On Wed, 12 Feb 2003, martin pi wrote:
some points to this - or "why is pd really not friendly to the user"
- it has modes (as opposed to modeless environments (this is why
people do not like vi, too). modes are hard to understand - especially for mac people since the mac interface is traditionally modeless
Modes are useful to reduce the number of different functions that need a key-binding or hot-spot. In VI, this is there because it allows a typewriter-trained person to keep his/her hands on the main part of the keyboard, while keeping the amount of pressing of modifier-keys quite low. In MAX/PD/JMAX this seems to be because there would be too many different clickable functions in a too small space, so some things are only available in Run mode, and some only in Edit mode.
However the presence of those modes is consistent with the fact that what you can do in edit mode doesn't affect what happens inside an object (except when you create or delete one), while what you can do in run mode affects what happens inside an object but not the rest... for example, the Undo function will not undo messages that have been sent through the message system due to a click in run mode (or whatever else) ! So there may be more to modes than what I said in the previous paragraph...
yet it is mostly verb-noun based thus good in the general flow
could you please explain this concept (verb-noun based) and how it opposes to other possible designs, or give references to webpages explaining it.
Mathieu Bouchard http://artengine.ca/matju