Subject says it all.
I'm curious whether there are people who do all their computing, or part
of it, without a GUI at all. That is, just plain Text Mode.
While I use a GUI mostly, there are times I just want to discard the GUI
and switch to the Framebuffer and just use text mode. Its not just for 'retro' reasons, but having a purely text based set up does reduce distraction! The fact that nothing else is visible (except the TMUX modeline) and nothing else is going on, just creates a different
experience, one more conducive to single minded focus. The mental
map of what is going on is different, cleaner.
Just want to hear other peoples thought, whether they find this too.
Borax Man <rotflol2@hotmail.com> writes:
Subject says it all.
I'm curious whether there are people who do all their computing, or part
of it, without a GUI at all. That is, just plain Text Mode.
I'd begin by asking the guy behind FreeDOS.
https://freedos.org/
Subject says it all.
I'm curious whether there are people who do all their computing, or part
of it, without a GUI at all. That is, just plain Text Mode.
The GNU EMACS is way more than a text editor, in which you can handle
mail and news---all in essentially a plain-text interface, with all the advantages of a GUI.
What!!! You mean that GUI thing actually caught on with some people?
I thought it wa a passing fad.
If supporting processes on a server, more then likely you are using a
command line supporting the processes.
The GUI version of Emacs even comes with a GTK-based build that works
with Wayland.
On Fri, 25 Apr 2025 20:09:56 -0000 (UTC), Jim Jackson wrote:
What!!! You mean that GUI thing actually caught on with some people?
I thought it wa a passing fad.
People outside the *nix world are rediscovering the things that the
command line makes easier than any GUI -- namely, automating repetitive tasks.
Trouble is, after so many decades of being conditioned by major vendors
like Microsoft and Apple to be allergic to the command line, it’s turning out to require some major intellectual effort, on the part of both users
and vendors, to get to grips with this new-old way of doing things. Look
at Microsoft’s struggles to turn Windows into something closer to Linux.
Apple in theory has a slight advantage in that, buried somewhere within
its proprietary OS is the remnants of something that used to be more like
a *nix system. But it seems to have deviated too far from the mainstream,
and the company shows little interest in remedying that.
The command line is like "telling" the computer what to do. The GUI is
like "showing" the computer what to do. Not having any command line
usage at all, make certain things, automation, but even composing
commands, very difficult.
For example, at work, I often have to do repetive work (such as generate specifications). This involves a lot of bring up dialog boxes, clicking options, saving files, changing filenames, over and over and over again.
What!!! You mean that GUI thing actually caught on with some people?Subject says it all.
I'm curious whether there are people who do all their computing, or
part of it, without a GUI at all. That is, just plain Text Mode.
I thought it wa a passing fad.
For example, at work, I often have to do repetive work (such as generate >specifications). This involves a lot of bring up dialog boxes, clicking >options, saving files, changing filenames, over and over and over again.
For example, at work, I often have to do repetive work (such as generate >specifications). This involves a lot of bring up dialog boxes, clicking >options, saving files, changing filenames, over and over and over again.
On Windows one also can access the screen programmatically with code
that goes somewhat like, "If there is a dialog of this class on the
screen, then press its [OK] button. Wait one second. Wait until a
Window with 'editor' in its title comes up. Then press [Ctrl]-[F]."
On 26 Apr 2025 12:49:06 GMT, Stefan Ram wrote:
On Windows one also can access the screen programmatically with code
that goes somewhat like, "If there is a dialog of this class on the
screen, then press its [OK] button. Wait one second. Wait until a
Window with 'editor' in its title comes up. Then press [Ctrl]-[F]."
This idea has been tried with every GUI. Think of it as the worst of both worlds: the complexity of learning how to write code combined with the slowness and fragility of trying to automate something that was never designed to be automated.
| Sysop: | Keyop |
|---|---|
| Location: | Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, UK |
| Users: | 491 |
| Nodes: | 16 (2 / 14) |
| Uptime: | 94:05:45 |
| Calls: | 9,679 |
| Files: | 13,725 |
| Messages: | 6,174,217 |