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Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

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191–200 of 299 posts

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#191

Post by gessha »

graemep wrote: post #162
beachy wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in the old days, the primary users of many mainframe UIs were the data entry team (almost universally female). Sitting in large offices with rows of desks and a huge clock on the front wall, they weren't interacting with customers, they were transcribing from sales sheets, order forms, application forms, etc. prepared by someone else. There was no great need for user friendliness, because the only users were in…

Mice are the problem, not the rest of the GUI. Keyboards are just faster once you learn them.

Mice + keyboards are good for versatility. When you need more than data entry or non-tabular (images, video) data entry or processing, having a mouse is key.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#192

Post by cdchn »

solardev wrote: post #6

In stark contrast to most GNU/*nix tools, I really liked MS-DOS's edit.com text editor. Unlike emacs or vim or even nano, it didn't have a bunch of invisible shortcut keys, just a Windows-like drop-down menu system (but rendered in DOS). You could easily browse through the menu hierarchy, but still memorize certain shortcuts that you often use (just like Windows). In later versions you could even use the mouse to sel…

To me, Borland Turbo Pascal / Turbo C are the apex of IDEs.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#193

Post by cdchn »

rzzzt wrote: post #42
solardev wrote: post #6

In stark contrast to most GNU/*nix tools, I really liked MS-DOS's edit.com text editor. Unlike emacs or vim or even nano, it didn't have a bunch of invisible shortcut keys, just a Windows-like drop-down menu system (but rendered in DOS). You could easily browse through the menu hierarchy, but still memorize certain shortcuts that you often use (just like Windows). In later versions you could even use the mouse to sel…

Fun fact: EDIT.COM and HELP.COM are secretly QBASIC.EXE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QBasic#Contents

Doesn't get more integrated as far as integrated development environments go when your editor is your language interpreter.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#194

Post by al_borland »

kjellsbells wrote: post #115

If you are in the US, pick a slow day and chat to the customer service people at Lowes or Costco. Both stores use TUI interfaces for their instore service apps, and boy are they fast with them. They reserve GUI things for the self service point of sale systems and keep the TUI for cases where speed matters. I suspect that these apps might once have been mainframe hosted (in other words, screen-oriented, with the PC t…

I’ve always wondered about this. I get that a keyboard driven text interface can be extremely fast for an experienced user. However, when I think about a lot of the places I see them, they are retail jobs with what I can only assume is high turnover. The text interface has to have a much higher learning curve, which I would think would only pay off for jobs people work in for a long time.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#196

Post by y04nn »

I like TUI applications, they allow me to stay in the the terminal in tmux which make everything easy and fast. Here is a list of what I use and I can think of right now:

- neomutt (email client)

- ncspot (Rust Spotify client)

- glirc (Haskell IRC client)

- newsboat (RSS reader)

- calcurse (calendar)

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#197

Post by al_borland »

neelc wrote: post #123
kjellsbells wrote: post #115

If you are in the US, pick a slow day and chat to the customer service people at Lowes or Costco. Both stores use TUI interfaces for their instore service apps, and boy are they fast with them. They reserve GUI things for the self service point of sale systems and keep the TUI for cases where speed matters. I suspect that these apps might once have been mainframe hosted (in other words, screen-oriented, with the PC t…

I've seen those at Costco stores also. Whereas in indie coffee shops they use a Square tablet and in Apple stores the store people just use iPhones with special cases. Best Buy or Walgreens uses POS tablets with a relatively ugly GUI. Legacy apps never die. Charles Schwab might use mainframes while Robinhood won't but Schwab won't move off because it's too hard for an established firm. Same with Costco TUIs.

Before Apple switched to the iPhone for their POS system they used iMacs with a very ugly app. I think it was called iPOS. I know as a customer I wasn’t supposed to see it, but I was surprised Apple used something like that, considering Jobs always talking about how even the inside of something that no one ever sees should still be beautiful.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#198

Post by zzo38computer »

graemep wrote: post #162
beachy wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in the old days, the primary users of many mainframe UIs were the data entry team (almost universally female). Sitting in large offices with rows of desks and a huge clock on the front wall, they weren't interacting with customers, they were transcribing from sales sheets, order forms, application forms, etc. prepared by someone else. There was no great need for user friendliness, because the only users were in…

Mice are the problem, not the rest of the GUI. Keyboards are just faster once you learn them.

A mouse is not itself a problem, although most functions should be operable by keyboard. When selecting objects and points on the screen, the mouse is helpful. It is best to have both, although I would think that a keyboard alone is generally better than a mouse alone.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#199

Post by bigstrat2003 »

zzo38computer wrote: post #198
graemep wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mice are the problem, not the rest of the GUI. Keyboards are just faster once you learn them.

A mouse is not itself a problem, although most functions should be operable by keyboard. When selecting objects and points on the screen, the mouse is helpful. It is best to have both, although I would think that a keyboard alone is generally better than a mouse alone.

You're 100% correct. Keyboard is not better than mouse, both are good tools which complement each other.

Re: Ask HN: Interesting TUIs (text user interfaces), maybe forgotten ones?

#200

Post by davisr »

kqr wrote: post #142
RyanHamilton wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To enable the helpful mouse interface, run with this mode and add this to your hidden config file. What's a mode? How do I edit the config file until I fix my editor? This is such a unix answer.

To be fair if you're trying to start Emacs in a terminal instead of letting Emacs control its output on its own you've already gone off the beaten path. The thing you want (the helpful mouse interface) is the Emacs default. The funny command-line flag is what makes it weird. Just don't use that flag.

But then it's not a TUI anymore, which is the whole point of this exercise.
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