Moving the MC IDE forward

[Ben Rubinstein]

on 7/21/03 3:10 PM, Simon lord wrote

> Maybe Kevin will add a pref dialog that allows us to decide what
> palettes and menus we want to see in our work environment.  That would
> help considerably and I don't see it as being that difficult to provide.
[...snip...]
> On Monday, July 21, 2003, at 09:10 AM, Robert Brenstein wrote:
[...snip...]
>> Well, I for one have just renewed MC licence, so I am "stuck" so do
>> speak with MC for another year. Not that I despair. I am happy with
>> MC, and I see no need for fork out a few hundred bucks to switch to
>> Rev any time soon. I am among those for whom Rev's interface is too
>> rich and gets in my way.

Not that I'm here to speak for RunRev or anything (and for all I know those
folks may know of a reason why this suggestion is a very bad idea); but if
you're interested in things like the database support, but find the
interface too rcih/in your face, have you tried the "Suspend Development
Tools" option under the "Development" menu?

I'd have thought this might mean you get all the advantages of Rev in terms
of extended libraries - but effectively get rid of all their UI (except for
one tiny pallete with a "Restore" button on, which you minimise).  I'd guess
you could then just open the MetaCard UI instead (but of course I could be
wrong).

Maybe that is the way forward for those who will want to continue to upgrade
to new engines etc, benefit from the additional libraries, but use their own
or the "classic" MetaCard UI.  It might even be possible to formalise this
in a future version of Rev - eg have preferences to switch off the Rev UI at
startup, and to open some other UI at the same time.  (Actually the latter
may hardly be needed; I have a little toolbar which supplements the Rev UI,
which is implemented as a Rev "plugin", and set to open at startup and glue
itself to the end of the Rev menubar.  When the Rev UI is suspended, my bit
stays in place.)

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who gives this a go.  Or RunRev's
opinions if in fact they think it's a Very Bad Idea.
 
  Ben Rubinstein               |  Email: benr_mc at cogapp.com
  Cognitive Applications Ltd   |  Phone: +44 (0)1273-821600
  http://www.cogapp.com        |  Fax  : +44 (0)1273-728866