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Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

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Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#71

Post by fmxsh »

Looks very smooth!

However, from my perspective, the extensive need to drag windows around and resize them is a habit of windows environment. So, perhaps, this is for the mouse what tmux and Neovim are for the keyboard.

In tmux, the window layouts I need are fixed sets of 2x2 panes, with some predefined ways of resizing them and toggling full-screen. With effective tools like telescope and nvim, the need to line all windows up disapears, because the switching is so efficient and I have more of a mental picture than a visual one of what's available. For example, no need for the file tree commonly to the left in most IDEs.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#72

Post by gjvc »

o-sdn-o wrote: post #67
gjvc wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hooray, thank you! When I said "zooming" I was thinking of the white tethers attached to each window which would pull them back into a centre bundle. You can see what I mean here: https://changelog.com/news/a-textbased-desktop-environment-i... at the bottom left, the lines going off to a single point. actually, by zooming out, I can still see the tethers on the windows. The ssh version was quite mind-blowing back whe…

This is the same thing as the public demo back then via 'ssh vtm@netxs.online'. There are no public demo servers running now, but you can still ssh to your running vtm instance with any number of connections. In case of using MS Windows you can even get the output in a standalone GUI window via 'vtm ssh user@unixserver vtm'.

am I imagining it, or were there more features in the original public demo?

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#73

Post by fmxsh »

hidelooktropic wrote: post #43
accrual wrote: post #3

We've come full circle. We invented a GUI to replace the TUI, then reimplemented the GUI in the TUI. Long live the terminal!

Yeah. Am I missing the point that this leans so far into being as capable as a GUI as it can, that we lose something from starting in the terminal in the first place?

I was exploring why Linux terminal environment is so powerful compared to Windows terminal. Windows is built at the kernel level to support graphics and GUI, while *nix systems are built with terminal at the core. Thus Windows historically has had way more powerful GUIs. They are two different domains of power. Each of them also trying to do what the other does better.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#75

Post by o-sdn-o »

gjvc wrote: post #72
o-sdn-o wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the same thing as the public demo back then via 'ssh vtm@netxs.online'. There are no public demo servers running now, but you can still ssh to your running vtm instance with any number of connections. In case of using MS Windows you can even get the output in a standalone GUI window via 'vtm ssh user@unixserver vtm'.

am I imagining it, or were there more features in the original public demo?

Now vtm is the same as it was running on demo servers. In the modern version, the fading effects and window shadows are disabled by default in the settings. Perhaps the fading effects were removed as unnecessary.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#76

Post by o-sdn-o »

gjvc wrote: post #72
o-sdn-o wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the same thing as the public demo back then via 'ssh vtm@netxs.online'. There are no public demo servers running now, but you can still ssh to your running vtm instance with any number of connections. In case of using MS Windows you can even get the output in a standalone GUI window via 'vtm ssh user@unixserver vtm'.

am I imagining it, or were there more features in the original public demo?

There were demo apps in the menu, they are still there: 'vtm --run text', 'vtm --run calc', 'vtm --run test', 'vtm --run truecolor'... You can play with it by running them directly inside the vtm desktop, by typing (or right click to paste) commands like vtm.desktop.Run({ type='calc' }) in the 'Log Monitor' command line.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#77

Post by throwawayForMe2 »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #5
accrual wrote: post #3

We've come full circle. We invented a GUI to replace the TUI, then reimplemented the GUI in the TUI. Long live the terminal!

Revenge of DESQview

I also remember the first version of Smalltalk from Digitalk that was character based and windowed. It was called Methods. I can’t seem to find any reference to it on the web now.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#78

Post by ninetyninenine »

hnlmorg wrote: post #62
ninetyninenine wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. This isn’t true. Most terminals are native. They don’t run under a browser engine.

A browser engine isn’t a prerequisite for something using a graphical framework nor running on a desktop environment

Ah I see what you mean. I mean it’s all pixels in the end right? and pixels are primitives for guis. So then the root primitive is in actuality the gui.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#79

Post by pjmlp »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #5
accrual wrote: post #3

We've come full circle. We invented a GUI to replace the TUI, then reimplemented the GUI in the TUI. Long live the terminal!

Revenge of DESQview

Just like whenever I see someone praising Ratatui, what comes to my mind is Turbo Vision, Clipper and curses.

Re: Vtm: Text-Based Desktop Environment

#80

Post by pjmlp »

pantulis wrote: post #27
accrual wrote: post #3

We've come full circle. We invented a GUI to replace the TUI, then reimplemented the GUI in the TUI. Long live the terminal!

The demo video has a lot of Borland's Turbo Vision vibes.

It was a great framework, it was my path into OOP, after learning it previously in TP 5.5 (TV was released alongside TP 6, and Borland C++ 3.0), and its design was quite pragmatic.
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