4 ms·

For those who want to use a GUI, but don’t want to say they use a GUI.

by togaen 4y ago

opan 4y ago
For me the main benefit of TUI programs is working with ssh and tmux. Also, they just tend to work better than gtk and qt stuff. My IRC client never lags or crashes, unlike my XMPP and Matrix clients.
- whartung 4y ago
  Also, even though they may support a mouse, TUIs almost inevitably are very well keyboard driven, and typically do a better job of it than a GUI, particularly web GUIs. It can be done with GUIs, of course. You can also have bad TUIs. But "out of the box", the TUI tends towards better keyboard navigability than GUIs, so are more likely to get something usable "for free". I find it very easy to get "trapped" in GUIs where your keyboard falls in to a focus pit that it can't get out of.
  - int_19h 4y ago
    Electron apps seem to be especially bad at keyboard navigation. A decade ago, the kind of breakage you'd see in GUI apps when trying to use the keyboard was mostly the lack of shortcuts/accelerators and nonsensical tab order - but it would still be usable in principle. Now I keep running into apps where tab navigation doesn't work at all, or where Enter/Esc doesn't do the expected thing in modal dialogs.
    - ectopod 4y ago
      Modern Windows apps also suffer from this kind of breakage. For example, the calculator. If you use the mouse to press a button while entering a calculation (for a trigonometric function say) then when you press enter to get the result it just presses that button again. This is contrary to the Windows design guidelines and, more importantly, it isn't useful. It's like the apps have been redeveloped by people who never use a keyboard.
      - int_19h 4y ago
        They were redeveloped using web pages as a model, is the problem.
- zaik 4y ago
  You might like https://profanity-im.github.io/ https://profanity-im.github.io/ then. It's a XMPP TUI client.
- MattJ100 4y ago
  I use poezio in tmux over ssh full-time for XMPP. Works great. I know remote desktop stuff exists for GUIs (from RDP to VNC to X tunnelling), but ssh (or mosh) with TUI apps can provide a great balance of functionality and reliability that I've never found with any of the remote GUI solutions.
zmmmmm 4y ago
> For those who want to use a GUI, b̵u̵t̵ ̵d̵o̵n̵’̵t̵ ̵w̵a̵n̵t̵ ̵t̵o̵ ̵s̵a̵y̵ ̵t̵h̵e̵y̵ ̵u̵s̵e̵ ̵a̵ ̵G̵U̵I̵ but work on minimal headless servers over ssh or in docker containers

For those who want to use a GUI, but don’t want to say they use a GUI.

by togaen 4y ago

For those who want to use a GUI, but don’t want to say they use a GUI.

opan 4y ago

For me the main benefit of TUI programs is working with ssh and tmux. Also, they just tend to work better than gtk and qt stuff. My IRC client never lags or crashes, unlike my XMPP and Matrix clients.

whartung 4y ago
Also, even though they may support a mouse, TUIs almost inevitably are very well keyboard driven, and typically do a better job of it than a GUI, particularly web GUIs. It can be done with GUIs, of course. You can also have bad TUIs. But "out of the box", the TUI tends towards better keyboard navigability than GUIs, so are more likely to get something usable "for free". I find it very easy to get "trapped" in GUIs where your keyboard falls in to a focus pit that it can't get out of.
- int_19h 4y ago
  Electron apps seem to be especially bad at keyboard navigation. A decade ago, the kind of breakage you'd see in GUI apps when trying to use the keyboard was mostly the lack of shortcuts/accelerators and nonsensical tab order - but it would still be usable in principle. Now I keep running into apps where tab navigation doesn't work at all, or where Enter/Esc doesn't do the expected thing in modal dialogs.
  - ectopod 4y ago
    Modern Windows apps also suffer from this kind of breakage. For example, the calculator. If you use the mouse to press a button while entering a calculation (for a trigonometric function say) then when you press enter to get the result it just presses that button again. This is contrary to the Windows design guidelines and, more importantly, it isn't useful. It's like the apps have been redeveloped by people who never use a keyboard.
    - int_19h 4y ago
      They were redeveloped using web pages as a model, is the problem.
zaik 4y ago
You might like https://profanity-im.github.io/ https://profanity-im.github.io/ then. It's a XMPP TUI client.
MattJ100 4y ago
I use poezio in tmux over ssh full-time for XMPP. Works great. I know remote desktop stuff exists for GUIs (from RDP to VNC to X tunnelling), but ssh (or mosh) with TUI apps can provide a great balance of functionality and reliability that I've never found with any of the remote GUI solutions.

zmmmmm 4y ago

> For those who want to use a GUI, b̵u̵t̵ ̵d̵o̵n̵’̵t̵ ̵w̵a̵n̵t̵ ̵t̵o̵ ̵s̵a̵y̵ ̵t̵h̵e̵y̵ ̵u̵s̵e̵ ̵a̵ ̵G̵U̵I̵ but work on minimal headless servers over ssh or in docker containers