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Text is good for efficiency. Not for learning. When I see a UI of an app - I can at one instant see all the possible things that can be done using it. text st

by 1971genocide 11y ago

Text is good for efficiency. Not for learning. When I see a UI of an app - I can at one instant see all the possible things that can be done using it. text starts becoming a problem when their is a combinatronical explosion in what you can do with your app. I cannot imagine Photoshop, Maya or After Effects to be text based. Its a fairly interesting computer science question to me.

dllthomas 11y ago
"I cannot imagine Photoshop [...] to be text based." ImageMagick is amazing. There are certainly tasks for which the interface is more awkward than Photoshop (or GIMP), but there are tasks for which the opposite is true. For instance, I was easily able to write a script for "take a screenshot, detect where the variably-sized error message box appears within it and crop to it".
detaro 11y ago
Maya at least has strong scripting support from what I've heard. Similarly Blender. Which IMHO is a great way: have a GUI, but also have a scriptable console.
miguelrochefort 11y ago
It should be the job of the operating system to expose a coherent and flexible set of tools, features, and UI paradigms that people can use across many different use-cases (nowadays called "apps"). Copy and Paste, although poor operators in retrospect, is such an example. Undo is an other, much better one. I firmly believe that we could reduce or eliminate most application-specific commands by increasing the standard set provided by the OS. Some kind of semantic primes that could be composed into anything. A new UI language if you will.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
ddingus 11y ago
The MEL language is a huge part of MAYA, and it's the guts that do lots of the work. Part of the magic of MAYA is the killer GUI for making models, etc... The real heavy lifting comes from the tight integration between MEL and that GUI, which permits all sorts of things to be made and then quickly manipulated using the SAME MAYA GUI.
- 1971genocide 11y ago
  I agree - having done Python programming in Maya. The scripting allows you to really super-charge your work. But What I meant is When I started working with Maya initially - I was already put off by the extremely complex GUI. Trying to program ? I do not think many programmers appreciative the deep learning curve needed - and the average modeler is not adequately equiped.
  - ddingus 11y ago
    I had similar experiences. And that applied to MCAD too, not just general 3D modeling. That is a complex UI space to manage. The data is complex, there are nearly always multiple interaction modes, selections, etc... going on too. Back when I learned on 8 bit computers, it was kind of easy because they didn't do much. One soon found themselves into the guts of the machine doing assembly language to make any magic happen. All from books, magazines, peers, etc... Looking at listings was high value. Well, today we've got YouTube and it's awesome! I can watch somebody model, or program, or do both. It is a deep curve, but we've got so much better learning now. Back when I learned CAD and things like MAYA, I had to do it old school. Get the book, go. I had the advantage of some peers who would give me some help, or do a quick tutorial. Know what? I videotaped one of those, a little precursor to what we have today. There is a worry I have of hobbling great UI models by over engineering this learning curve bit. Where we can simplify, we should, but not at the expense of the peak use capability possible by experienced and adept users. MAYA, and many CAD packages are bending that line, and it hurts at times. People who know their stuff could be sharing it just as much as relearning or working around the changes needed to reduce the need for said sharing.

dllthomas 11y ago

"I cannot imagine Photoshop [...] to be text based." ImageMagick is amazing. There are certainly tasks for which the interface is more awkward than Photoshop (or GIMP), but there are tasks for which the opposite is true. For instance, I was easily able to write a script for "take a screenshot, detect where the variably-sized error message box appears within it and crop to it".

detaro 11y ago

Maya at least has strong scripting support from what I've heard. Similarly Blender. Which IMHO is a great way: have a GUI, but also have a scriptable console.

miguelrochefort 11y ago

It should be the job of the operating system to expose a coherent and flexible set of tools, features, and UI paradigms that people can use across many different use-cases (nowadays called "apps"). Copy and Paste, although poor operators in retrospect, is such an example. Undo is an other, much better one. I firmly believe that we could reduce or eliminate most application-specific commands by increasing the standard set provided by the OS. Some kind of semantic primes that could be composed into anything. A new UI language if you will.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

ddingus 11y ago

The MEL language is a huge part of MAYA, and it's the guts that do lots of the work. Part of the magic of MAYA is the killer GUI for making models, etc... The real heavy lifting comes from the tight integration between MEL and that GUI, which permits all sorts of things to be made and then quickly manipulated using the SAME MAYA GUI.

1971genocide 11y ago
I agree - having done Python programming in Maya. The scripting allows you to really super-charge your work. But What I meant is When I started working with Maya initially - I was already put off by the extremely complex GUI. Trying to program ? I do not think many programmers appreciative the deep learning curve needed - and the average modeler is not adequately equiped.
- ddingus 11y ago
  I had similar experiences. And that applied to MCAD too, not just general 3D modeling. That is a complex UI space to manage. The data is complex, there are nearly always multiple interaction modes, selections, etc... going on too. Back when I learned on 8 bit computers, it was kind of easy because they didn't do much. One soon found themselves into the guts of the machine doing assembly language to make any magic happen. All from books, magazines, peers, etc... Looking at listings was high value. Well, today we've got YouTube and it's awesome! I can watch somebody model, or program, or do both. It is a deep curve, but we've got so much better learning now. Back when I learned CAD and things like MAYA, I had to do it old school. Get the book, go. I had the advantage of some peers who would give me some help, or do a quick tutorial. Know what? I videotaped one of those, a little precursor to what we have today. There is a worry I have of hobbling great UI models by over engineering this learning curve bit. Where we can simplify, we should, but not at the expense of the peak use capability possible by experienced and adept users. MAYA, and many CAD packages are bending that line, and it hurts at times. People who know their stuff could be sharing it just as much as relearning or working around the changes needed to reduce the need for said sharing.