye, you have already won typical user's attention. 
Sadly, but the rest is often "a technical detail". We miss some gfx 
guys here, as Chris is surely pressed for the time. View engine is 
created for non-typical designs, yet we were not successfull in utilising 
it ...

That's what I'm addressing -- it takes over much effort to make a 
good looking reblet UI, compared with say, making a Ajax-based app 
with HTML + CSS (not to say it's easier to provide app logic).

you are kidding, no? how can be Ajax and css easier to produce? in 
CSS you have to do it nearly manually (you said so to me some time 
ago :-)

hmm, maybe I missunderstand .... what might be easier is to provide 
final look, as css is independent to gui elements ...

but it should not be the problem to do the same using rebol ... you 
remember Gateway's RT catalogue? Looked very nice for such kind of 
app ...

Creating CSS manually is not necessarily a barrier.  I love the control 
it provides.

You would think.  But you have to dig deeper to get comparable results.

ok, what you miss in particular when you compare with creating such 
ui with rebol? You can start with placing images at concrete (absolute) 
position, not using auto-positioning mechanism too .... in opposite, 
ajax design means combination of js, html, css .... just asking

isn't it because you are a web guy? You know how to do design, you 
have visual editor etc. What would be needed for you to turn it into 
comparatively looking rebol equivalent?

I have my feet firmly in both camps.  I look for crossover, and look 
and feel is one part that is more consistent on the web.

but then you are not talking fully rich apps? Are you? Grid, tabs, 
combo-boxes, list-boxes, group-boxes, etc.

Also, while JS is inelegant compared with Rebol, it is not the millstone 
you make it out to be...

I am not sure I am the one who tries to pretend js is ugly or so 
;-) In fact, I start to like C-like/basic-like apps, and I am not 
sure I would learn functional language once again ....

Ajax is a clear combination of four components protocol (http), data/interface 
(html), presentation (css) and behaviour (js).  You can create a 
functional web app with the first two.  Then you can optimise by 
modifying behaviour.  Then (or from the beginning) make it look good 
with CSS.

what bothers me, for simple apps is, that for typical "developer" 
as me, I have to utilise html, css, javascript, visual tools ... 
and that is too much on me ...

What is the value of 'fully rich apps', at least for the sake of 
it?  If 'rich' allows for better expression of the problem at hand, 
then that's good.  However, there is a tendency to allow 'rich' to 
define the problem, that's bad.

Ashely, in addition to your list of a b c items, I would say simplicity 
is actually #1.  While immediacy is very important, people seem to 
really want and understand single word descriptions, that go no further.....Weather, 
Stock, Tasks, Music, etc.   Almost no prefs, and almost no buttons...

Sorry, and just realized, we should all move this convo out of here 
and into one of the UI groups...which one?  I would like to address 
Pekr and Chris on this CSS/Reblet issue, I think you will like my 
direction...

web?

or we can establish new group .... this is interesting topic .... 
I would like to get everybody's idea, as VID will be redone for 3.0 
.... maybe we could move more towards css aproach and the like ....?

Exactly my thought as well.

Let me look through the massive list.

Hmmm, I don't see anything that exactly nails this topic.  Clearly 
this about UI, VID, widgets, ease of developement.   Perhaps...

Some names
VID - This perhaps is the most direct.
UI - This works too, and perhaps it is "UI - VID, Others"

I will make it, and we can always rename.

or VID+

Done.

ah, strange issue .... I swear I saw your post being longer, then 
group became red once again, it seems like edited down :-)

Yes.  I posted the complete contents of my edit buffer (Word), and 
deleted it and restarted.  Not that anything was important, but it 
may have read oddly (even for my posts).

Btw, before leaving this group, Firebug (for Firefox) goes a long 
way to making JS more transparent...

Agreed.

I wonder if plug-in could be used as partial replacement for javascript?

I mean - integrated in similar way, for usage purposes, not to replace 
it ....

NetKernel OS - anyone heard of this one? http://www.1060.org/

JAVA 6 to support scripting, speed-up client side GUI, etc - http://www.betanews.com/article/Sun_Releases_Second_Java_6_Beta/1150922228

some of JAVA 6 features - http://java.sun.com/javase/6/webnotes/features.html

Level of scripting support in JAVA 6 - http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=223

http://www.byoms.com(but keep tracking www.kozoru.com)

java. hated by end-users so much it's had to retreat from desktops 
& browsers to hide on the server. :-)

and it can stay there.

The battle is shifting beyond Windows and Linux," he says. "Google 
isn't concerned about what executes down on the client machine, whether 
it's Windows or Linux. The action has moved up a level. The real 
innovation in software is not occurring in the context of the 1980s 
and 1990s PC. It's occurring in applications that reside in the broader 
Web. The interesting innovations are going to occur around different 
ways to organize and share and access information."" -- Paul Maritz 
(once 3rd in comand at Microsoft) regarding his new venture.. PI 
 http://www.forbes.com/technology/2006/06/23/linux_vista_open_cz_dl_0623linux.html