Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!snorkelwacker!usc!cs.utexas.edu!rice!uw-beaver!cornell!vax8530!ke2y
From: ke2y@vax5.cit.cornell.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: Can't resize windows? (was Re: Windows 3.0 & the Mac)
Message-ID: <4706.26a43afd@vax5.cit.cornell.edu>
Date: 18 Jul 90 14:33:33 GMT
References: <1990Jul10.022352.4138@bdmrrr.bdm.com> <3097@gmdzi.UUCP> <90195.153543Q8N@psuvm.psu.edu> <3114@gmdzi.UUCP>
Distribution: comp
Lines: 56

In article <3114@gmdzi.UUCP>, strobl@gmdzi.UUCP (Wolfgang Strobl) writes:
> 
> But even the Multifinder suffers from the original single-application-
> design: a switch from one application to another one has to 
> replace the menu bar on top of the screen, because there is only
> one of them. This is more disturbing than MS Windows use of
> multiple menu bars and the use of highlighting to show the 
> active application with the keyboard focus. 

  It has been argued here before (re: Mac vs other GUI) that the Mac's
single menu bar is a highly useful feature, since it provides the menus
at a constant location (i.e. you don't have to go mouse-hunting; you can just
whip the pointer up to the top of the screen and you've hit it).  Furthermore,
applications that follow Apple's guidelines make even more use of this feature
by keeping the Apple, File and Edit menus in the same location (thus easier to
'hit').

> This indicates that the resizing capability alone is not enough 
> to get applications to share a screen without either confusing 
> or keeping the user busy. MS Windows tries to tackle this problem
> by giving the user the option to run an application in one of three
> modes: minimized (i.e. as an icon), normal size (resizeable or not),
> and maximized (resized to the maximum size the application allowes),
> and a fast method to switch between these three modes.

  Problem here is that as soon as MultiFinder came out, dozens of third-
party developers come out with their own INITs and cdevs to do just that,
along with many other things.  At present, I can think of no less than
FOUR utilities (either cdev/INITs or such) that add a 'ICONIZE' option to
a window (or at least shrink it in some way).
  Why should Apple waste its resources in reinventing the wheel when others
have put a lot of their own energy into this?
  You'll probably argue that some of these things should have been features
to begin with.  Perhaps that's true, but I can't knock Apple too bad - it's
impossible to throw every whiz-bang feature into a new product; someone's
bound to think of something that's missing.


  I'm not arguing Apple's perfect.  Not even that they're better or worse than
IBM/Atari/Amiga/etc.  Just that I can see some reasons for some of the stuff
being the way it is.

  Even with some of the flaming, this is turning out to be an interesting and
informative discussion.  Let's keep it up...

> Wolfgang Strobl
> #include <std.disclaimer.hpp>

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|  John T. Chapman                       |                                    |
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|  ke2y@vax5.cit.cornell.edu             |                                    |
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