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Date:	Thu, 17 Jul 2003 08:46:03 PDT7
From:	Peter Skye <pskye@peterskye.com >
Reply-To:	scoug-programming@scoug.com
To:	scoug-programming@scoug.com
Subject:	SCOUG-Programming: button challenged

Content Type: text/plain

Lynn H. Maxson wrote:
>
> I've never considered that reformulating a process
> of existing technology based on an existing method
> of doing so as theoretical design.

My buttons were "theoretical" until Steven mentioned that the wheel had
already been invented.

> I guess until it's completed it remains theoretical.

Yup. :)

> Your enhanced help facility comes builtin to all fourth
> generation languages including AI and neural nets, in
> fact all of logic programming. It comes as a byproduct
> of the first proof, the completeness proof, of the
> two-stage proof engine. In the parlance it's called
> backtracking, taking you from the final cause-effect
> result of a sequence (or path) of such processes "back"
> through and to the initial set. Thus it is part and
> parcel of what I have been proposing.

Yes. Even lowly Rexx has a traceback when a function call results in an
error.

I was looking for a human interface, however. For example, suppose a
sophisticated date parser receives the date string

17Jul2003 2015

meaning 8:15 p.m. on July 17 2003, but instead returns the value

July 17, 2015

Why did it discard the value 2003? Why didn't it ask? A click on my
Ouch button and the parser would be called again with the same value but
asked to show _and_ _explain_ its actions -- perhaps it does find the
year value 2003 but then overwrites it with the second value 2015
without checking to see if a year value has already been found.

> the fixpaks of OS/2 offer a more protective form in that it
> also supports return from a newer version to the previous.

I've never had to revert to a prior version. In fact, if I did have to,
I don't know where I'd find the instructions to do so.

> The question then becomes one of control that you have
> over the level of [software] change. Does that control
> reside with you or with someone else? And at what level
> of detail?

Okay. New theoretical button. A "Newbie" button to tell the software
that the user is unconscious and not trust anything they do. Pressing
this button removes all control functionality from the user's grasp.

> I see no reason for an update button per se as much as I
> see a further purpose in a source maintenance system which
> offers you a choice of versions from the change of a single
> statement on up. That allows you to determine what changes
> you want and those you do not plus the ability to return to
> where you started or to an even earlier point.

That's a little too tunneled for me. Granted there are some software
apps where I want this control, but (for example) take the HTML
preprocessor PPWizard which is often updated. It's a tool and I just
want to use it; allow me to get the latest version without spending a
precious hour researching the often-minor touchups that are now
incorporated (the Update button could, I suppose, return the message
"Warning: Major Update - see the ReadMe" if the programmer felt it was
warranted).

> I would suggest that you forego the "update" button
> in favor of a system that allows you to "see" not
> only your version but all versions.

It's an ease-up-update issue, Lynn. If there's an update for my Pop3
monitor I just want to Update, I don't want to read about how the
programmer now allows you to choose any of 256 background colors. Give
me that option -- or are you trying to remove my control of that
option?

> That, my friend, is open source. Unfortunately its promise
> remains in your terms a "theoretical design". I'm working
> to remove it from that category. Unfortunately until
> the work is complete, until that version exists, it remains
> a theoretical design. Ah, the curse of all software.

Here's a challenge for you, Lynn. Why don't you introduce Open Source
to Henry Ford? Rather than have everyone go out and buy the parts and
then assemble their car at home, Henry created "experts" on his assembly
line who could each do a single job and do it very well. I'd like to
have a couple of such experts, an Update button and an Ouch button, who
would be available on all my software.

If I poked around in netbeans (hi Steven!) or sub-classing or C++ or
even frameworks I would probably find some kind of structure that this
could be built on. But the programs I use don't have Update or Ouch (or
Newbie) buttons. And I want them.

- Peter

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