Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!uflorida!novavax!hcx1!brian
From: brian@hcx1.SSD.HARRIS.COM
Newsgroups: comp.windows.news
Subject: Re: Has X Won the Window Wars? (was Re:
Message-ID: <120900001@hcx1>
Date: 1 Sep 88 20:48:00 GMT
References: <66437@sun.uucp>
Lines: 32
Nf-ID: #R:sun.uucp:66437:hcx1:120900001:000:1491
Nf-From: hcx1.SSD.HARRIS.COM!brian    Sep  1 16:48:00 1988


> One thing X will have a big problem with is input from new devices 

There hasn't been a flood of new devices over the past ten years, with
the exception of "specialty" devices (eg tablets for CAD'ers).  Basically,
you've got the keyboard, and you've got the mouse.  Until we grow more
hands or evolve differently, we probably won't see many new input devices.
True, NeWS has the advantage here, but I don't see it tipping the scales
much.

> Another problem I see with X is lack of standards: no standard toolkit
> and no standard look and feel.  Whenever we have a new rev of X, we also
> have to have a whole new slew of toolkits...mostly a complete re-write.
> NeWS will have more stability in the next release with NDE and Open Look.

Open Look won't be available over X?  It really depends on which user interface
becomes the standard.

> We'll see what happens with windowing in the next year or so.  Really,
> as far as the masses are concerned...they are still using glass tty's

A good point - I wonder how long it will take before we're rid of them?

The winner of the Windows War will not be decided by technical merit (I'd
give it to NeWS there) or ease of use -- it will be decided by the vendors
writing the applications.  The window system should be fairly transparent -
it's the application the customer or programmer really cares about.

If I were so bold to predict a winner, I'd pick X.

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brian                                     email: brian@hcx1.SSD.HARRIS.COM