The more I use Pharo, the less I use web documentation. For me seems pretty suboptimal compared to live environment with code browser and GT-Spotter. Regarding the comment on Medium, it also took me little to find #raisedTo:, so the millage can vary. What I was missing was proper books for particular domains, but Pharo books are covering that. I don't know if a Q&A site could improve search-ability for newbies (certainly you can find little stuff in Stack Overflow).
My bet is about trying to create more "end user" tools (Grafoscopio is kind of this), besides tools for developers. There is a broad community of people who can be active contributors and members of the community, welcome Pharo and live coding a lot and don't complain that much about stuff that is not already pretty similar to what they already know (being that only English MOOC or online static html docs). Cheers, Offray On 11/10/17 07:34, Dimitris Chloupis wrote: > for me it is a yes and no situation, yes its very coold to have your > entire system in your fingertips but Pharo has serious issues with > code organisation and I find the lack of namespaces quite > inconvenient. You have to be careful how to name your classes which > does not sound to me very OOP friendly. > > Also the IDE does not handle spaggetification very well, sure you can > find implementors , senders etc but if the execution chain is complex > , welcome to spaggeti hell. But that is a problem with most other IDEs > if not all as well. Problem is in this case that we have the very good > rule of using sort methods which multiplies this problem and makes > navigation even harder. Code becomes much easier to read per method > and messages but much harder to understand in a bird eye view. > > Some of that pain has been aleviated with the introduction of > GTSpotter which I have praised quite a lot and I will continue to do > so. But yeah there are more needed to be done in the department to > make Pharo code navigation a more comfortable task. > > On Wed, Oct 11, 2017 at 2:57 PM Vitor Medina Cruz > <vitormc...@gmail.com <mailto:vitormc...@gmail.com>> wrote: > > I dunno, maybe I’m weird, but I find the System Browser a > fantastic way to explore the class library. If you find a > class or method that isn’t well documented, write a comment > and send a change request. Stef told me this ages ago. I might > add, if you find a bug you should write a test that exercises > the bug and submit it on fogbugz (the bug tracking system). > > > I will reference of response of mine to a similar opinion made by > Richard: > > https://medium.com/@vitormcruz/i-disagree-it-is-much-harder-to-find-anything-in-the-environment-c6bdd44f6eea > > My 2 cents. > > > > > On Tue, Oct 10, 2017 at 11:59 PM, john pfersich > <jpfers...@gmail.com <mailto:jpfers...@gmail.com>> wrote: > > > > On Oct 10, 2017, at 09:58, horrido > <horrido.hobb...@gmail.com <mailto:horrido.hobb...@gmail.com>> > wrote: > > > > Interestingly, I'm getting a fair amount of pushback on > this. Personally, I > > think it would be very helpful to have a live (updatable, so > as to keep it > > current) reference page for the class library, something > that developers can > > easily look up what they need. After all, most of the power > of Pharo comes > > from the class library and we need to make it as accessible > as possible to > > less experienced Pharoers (i.e., beginners). > > > > Exploring the class library through the System Browser is > very inefficient. > > This is further exacerbated by the fact that many classes > and methods are > > simply not well-documented (containing a cursory remark > which is just barely > > useful). > > > I dunno, maybe I’m weird, but I find the System Browser a > fantastic way to explore the class library. If you find a > class or method that isn’t well documented, write a comment > and send a change request. Stef told me this ages ago. I might > add, if you find a bug you should write a test that exercises > the bug and submit it on fogbugz (the bug tracking system). > > > I realize that creating a live reference page is not easy to > do. In fact, > > it's a lot of work. But the absence of such a page is a real > obstacle to > > Pharo acceptance. > > > > > > > > horrido wrote > >> Thanks. I gave your answer verbatim. I also added the > following paragraph: > >> > >> The problem I find with today’s developers is that they are > rather > >> closed-minded. They are rigid and inflexible, and not > willing to adapt to > >> new and different ways of doing things. In my generation (circa > >> 1980–1990), > >> people didn’t have a problem with trying different > technologies. That’s > >> why > >> I had no issue with learning Smalltalk 10 years ago, after > I had retired > >> from a 20-year-long career in C systems programming and > FORTRAN scientific > >> programming. > >> > >> > >> > >> Sven Van Caekenberghe-2 wrote > >>>> On 6 Oct 2017, at 14:54, horrido < > >> > >>> horrido.hobbies@ > >> > >>> > wrote: > >>>> > >>>> I received this comment from someone who complained: > >>>> > >>>> *What about the lack of documentation? From time to time > I’ve checked > >>>> some > >>>> SmallTalk implementations like Squeak, GNU-Smalltalk and > now Pharo. Of > >>>> these, only GNU-SmallTalk appears to have a free, > official programming > >>>> guide > >>>> and core library reference that any serious programmer > expects from a > >>>> language. > >>>> > >>>> > https://www.gnu.org/software/smalltalk/manual-base/html_node/* > >>>> > >>>> I pointed to Pharo's documentation but then he came back > with: > >>>> > >>>> *Then show me a link of the free, maintained reference > documentation for > >>>> the > >>>> classes that form “the core library”, like this one for > Python > >>>> (https://docs.python.org/3/library/index.html)* > <https://docs.python.org/3/library/index.html%29*> > >>>> > >>>> It's true, most Smalltalks do not have a core library > reference, not > >>>> even > >>>> VisualWorks! So what is the proper response to this > complaint? > >>> > >>> The first answer is that Pharo/Smalltalk is unique in that > a running > >>> system/IDE contains _all_ source code, _all_ documentation > (class, > >>> method, > >>> help, tutorial), _all_ unit tests and _all_ runnable > examples in a very > >>> easy, accessible way. It takes some getting used to, but > this is actually > >>> better and much more powerful than any alternative. > >>> > >>> The second answer is that there are lots of books and > articles that take > >>> the classic/structured book/paper approach. There is > >>> http://books.pharo.org, http://themoosebook.org, > >>> http://book.seaside.st/book, > http://medium.com/concerning-pharo and many > >>> more. > >>> > >>>> Thanks. > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> -- > >>>> Sent from: > http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html > >>>> > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> -- > >> Sent from: > http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html > > > > > > > > > > > > -- > > Sent from: > http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html > > > >
