Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!snorkelwacker!bloom-beacon!EXPO.LCS.MIT.EDU!rws
From: rws@EXPO.LCS.MIT.EDU (Bob Scheifler)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: R4 Athena Widget question.
Message-ID: <9003012133.AA00940@expire.lcs.mit.edu>
Date: 1 Mar 90 21:33:36 GMT
Sender: daemon@athena.mit.edu (Mr Background)
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 12


    If a widget consumes
    a resource that needs explicit freeing, the widget documentation had
    better document this so that the application can be sure to destroy the
    widget before exiting.

This seems like bad design.  I may have a Text widget today that doesn't do
checkpoint files, so my documentation doesn't say it has to be destroyed, and
the application believes this and blithely calls exit.  Tomorrow I add
checkpoint files, thinking this to be a nice addition from the user perspective,
and suddenly I have to ask all developers to rewrite their applications?  That
doesn't sound like a very good design.