Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ncar!hsdndev!spdcc!tauxersvilli!alphalpha!nazgul
From: nazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: Xt program resource files - How much is enough?
Message-ID: <1991Mar27.145454.15520@alphalpha.com>
Date: 27 Mar 91 14:54:54 GMT
References: <1991Mar27.020710.22641@smsc.sony.com>
Organization: asi
Lines: 31

In article <1991Mar27.020710.22641@smsc.sony.com> dce@smsc.sony.com (David Elliott) writes:
>I believe that this gives my "customers" extra advantages.  For
>example, if someone needs to find out the widget hierarchy, my
>app-defaults file tells them this, and even shows them which resources
>are being used to lay things out.  Within reason, they can even change
>the layout of the program.  It also has the advantage that my
>applications can be changed to support other (human) languages very
>easily.
>
>So, am I going overboard, or are application programmers that don't go
>that extra mile just being lazy?

Depends on what kind of customers you have.  The hackers will be
delighted.  A smart user might possibly figure things out assuming
that all the resources are well documented.  Anyone else may well
screw themselves up.  Also you are taking a certain amount of
performance hit for increasing the number of resources (particularly
in R4, where there are leaks if you delete widgets).  I don't think
that a resource file is any substitute for a good preferences facility
built into the program.  But I suspect that this quickly becomes a
religious argument.


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I'm not sure which upsets me more: that people are so unwilling to accept
responsibility for their own actions, or that they are so eager to regulate
everyone else's.