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Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

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Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#161

Post by GoblinSlayer »

supriyo-biswas wrote: post #26
arepublicadoceu wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it sad? Every time I see a piece of software that provides a lot of value and it’s not focused on money-making (ublock for example) it gives me a warm feeling.

Because there is something ironic about people (in general, including those here) dreaming about well paying jobs, but then wanting high quality products that have been worked on by people without compensation, when that time could have been invested by the worker (developer in this case) working another paid job, spending time with loved ones, and the like.

That's the virtue of suckless software too: you can do it in spare time.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#162

Post by GoblinSlayer »

anta40 wrote: post #62

>> The only way for one person to even attempt cross-platform app is to use a UI abstraction layer like Qt, WxWidgets or Gtk. The problem is that Gtk is ugly, Qt is extremely bloated and WxWidgets barely works. So, how you are going to write cross platform apps, then? :D

Put UI behind PAL like sumatra does with pdf engine.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#163

Post by acuozzo »

tacotacotaco wrote: post #136
acuozzo wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but paradoxically the more professional an open source site looks, the more I assume there's going to be a catch I hate to admit this, but I feel the same way when it comes to programmers themselves. I've tried very, very hard to be mindful of this in an effort to correct it, but I still have this gut feeling when I encounter a fellow programmer with the general put-together-ness of someone in the C-suite. What mak…

I’m far from cover-of-GQ but I did wear a suit every day for a few years to a programming job. Maybe it’s the punk in me but when every person in the company, including the C suite, dressed in a t-shirt and jeans or sweats I felt the need to be a little counter culture. Honestly it was an insightful experiment in biases, seeing how different people treated me (such as your admission) based on my clothes alone. … and…

> I did wear a suit every day for a few years to a programming job

Was it a tailored suit by a designer brand? Alternatively, was it a fancy bespoke suit?

Suits usually don't set off my bullshit detector. Many legitimate hackers have had to wear them since the dawn of computing.

It's the details that catch my eye.

The money, priorities, and (most import of all!) time are in the details.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#164

Post by acuozzo »

xarope wrote: post #137
sph wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Likewise, I'd never trust a software engineer in a suit, unless it's for a project written in Java or COBOL. Nor a sysadmin that isn't wearing black, running Linux and/or listening to metal. Unless they have a white beard, then you know they have been around for a while. (Just partially serious here, don't read too much into it. But you know it's true.)

Much like some people like wearing a nice watch, pants, etc, I like wearing a nicely cut suit or jacket. Is that really any different to people wearing a comfortable pair of jeans? And paradoxically, I have carried server equipment wearing an italian suit, whilst others were bemoaning dust getting on their levis jeans... So please, please don't judge a book by it's cover. Actions speak louder.

> I like wearing a nicely cut suit or jacket.

Suits don't set off my bullshit detector. Legitimate hackers have had to wear them since the dawn of computing.

The devil is in the details. Alarm bells start to ring for me when the sum of the details exceeds what my gut feels is reasonable.

Being worthy of the cover of GQ takes a ton of time, energy, and resources to maintain.

Managing to maintain the same perfect tan all year is an investment for sure, but not necessarily an investment that aligns with the hacker ethos.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#165

Post by daveoc64 »

grishka wrote: post #97
kjksf wrote: post #60

SumatraPDF author here. Glad people like the software for the reasons I thought the would (small, fast). If you haven't already: use Ctrl + K (Command Palette), a better way to operate the program than menus etc. Also I'll plug my latest project: I "ported" notepad2 to web: https://onlinetool.io/notepad2/ It's 85% done i.e. some functions are not implemented. On Chrome / Edge it can even read / write files from your…

As someone who now also works on an open-source personal project, I'm really fascinated by this kind of thing. Especially the "I don't care about dogmatic ways of doing things", this very much resonates with me. As for SumatraPDF, I haven't used it myself because I don't use Windows as my main OS, but I definitely remember seeing that icon on other people's Windows machines. So it is reasonably popular in my part of…

Adobe was reported to be threating Microsoft with anti-trust complaints in the mid-2000s, as Office had started to include support for outputting PDFs without needing to buy a plugin from Adobe.

I imagine they've steered clear of stepping on Adobe's toes since then.

The PDF functionality in Edge avoids these problems, as it's a standard web browser feature these days.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#166

Post by wonrax »

> This requires resolve. I constantly get requests to add more icons to the toolbar and I constantly have to say “no” because adding 2 more icons to the toolbar to satisfy 10% of users makes the app slightly worse for 100% of the users.

This, this is why I love the app. Adobe Acrobat has more pleasing GUI but it clutters with buttons and sidebars and functionalities that I'll never use most of the time but they consume most of the screen real estate. When reading, I'd like everything to get out of the way and let me focus on the content, SumatraPDF serves me well.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#168

Post by lenkite »

kjksf wrote: post #60

SumatraPDF author here. Glad people like the software for the reasons I thought the would (small, fast). If you haven't already: use Ctrl + K (Command Palette), a better way to operate the program than menus etc. Also I'll plug my latest project: I "ported" notepad2 to web: https://onlinetool.io/notepad2/ It's 85% done i.e. some functions are not implemented. On Chrome / Edge it can even read / write files from your…

Many Thanks for your software. I used SumatraPDF heavily for 10+ years while I was on Windows. Used to shudder at Adobe Reader.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#169

Post by tormeh »

olddustytrail wrote: post #114
tormeh wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mupdf is the key. Sadly there's no user-friendly mupdf wrapper like Sumatra on Linux.

What about zathura mentioned upthread?

Doesn't have a ToC sidebar, which I consider pretty much the absolute minimum of GUI necessary. You can use a keyboard-driven menu by pressing tab, but in my experience it just takes you to the last page of the pdf. Maybe there's a bug or maybe it's user error. Regardless, this isn't what I'm looking for.

Re: Lessons learned from 15 years of SumatraPDF, an open source Windows app (2021)

#170

Post by tincholio »

scns wrote: post #121
arcanemachiner wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the killer audio player was Winamp. I could hide the window and control everything via keyboard shortcuts. It was the perfect program: completely invisible and yet completely functional.

Was because you left Windows? Development picked up again.

I was thinking about trying Winamp again at some point, but nowadays I use Spotify, and shuffling a ton of MP3s across systems doesn't seem as compelling as it did 10 or 15 years ago. I guess I don't really have a strong need for an mp3 player anymore.
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