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Also once your workflow is increasingly keyboard based (like when using a tiled window manager), TUIs just make more sense. Every GUI I replace with a TUI is o

Also once your workflow is increasingly keyboard based (like when using a tiled window manager), TUIs just make more sense. Every GUI I replace with a TUI is one less flow-breaking obstacle where I have to suddenly reach for the mouse.

jnovek 1y ago
I think my low-key long-term goal is to eventually fully eliminate the mouse while still enjoying the niceties of a modern GUI desktop.
- Zetaphor 1y ago
  Going to shill for the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard here, specifically its mouse-keys capability, which is where I can move the mouse via WASD (or any other binding). I have both the touchpoint and trackball add-on modules, but I still use mouse keys to manipulate my cursor 99% of the time.
WD-42 1y ago
Other benefits: 1. Consistent font and sizing. Pick the font you find easiest to read and set it in the terminal, now all TUI apps use it at the correct size. 2. Consistent theming. TUI apps use the same color scheme as your terminal, as your vim, etc. A consistent "desktop" is less distracting. Especially when you don't have to deal with crappy Electron apps displaying animations and ads (looking at you Discord). 3. Efficient on screen real-estate. Most TUI apps don't waste a lot of space on "padding", "giving elements space to breathe" or other "correct UX patterns". They tile nicely. 4. Never and issues copy and pasting. I used a GUI chat app recently that wouldn't let me select text, seriously. 5. Did I mention they are fun to use and relatively easy to develop?
- jvanderbot 1y ago
  And built in remote use via SSH.
- c-hendricks 1y ago
  Yeah they all use the same palette, but they don't all use the palette the same way. And copy / paste, "hm does this TUI intercept mouse clicks, ah it does, oh what was the key combo for my terminal emulator that allows to skip that? Crap I pressed ctrl-c instead of ctrl-shift-c". Or worse when you want to select text in a column-based TUI and your terminal emulator doesn't have any sort of column-selection handling.
eviks 1y ago
they do not, GUI is more capable of handling keyboards than TUI because terminals still have pretty dumb limitations where some modifiers aren't even visible/bindable!
- hombre_fatal 1y ago
  This seems trivially false or disconnected from the important part of what I'm referring to here. TUIs have to be navigable by keyboard. They could be garbage in every other way, but at least they have that. GUIs might have keybindings as polish if the developers put in the effort. Otherwise they either don't have keybindings, or they rely on generalized keybindings that come with the OS/UI toolkit that can be bad/impossible in arbitrary ways, like if tab is swallowed by an input so you can't even tab past a component or dismiss a modal. Or the only GUI is inside a web browser.
  - eviks 1y ago
    This seems trivially false to you because you don't rise above the trivial, but also forget about similar trivial fails in TUIs. > They could be garbage in every other way, but at least they have that Not really, they could also not implement keyboard input for some interactions and only react to mouse. You could have a click-to-open-url in your terminal without a keyboard fallback setup. Of course, you could set it up, but that would be "polish if you put in the effort" There is no limit to garbage. > Also once your workflow is increasingly keyboard based (like when using a tiled window manager), Exactly, for example, you've set your Windows key to be reponsible for all window-based movements, so you have it move/resize app windows and want to have the same key help you move/resize "inner windows/panes/columns" in a TUI app. Well, tough luck, the terminal doesn't even recognize this modifier! Again, "as polish if you put in the effort" you can achieve anything via some external remapping to supported keys, but "otherwise" you don't have keybindings, and don't even have generalized fallback common (though not universal, again, there is no limit to garbage) to GUIs. Or you'd be unable to bind some key combo because in a terminal that key combo is equivalent to regular typing and you need to timeout to differentiate between the two, so a permanent friction. > tab is swallowed by an input so you can't even tab past a component Of course you can, use your keyboard to move the mouse pointer and click outside of the input field. All pure organic keyboard-based interaction! "They could be garbage", but at lest you have that keyboard-based option (yes, only "polish/put in effort")
ndiddy 1y ago
Well-designed GUIs can be fully keyboard operated, where the mouse-driven interface only serves as a way to educate the user about which functionality is available. I'll use Tera Term (a serial terminal emulator) as an example. If you want to start a serial XMODEM transfer, you can figure out how to do it just by clicking around the user interface. You click on "File", then "Transfer", then "XMODEM", then "Send". Once you do it a few times, you remember the layout of the menus, and can start navigating solely by keyboard. Instead of "breaking your flow" by having to reach for the mouse, you just hold down Alt and type "FTXS". This is much faster, and you learned how to do it entirely from just using the program and observing which letters are underlined in the menus. There's no need to look at a manual or help page.
- hombre_fatal 1y ago
  A well-designed TUI and GUI have great keyboard nav, discoverability, UX, and all. The question is more about what you want for the 99% of UIs that aren't well-designed nor polished, and what kind of worst-case you want to deal with. By default, TUIs have bad discoverability unless the developer puts in the effort. But at least you have keyboard navigation and run in a terminal. By default, GUIs have bad keybindings unless the developer puts in the effort. In the worst case they aren't even kb navigable. But at least they tend to be discoverable.

jnovek 1y ago

I think my low-key long-term goal is to eventually fully eliminate the mouse while still enjoying the niceties of a modern GUI desktop.

Zetaphor 1y ago
Going to shill for the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard here, specifically its mouse-keys capability, which is where I can move the mouse via WASD (or any other binding). I have both the touchpoint and trackball add-on modules, but I still use mouse keys to manipulate my cursor 99% of the time.

WD-42 1y ago

Other benefits: 1. Consistent font and sizing. Pick the font you find easiest to read and set it in the terminal, now all TUI apps use it at the correct size. 2. Consistent theming. TUI apps use the same color scheme as your terminal, as your vim, etc. A consistent "desktop" is less distracting. Especially when you don't have to deal with crappy Electron apps displaying animations and ads (looking at you Discord). 3. Efficient on screen real-estate. Most TUI apps don't waste a lot of space on "padding", "giving elements space to breathe" or other "correct UX patterns". They tile nicely. 4. Never and issues copy and pasting. I used a GUI chat app recently that wouldn't let me select text, seriously. 5. Did I mention they are fun to use and relatively easy to develop?

jvanderbot 1y ago
And built in remote use via SSH.
c-hendricks 1y ago
Yeah they all use the same palette, but they don't all use the palette the same way. And copy / paste, "hm does this TUI intercept mouse clicks, ah it does, oh what was the key combo for my terminal emulator that allows to skip that? Crap I pressed ctrl-c instead of ctrl-shift-c". Or worse when you want to select text in a column-based TUI and your terminal emulator doesn't have any sort of column-selection handling.

eviks 1y ago

they do not, GUI is more capable of handling keyboards than TUI because terminals still have pretty dumb limitations where some modifiers aren't even visible/bindable!

hombre_fatal 1y ago
This seems trivially false or disconnected from the important part of what I'm referring to here. TUIs have to be navigable by keyboard. They could be garbage in every other way, but at least they have that. GUIs might have keybindings as polish if the developers put in the effort. Otherwise they either don't have keybindings, or they rely on generalized keybindings that come with the OS/UI toolkit that can be bad/impossible in arbitrary ways, like if tab is swallowed by an input so you can't even tab past a component or dismiss a modal. Or the only GUI is inside a web browser.
- eviks 1y ago
  This seems trivially false to you because you don't rise above the trivial, but also forget about similar trivial fails in TUIs. > They could be garbage in every other way, but at least they have that Not really, they could also not implement keyboard input for some interactions and only react to mouse. You could have a click-to-open-url in your terminal without a keyboard fallback setup. Of course, you could set it up, but that would be "polish if you put in the effort" There is no limit to garbage. > Also once your workflow is increasingly keyboard based (like when using a tiled window manager), Exactly, for example, you've set your Windows key to be reponsible for all window-based movements, so you have it move/resize app windows and want to have the same key help you move/resize "inner windows/panes/columns" in a TUI app. Well, tough luck, the terminal doesn't even recognize this modifier! Again, "as polish if you put in the effort" you can achieve anything via some external remapping to supported keys, but "otherwise" you don't have keybindings, and don't even have generalized fallback common (though not universal, again, there is no limit to garbage) to GUIs. Or you'd be unable to bind some key combo because in a terminal that key combo is equivalent to regular typing and you need to timeout to differentiate between the two, so a permanent friction. > tab is swallowed by an input so you can't even tab past a component Of course you can, use your keyboard to move the mouse pointer and click outside of the input field. All pure organic keyboard-based interaction! "They could be garbage", but at lest you have that keyboard-based option (yes, only "polish/put in effort")

ndiddy 1y ago

Well-designed GUIs can be fully keyboard operated, where the mouse-driven interface only serves as a way to educate the user about which functionality is available. I'll use Tera Term (a serial terminal emulator) as an example. If you want to start a serial XMODEM transfer, you can figure out how to do it just by clicking around the user interface. You click on "File", then "Transfer", then "XMODEM", then "Send". Once you do it a few times, you remember the layout of the menus, and can start navigating solely by keyboard. Instead of "breaking your flow" by having to reach for the mouse, you just hold down Alt and type "FTXS". This is much faster, and you learned how to do it entirely from just using the program and observing which letters are underlined in the menus. There's no need to look at a manual or help page.

hombre_fatal 1y ago
A well-designed TUI and GUI have great keyboard nav, discoverability, UX, and all. The question is more about what you want for the 99% of UIs that aren't well-designed nor polished, and what kind of worst-case you want to deal with. By default, TUIs have bad discoverability unless the developer puts in the effort. But at least you have keyboard navigation and run in a terminal. By default, GUIs have bad keybindings unless the developer puts in the effort. In the worst case they aren't even kb navigable. But at least they tend to be discoverable.