6 ms·

UI looks ugly as sin

by tbolt 8y ago

jacquesm 8y ago
So does a chainsaw. But it gets the job done quickly and with a minimum of fuss. Eye candy is fine of you put form over function, personally I prefer fast and effective. Pretty is optional.
- dsies 8y ago
  I don’t think it has to be quite that black and white. It doesn’t have to have “eye candy” and it also doesn’t have to look like a 1998 Delphi project. Strive for the gray area and if that is not achievable... then yes, function over form.
  - jacquesm 8y ago
    Feel free to use the extensive settings Leo has to customize it to your taste. Personally I prefer 'minimal' but I'm sure that if you work hard at it you can make it look pretty enough to suite you.
  - fiddlerwoaroof 8y ago
    If more things looked like a 1998 Delphi project, desktop UIs would be much nicer to deal with.
- lghh 8y ago
  I don't have to look at a chainsaw for 8 hours a day, either.
  - jacquesm 8y ago
    Foresters do and they would really be insulted if you made their main tool set look 'pretty' just for the sake of it. It's a tool, it needs to be reliable, powerful, easy to service and safe. There are lots of chainsaws that look prettier than Husqvarna's and Stihl and yet those are the ones that most professionals will use.
    - lghh 8y ago
      They don't look at their chainsaws all day, they look at the trees they are chopping down. I don't look at the keyboard I'm typing on all day, I look at the editor/code.
      - jacquesm 8y ago
        So if the trees aren't pretty the foresters would bitch? Really, you are putting way too much effort into this argument. I learned how to program on 40x25 and consider what I have today an incredible luxury, if you want you can customize Leo to look better but to me it isn't worth the time, I would rather spend that time on my work.
      - boomlinde 8y ago
        Conversely, if you're using a text editor all day you'll spend much more time looking at the text you are editing than the UI. Also, if you ever actually use a chainsaw, please do look at it as you are using it.
- cgag 8y ago
  Fair enough but a chainsaw looks awesome.
  - jacquesm 8y ago
    They're pretty versatile too if you are good with them. You can easily sculpt wood with them and as long as you keep them sharp they are reasonably safe but you really should always wear ballistic clothing and a helmet.
    - fineline 8y ago
      Yep chainsaws are a very creative tool, as well as sculpture there's an amazing array of different notches and joins used for assembling log-built structures with little if any fastening hardware. And a well-tuned gang of climbers dropping a big tree, swinging from limb to limb with saws dangling from their waist, is a sight to behold. I would put glasses, ear defenders, gloves and boots higher on that safety gear list, when cutting firewood, doing minor pruning and lopping etc.. Wear a helmet when doing anything bigger, although wood is very dense and you shouldn't expect a helmet to save you if a decent size limb comes your way. Technique is everything - learn from an expert before trying it yourself. Chain sharpening is a mystical, ancient art, all the experts I talk to have a different view on the right technique, ranging from bench grinders to intricate jigs to simple "file and feel". I've tried them all and it basically comes down to experience. Just as important is the even wear of the bar itself, once its worn more on one side than the other the cuts bend like bananas and you can only cut so deep before the saw gets no purchase on the wood at all. I think chainsaws are as pretty as IDEs - which maybe isn't saying much, but I love 'em both anyway...
      - type0 8y ago
        Also it has some fascinating history: > Joseph Buford Cox invented what is now known as the chipper type chain for chain saws. He based his design on the C-shaped jaws of the larva of the timber beetle. > He only reached the fifth grade in his formal education. from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Buford_Cox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Buford_Cox If you think that sharpening is complicated now, think again, it must have been impossible before this guy.
jasonkostempski 8y ago
That's a good sign it's not going to hog memory and randomly lag doing simple things. Leave the cookie-cutter "polished" UI to websites, I prefer my desktop applications have some character.
- PurpleRamen 8y ago
  Have you used it? It can lag like hell on the simplest things. Just because it's written in Python and Qt instead of Electron and Javascript doesn't mean it performs well.
  - BeetleB 8y ago
    Genuinely curious - which aspects make you lag. I'm relatively new to it, but I did do a stress test once. Loaded several hundred (over a thousand?) files of source code. Apart from the initial conversion to nodes, it was fairly performant. Doing a cff on the whole code base was pretty fast. I did have to disable the setting to poll for file changes, though. When you have so many files open, that will seriously slow things down. I believe this was over a network too (i.e. the files I was opening were on a remote machine).
    - PurpleRamen 8y ago
      Number of files doesn't really matter, at the end they all go to the same outline. Number of notes, complexity of the outline (clones), content loaded in the editor, that are hard numbers influencing the perfomrmance. But of course it also depends on the hardware. On my old rusty system I usually experienced lags starting with some 10k nodes. Editor usually lags when content with longer lines (some hundred characters) or content with many lines (some hundred or thousand lines) is loaded. Directives in the content are influencing behaviour, as also the used syntax highlighting. Even activated features are influencing things of course. The declutter-code for example seems horrible ineficient and called way to often I think, but I haven't digged deeper there yet. Though, it should be noted that in the last months some improvments were in progress, and the actual developer-version seems to behave a bit better on certain aspects. So version is also a factor. My personal rule is to slim down leo-files when they go >10 MB.
PurpleRamen 8y ago
It also behaves as ugly as sin. This app is on most parts pure gargabe. Most things are just hacked together as pet features to satisfy urgent needs on the spot, and then forgotten as things "work". And those things have grown over the last 20 years, while the dev has no real clue about modern software development or UX, leading to the mess this software is today. But if you reach the point where you accept defeat to this monster, and ignore all features, it can become quite useful.
- terminalcommand 8y ago
  Could you please elobarate a bit, maybe give some examples? I'd be interested to gain some insight into why you find Leo's UX pure garbage and how it should have grown over the years.
  - PurpleRamen 8y ago
    Well, explaining Interface-fails in short text is always a bit hard, but lets see. The key F1 opens the help-widget, which is an area with text, located besides the editor. This area is just there, has now controls, no way to move it or close it. There is some text in it that explains this area can be closed with some shortcut, except it does not work. I don't even know whether it's a problem with my setup, because leo,has no way to check this. Just broken by design. Notable is that this hacked-in area seems to be used by several other functionalitys and plugins. All with the same fails. Another strange quirk of leo is the minibuffer. It's something people knowing emacs will understand, for the rest, it,s just a strange line at the bottom of the window not explaing what it does, what purpose it has or how they can use it. But ok, that's how it is, just following some fade of unrelated culture. Really interessing is the usage. You enter some text, then hit tab to invoke autocompletion and surprise..in another part of the application, unconnected to the textwidget of the minibuffer switches a tab and some new widget appears presenting a list of possible candidates. Not that Qt hasen't a way to present autocomplete-lists, but thats just how it is. Quirky hackish, ugly. And of only working as ling as the tablist is not hidden. Another funny part is the menu. Just look up what is weitten in them, what name, what order they have, and how this compares to the established names and positions in pretty much every other application. Or let's take the configuration. Nodes with some directives in the outline. No actual documentation or discoverability in the app itself. No support to prevent failures. Not even instant-loading of changed settings. Restart the program, good enough 20 years ago, good enough today. Or let's take the API: Single letter variable names. Objects with hundreds of unrelated methods and no documentation. Plugins which are just python-modules imported from the python-path, and not real plugins with actual structure and API. Oh, and the worst, plugins which just don't work and functions which have no obvious result because someone forgot to refresh the outline. Though, this is probably just one of the endless number of obvious bugs one encounters at some point.

UI looks ugly as sin

by tbolt 8y ago

UI looks ugly as sin

So does a chainsaw. But it gets the job done quickly and with a minimum of fuss. Eye candy is fine of you put form over function, personally I prefer fast and effective. Pretty is optional.

dsies 8y ago
I don’t think it has to be quite that black and white. It doesn’t have to have “eye candy” and it also doesn’t have to look like a 1998 Delphi project. Strive for the gray area and if that is not achievable... then yes, function over form.
- jacquesm 8y ago
  Feel free to use the extensive settings Leo has to customize it to your taste. Personally I prefer 'minimal' but I'm sure that if you work hard at it you can make it look pretty enough to suite you.
- fiddlerwoaroof 8y ago
  If more things looked like a 1998 Delphi project, desktop UIs would be much nicer to deal with.
lghh 8y ago
I don't have to look at a chainsaw for 8 hours a day, either.
- jacquesm 8y ago
  Foresters do and they would really be insulted if you made their main tool set look 'pretty' just for the sake of it. It's a tool, it needs to be reliable, powerful, easy to service and safe. There are lots of chainsaws that look prettier than Husqvarna's and Stihl and yet those are the ones that most professionals will use.
  - lghh 8y ago
    They don't look at their chainsaws all day, they look at the trees they are chopping down. I don't look at the keyboard I'm typing on all day, I look at the editor/code.
    - jacquesm 8y ago
      So if the trees aren't pretty the foresters would bitch? Really, you are putting way too much effort into this argument. I learned how to program on 40x25 and consider what I have today an incredible luxury, if you want you can customize Leo to look better but to me it isn't worth the time, I would rather spend that time on my work.
    - boomlinde 8y ago
      Conversely, if you're using a text editor all day you'll spend much more time looking at the text you are editing than the UI. Also, if you ever actually use a chainsaw, please do look at it as you are using it.
cgag 8y ago
Fair enough but a chainsaw looks awesome.
- jacquesm 8y ago
  They're pretty versatile too if you are good with them. You can easily sculpt wood with them and as long as you keep them sharp they are reasonably safe but you really should always wear ballistic clothing and a helmet.
  - fineline 8y ago
    Yep chainsaws are a very creative tool, as well as sculpture there's an amazing array of different notches and joins used for assembling log-built structures with little if any fastening hardware. And a well-tuned gang of climbers dropping a big tree, swinging from limb to limb with saws dangling from their waist, is a sight to behold. I would put glasses, ear defenders, gloves and boots higher on that safety gear list, when cutting firewood, doing minor pruning and lopping etc.. Wear a helmet when doing anything bigger, although wood is very dense and you shouldn't expect a helmet to save you if a decent size limb comes your way. Technique is everything - learn from an expert before trying it yourself. Chain sharpening is a mystical, ancient art, all the experts I talk to have a different view on the right technique, ranging from bench grinders to intricate jigs to simple "file and feel". I've tried them all and it basically comes down to experience. Just as important is the even wear of the bar itself, once its worn more on one side than the other the cuts bend like bananas and you can only cut so deep before the saw gets no purchase on the wood at all. I think chainsaws are as pretty as IDEs - which maybe isn't saying much, but I love 'em both anyway...
    - type0 8y ago
      Also it has some fascinating history: > Joseph Buford Cox invented what is now known as the chipper type chain for chain saws. He based his design on the C-shaped jaws of the larva of the timber beetle. > He only reached the fifth grade in his formal education. from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Buford_Cox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Buford_Cox If you think that sharpening is complicated now, think again, it must have been impossible before this guy.

jasonkostempski 8y ago

That's a good sign it's not going to hog memory and randomly lag doing simple things. Leave the cookie-cutter "polished" UI to websites, I prefer my desktop applications have some character.

PurpleRamen 8y ago
Have you used it? It can lag like hell on the simplest things. Just because it's written in Python and Qt instead of Electron and Javascript doesn't mean it performs well.
- BeetleB 8y ago
  Genuinely curious - which aspects make you lag. I'm relatively new to it, but I did do a stress test once. Loaded several hundred (over a thousand?) files of source code. Apart from the initial conversion to nodes, it was fairly performant. Doing a cff on the whole code base was pretty fast. I did have to disable the setting to poll for file changes, though. When you have so many files open, that will seriously slow things down. I believe this was over a network too (i.e. the files I was opening were on a remote machine).
  - PurpleRamen 8y ago
    Number of files doesn't really matter, at the end they all go to the same outline. Number of notes, complexity of the outline (clones), content loaded in the editor, that are hard numbers influencing the perfomrmance. But of course it also depends on the hardware. On my old rusty system I usually experienced lags starting with some 10k nodes. Editor usually lags when content with longer lines (some hundred characters) or content with many lines (some hundred or thousand lines) is loaded. Directives in the content are influencing behaviour, as also the used syntax highlighting. Even activated features are influencing things of course. The declutter-code for example seems horrible ineficient and called way to often I think, but I haven't digged deeper there yet. Though, it should be noted that in the last months some improvments were in progress, and the actual developer-version seems to behave a bit better on certain aspects. So version is also a factor. My personal rule is to slim down leo-files when they go >10 MB.

PurpleRamen 8y ago

It also behaves as ugly as sin. This app is on most parts pure gargabe. Most things are just hacked together as pet features to satisfy urgent needs on the spot, and then forgotten as things "work". And those things have grown over the last 20 years, while the dev has no real clue about modern software development or UX, leading to the mess this software is today. But if you reach the point where you accept defeat to this monster, and ignore all features, it can become quite useful.

terminalcommand 8y ago
Could you please elobarate a bit, maybe give some examples? I'd be interested to gain some insight into why you find Leo's UX pure garbage and how it should have grown over the years.
- PurpleRamen 8y ago
  Well, explaining Interface-fails in short text is always a bit hard, but lets see. The key F1 opens the help-widget, which is an area with text, located besides the editor. This area is just there, has now controls, no way to move it or close it. There is some text in it that explains this area can be closed with some shortcut, except it does not work. I don't even know whether it's a problem with my setup, because leo,has no way to check this. Just broken by design. Notable is that this hacked-in area seems to be used by several other functionalitys and plugins. All with the same fails. Another strange quirk of leo is the minibuffer. It's something people knowing emacs will understand, for the rest, it,s just a strange line at the bottom of the window not explaing what it does, what purpose it has or how they can use it. But ok, that's how it is, just following some fade of unrelated culture. Really interessing is the usage. You enter some text, then hit tab to invoke autocompletion and surprise..in another part of the application, unconnected to the textwidget of the minibuffer switches a tab and some new widget appears presenting a list of possible candidates. Not that Qt hasen't a way to present autocomplete-lists, but thats just how it is. Quirky hackish, ugly. And of only working as ling as the tablist is not hidden. Another funny part is the menu. Just look up what is weitten in them, what name, what order they have, and how this compares to the established names and positions in pretty much every other application. Or let's take the configuration. Nodes with some directives in the outline. No actual documentation or discoverability in the app itself. No support to prevent failures. Not even instant-loading of changed settings. Restart the program, good enough 20 years ago, good enough today. Or let's take the API: Single letter variable names. Objects with hundreds of unrelated methods and no documentation. Plugins which are just python-modules imported from the python-path, and not real plugins with actual structure and API. Oh, and the worst, plugins which just don't work and functions which have no obvious result because someone forgot to refresh the outline. Though, this is probably just one of the endless number of obvious bugs one encounters at some point.