Misc posts that are off topic

[richmond62]

Perhaps we should be both radical and retro, get rid of the icons and force people to read.

The ancient Egyptians moved away from icons to demotic script to coptic 'greek letters +", so this dependence on icons seems a distinctly backward step to me.

Seriously, how about a coloured square with an 'M' ( as in 'Messages', geddit?), instead of even more culture and epoch bound stuff like envelope icons?

Or, an African runner with a letter folded in a cleft stick held head-high? Tough to fit that one in an icon.
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[richmond62]

I have a serious problem: my BBC Master (the BBC Micro saves to cassette tape - no prob. bought a cassette player from a 'nutty fruitcake retro gubbins' website (new!) saves to 800k floppy disks) saves to 800k floppies not those HD floppies.

HD floppies are 2-a-penny on ebay, but the 800k ones are very hard to come by.

But, Hey, as I am told ageing trendies say in a feebke attempt to appear cool, I'm 62 and counting.

Certainly if OXT is to appeal tp younger people than old farts like me the MenuBar needs something doing to it: and most definitely not 'Kev' black-and-black.

A few minutes lolly-gagging at other up-to-date IDEs might not be a bad idea.

[tperry2x]

HD floppies are 2-a-penny on ebay, but the 800k ones are very hard to come by.

Incidentally, cover up the other square hole on the floppy (not the write protect one) - 3D print or cut a small plastic square as an infil to superglue in. Hey presto, your disk will identify as an 800k floppy.

[richmond62]

3D print

Well, erm, my budget does not run to a 3D printer.

But the 'fill' solution sounds useful: are you sure, however, it won't identify as a 400k disk?

I remember a Canadian in Carbondale (Illinois, USA) had a special punch to make holes in floppy disks so they showed up with a larger capacity.

I also remember seeing really good ergonomic Mac ABD keyboards in the University there: have been lusting ever since (err: only about 29 years).
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[richmond62]

I'm obviously bonkers as I have just ordered this:
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Will collect it when I visit Mother in August.

Hey, what with my vertical mouse I may, at last get no wrist pain at all.

[tperry2x]

This is a placeholder for misc posts that are off topic, but might be useful for other reasons.

[richmond62]

Arrrrrh: but you missed something that was ON TOPIC nested amongst the 'noise':

Certainly if OXT is to appeal to younger people than old farts like me the MenuBar needs something doing to it: and most definitely not 'Kev' black-and-black.

A few minutes lolly-gagging at other up-to-date IDEs might not be a bad idea.

[tperry2x]

Well, I kind of put it here because it's kind of in the 'LC bashing' territory - the stuff we weren't going to do anymore.
There's work needed on the menu - not least for MacOS 11 versions (the IDE still has the patch to sort the menubar out - the image corruption only happens on standalones). - as far as I can tell, it might be something that lipo does to it or the standalone builder routines. It's hard to track down.

I can't think of many (any?) alternative IDEs that I'm actually a fan of.

Visual Studio - confusing menu-driven system with re-arrangeable tiled windows (which no matter how big your screen is, is never large enough).

xCode - same criticism about the menus, but with options buried deep within the IDE - several layers, that you have to go hunting for.

Godot - A UI that is like marmite: you either love it or hate it. I find it a job to remember how to call up certain inspectors, as they only appear once many other steps have been completed - and it's remembering what those steps are.

Blender (although not strictly an IDE), a lesson a confusing program reserved for 'those in the know'.
Half of the tools don't function until you've also done step A, B, back to A, then C. What are the keyboard shortcuts? pressing A does 'this' okay - ah, but not if you are in this view or have this tool selected, or if there's a T in the day of the week.

I can't think of an IDE that I'm a 'fan' of, or one that really feels 'intuitive'. Yes, LCC and OXT have their shortcomings in the IDE department, but at least everything is within reach. Kind of like an old pair of shoes

[richmond62]

the stuff we weren't going to do anymore

As far as I recall it was "we're not going to do it at the moment."

I suspect that that moment has passed: and my remark was mild.

And when something is wonky, we know why it is wonky, and we know who made it wonky, are we to pretend it just happened by itself?

Ah, wait a moment, we are now in the age where no-one accepts responsibility and no-one is to be blamed for anything ever.

[tperry2x]

the stuff we weren't going to do anymore

As far as I recall it was "we're not going to do it at the moment."

I thought it was 'anymore' - I don't think it gets us anywhere, probably the opposite if anything. Plus, I'm thankful for what we have regarding the prebuilts now - not that I'm any closer to getting a working recompile, but I know we'd be out of luck without them.

I suspect that that moment has passed: and my remark was mild.

Yeah, it was a mild comment - but why waste our efforts on doing that? Life is too short and all that.

And when something is wonky, we know why it is wonky, and we know who made it wonky, are we to pretend it just happened by itself?

No, I'm not suggesting that - I mean, we know what we've inherited. Nobody is more annoyed than me when I find something else broken or unfinished, but we have to make the best of what we have, then make it better.

Ah, wait a moment, we are now in the age where no-one accepts responsibility and no-one is to be blamed for anything ever.

I'm not a fan of that either - if you screw up, then say sorry at least. "Yeah, I introduced that bug when trying to fix something else" - because we are all human. But companies don't like to admit that, as it might damage their reputation. They'd like to phrase it as "due to unforseen recent changes in [library xyz], this had an adverse effect on [feature abc] in our product" - people are human and doing different things, and have different ways of implementing things.

Just look at the fallout from Microsoft as of late - proving that big companies can make code errors. I'm sure some entire team lost their jobs over it, but they are only human - as annoying or idiotic the error might seem.

[OpenXTalkPaul]

HD floppies are 2-a-penny on ebay, but the 800k ones are very hard to come by.

Incidentally, cover up the other square hole on the floppy (not the write protect one) - 3D print or cut a small plastic square as an infil to superglue in. Hey presto, your disk will identify as an 800k floppy.

I remember having to do this with my first Mac (512KE still boots) because it only has an 800kb floppy drive (and 1.4 were easier to come by) and then the reverse once I got a newer computer with double density floppy. Thick tape or a strong hole-punch will work in a pinch.