About “E-Hg Tech.Report”, received some interesting remarks, of potential
general interest. "> from a user's point of view... but I feel that that's
somehow like going against the stream." Much more than that, in my intention.
In my intention this would be a little, tiny “revolution”. A witness of how a
high tech. product is perceived and lived by a Mr. User turned from a passive
“subject” to a free and responsible citizen of his Computerland. "> it is huge
(170 pages!) " That is dictated, imposed by the very maniacal complexity of
the tool. When a Mr. User is to face a new tool he is, necessarily, unbiased;
each and all of the available commands and options are equally unknown to him
and, therefore, potentially equally relevant. No prejudicial preference, of
course.
That's why I've tried honestly and fairly to test, and understand, and
describe each and all of them. So “discovering” how abnormal they are.
A possible explanation is that Mercurial in itself is not a tool, it is a
language, sort of. Not to be used in itself, but to be used to build “real”,
practical VC Systems tools making a sensible, severe selection and use of its
inner mass of commands and options. I mean, with a resulting tool hopefully
comprising four or five commands at most, with no more than a handful of
options.VC Systems should be almost “transparent” to be a practical and
friendly tool, not a monstrous confused messy set of senseless commands. VC
Systems should be perceived as an aid, not a burden to designers.There is
another possible explanations for such senseless complexity: lack of effective
management. A project carried on by a committee. It was with that in mind that
I proposed the section “E-Hg Primer – Versioning in Practice”, just to be of
help to the poor fellow Mr User. But the real solution should be another:
rewriting from scratch the whole user interface, taking seriously into account
the real, practical needs of Mr. User.Your thoughts welcome. - P.M.
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