Re: misc. annoyances

[Brad Miller <miller@acorn.cs.rochester.edu>]

    Date:  Wed, 3 Jun 87 19:05 EDT
    From: Richard Lamson <Lamson@MIT-Multics.ARPA>

	Date:  3 June 1987 12:15 pdt
	From:  miller at CS.ROCHESTER.EDU

	There is nothing more annoying that creating a new editor and finding
	you can't use it because you are in the middle of an incremental
	search in the other one. I created the new thing so I could *save my
	state* in the first one!

    The real reasons why this hasn't been done are that doing it right is
    hard, and nobody within Symbolics has been given the time to work
    seriously on the editor in several years.

Apparently (according to Scott McKay SWM@SAPSUCKER.SCRC.Symbolics.COM) this
particular item *will* be in 7.2 (hurah! hosanna!) ...

	Anyway, I can't think of a single more important improvement to the
	user interface...

    How about generalized UNDO in the editor?  That's the other such "most
    important improvement" everybody wishes were done, and which nobody has
    the time to do...

Agreed, UNDO is a biggy too. It is unfortunate that Symbolics does not
typically allocate more time to these things (I assume they feel IBM protocol
compatibility or some such is a bigger issue? Maybe.). It becomes more
difficult to support a claim that the Symbolics environment is the best
available[1] when others DO have these important features[2].

Brad Miller

[1] I am not arguing this point in combination with the other features
supplied. The issue is that as soon as `important' features are missing, which
are supplied by competetors, the decision for the customer becomes harder
(they have to make a trade-off). Arguably not many customers would even notice
something on this level of detail when making an initial purchasing decision,
but I would think that for follow-up orders it would be noted... Of course,
everyone has different metrics for importance too. Naturally I apply mine, as
a user here. If I were more worried about sales, and had the data the
marketing VP presumably has, I might have a different metric. But the
satisfied user should certainly be a high priority (and seems to be, overall).
								
[2] TI's editor support's multiple processes. GNU Emacs supports the best UNDO
I've ever seen (and it's free!).
------
miller@cs.rochester.edu
miller@acorn.cs.rochester.edu