Re: [Help-smalltalk] User interface of VisualGST

[Gwenael Casaccio]

On Wed, 2009-10-14 at 14:51 +0200, Paolo Bonzini wrote:
> > 1. The toolbar is always the same no matter what window you're using.
> 
> 100% agreed, I reopened http://smalltalk.gnu.org/project/comments/add/382
> 
> > 2. Windows such as the debugger and message finders may not even need a 
> > menu bar (maybe File and Edit for Gnome / Windows environments - on OS X it 
> > could be removed completely).
> 
> Long term, I wonder if we want to create at all new windows for 
> everything but debuggers.  There should be of course a Tools->New Window 
> menu that creates a new window if the user wants one, but tools should 
> probably open as new tabs.
> 
> > 3. Using GtkSeparatorMenuItem instead of a blank GtkMenuItem looks nicer in 
> > OS X, under many GTK themes and is more correct anyway...
> 
> Gwen, please apply this.
> 
> Paolo

Hi,

thanks for your review. Yes VisualGST is a young project :)

- For the icons if you give me icons I'll put the icons everywhere ;)
(overloaded method, methods with halt inside, test method, ...)  

- For the window yes I had the same ideas in fact changing is not really
the ui is not really the problem everything is widget in VisualGST
I can plug everything in VisualGST without a "big" refactoring.

- Thanks for the patch. Paolo I'll check this evening if the patch for
the Restarting a saved image with the browser loaded is fine.

The project is not only young and we should not only attach attention
only on the UI.

How do we manage sources : image based approach or file based approach
or both ? What kind of versioning tool do we want (git, monticello, a
framework on which we can plug svn/git/monticello ?) with metacello ?
Integrate SUnit test inside the browser, SLint inside the browser too
(can be nice) Refactorings the "refactorings" are tooooo simple :p ? If
we act like an image we'll need a changeset (may be delta stream of
Goran Krample) ? if we output the file Nicolas want that we preserver
the same format (i.e. 1 tab = 4 spaces ... ) ...

For the debugger : see what part of the code is executed : impossible to
know it now, a decompiler, show the byte code, a stuff that can be nice
"Debugging Backwards in Time" , evaluating code failed sometimes ... .

SUnit : need to display the backtrace, have information on the time
taken, regression, statistic, ...

In the inspector we need more views sets, dictionaires, compMethods,
compBlock, ... may be for GtkWidget (drawing the widget inside the
textview ^^)

Improve the sender/implementor : list the implementor/sender in the
implementor/sender and navigate.

An other stupid problem RBParser is used to parse the St code and
highlight it that's fine ... but the version is old and if you have
a at: .. put: 3. if failed ... I am porting a newer version of RBParser
(I improved it) so we can have pattern rewritting and Refactorings
without loosing format (RBFormat in last versions for example loose
comments ...) 

The problem is not really the UI changing the menu bar, toolbar, ... is
easy...

I spend a lot of time on it really but the problem is not a question
of toolbar or whatever (but at the end I should change the toolbar
add some icons...) 

I've a lot of ideas but what I need is time and a little help.
I enjoy to work on it and with this community by trying to improve
VisualGST step by step that's fun !

Cheers,
Gwenael