[Oberon] Need V4 Code for trivial task.

[Lars]

On Tue, December 6, 2016 9:50 pm, Douglas G Danforth wrote:
> W,
> Thank you for saying that!
> I was paid $3,000 in 1979 by Three Rivers Computer to implement a Unix
> shell with pipes. I did that on a Terak
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terak_8510/a>
> machine written in Pascal. I never want to go back to that form of "linear
> thinking". I greatly prefer the GUI Oberon approach.
> -Doug Danforth
>

I like both the gui approach and the console approach...

A web program that runs on a server is actually a gui, that runs via a
console like program...

Sometimes the simplicity of a console program over the extreme complexity
of a GUI is very refreshing, and nostalgic.

On the other hand, console programs are extremely boring. The old turbo
pascal programs were utter boredom compared to today's wiz bang GUI candy.

But every time, for example, ComponentPascal Blackbox logs a message or a
line of text to the log window, you are essentially emulating a sort of
linear console mode program in a limited gui window that acts very much
like a console. Any time you LogLn or Write to a window it's very much
like a limited console.

In other words, both the console approach and the gui approach are useful
IMO. I don't think we should be Gui Nazis and get rid of all console mode
thinking entirely, or command line zealots (linux nerds) who only enjoy
and prefer console mode programming...

Console mode programming, is still useful for telnet/ssh into a web
server. I'd like to see how one manages a web server over telnet without
using console mode... i.e. one of the oberon projects has a web server
(bluebottle?). So how pray tell does one administer his server, from a
hotel, if you are on the road, with a web connection, without resorting to
a ssh/telnet console to take control of the server? you could
theoretically manage the server via a remote GUI but that complicates
matters: sometimes it is much simpler to log in to a server remotely using
telnet/ssh and type in a command, rather than opening up an entire GUI
protocol over an I internet connection.

The bandwidth wasted to for example run an X11 gui over an internet
connection, compared to a simple telnet/ssh session... is absurd
bandwidth. I'm sure running a remote oberon GUI would be more efficient,
but even a ssh/telnet connection to a bluebottle/oberongui that uses
simple console programs would IMO be much simpler and less complex than a
remote GUI session similar to the heavy and hefty X11 system.

As I am unfamiliar with some of the Oberon projects that have a web server
(bluebottle?), I don't even know if one can remotely administer a web
server over an internet connection. You could always use html itself, and
build a web based remote control system, but that still is not as simple
and powerful as a telnet/ssh console mode remote control ability that unix
has had for decades, and even ms windows has had for decades...

Sometimes forcing everything to be GUI, complicates matters...

On the other hand, I totally agree that console mode programs such as
Midnight Commander or pretty much any other console mode program, are
absolutely pathetic compared to their GUI counterparts such as Total
Commander.