::scr doesn't have the morlocks

[jonah]

on 27/3/02 10:34 pm, David Cantrell at david@cantrell.org.uk wrote:

>> ObAside:
>> I often hear CLI fans espousing the "power and flexibility of the
>> command line". Which is true to a certain extent - when I first
>> learned to use a CLI I found it very liberating. But it has fuck all
>> power and flexibility when you're trying to draw a pony (certain silly
>> perl modules aside). :)
> 
> But I don't want to draw ponies.  

Oh, I understand that - I was just making the point that many Unix
advocates seem to take the wrong approach when selling the OS to people
I'll label as "designers". Sure, the command line *is* powerful and
flexible, but these people don't understand that because they just want to
draw ponies and don't see how the command line could help. I wasn't making
a "command line bad" argument, I was making the equally-tired
"horses/courses" point.

I reckon the designer's lack of understanding of the strengths of the
command line and hacker's disdain for the point'n'drool GUI is a classic
illustration of two viewpoints being unable to connect because the
fundamentals of their worldviews are so different. This is why I find
people like my friend Howard interesting to chat to - he's a fully trained
graphic designer and long-time Mac user who has become a Perl hacker. This
gives him a perspective on "computing" unique amongst my friends.

* jonah pauses to marshall is thoughts, a tricky business at the best of
times

I remember sitting on top of castle hill with the SWCG[0] on a bright and
sunny afternoon, discussing this subject. My views have changed a bit
since then. Simon was asserting that in life, you have Morlocks and
Eloi[1], and that people are predisposed towards being one or the
other. At the time, I agreed with him. I thought of all the people I know
who blanche at the idea of using a computer, who actually feel terror at
the prospect. But now I'm not so sure that it's that simple. In short, I
think that while nurture may be crucial in this regard, nature has very
little to do with it.

As a few people here have correctly pointed out in the past, it's not like
this stuff is incredibly difficult. Okay, so it may require a certain
amount of concentration and focus, but no more than that required by
other, traditionally Eloi pursuits such as creative writing or painting or
musical performance/composition.

I reckon it's not about how much innate ability you have for this sort of
thing, I think it's just how much of your own personal "mindshare" you
choose to devote to it (a big chunk of which is how interested you are in
the first place). Of course, some people are cleverer than other people,
but this does not mean that they are better suited to creative vs
technical tasks (which, IMHO, is a fallacious distinction in the first
place).

I'd be interesting in hearing Simon reiterate why he has his Morlock/Eloi
throry again - I forget most of his reasoning now.

> The generic stuff does transfer well, apart from the use of Netinfo
> instead of "proper" config files.  Aside from that, it's no more weird
> than Solaris, or Irix or Linux or Unixware.

Yeah, the NetInfo thing was the first thing about the Unixy bits of OS X
that tripped me up. But it's no more tricky to figure out than debian's
change to using /etc/network/interfaces before they'd changed the
documentation on their webshite. And, IIRC, you can set it so that NetInfo
will "synch" with your traditional config files on command, thus allowing
you to continue to use them, can't you?

On a completely different note - can somebody find and eviscerate the
bastard that built this "interface" please? It's one of the most
lurchbysmal things I've ever used:

http://www.soulwax.com/download/download.html

-- 
matt
David Hasselhof smells of penny farthing bicycles and a small fudge
shop in Harrogate.

[0] http://www.snurfer.org/cgi-bin/sands.pl?full=swcghill.jpg
[1] In the unlikely event that someone here hasn't heard of these terms, I
suggest s#Morlock#hardcore engineering/techie type# and s#Eloi#Airy-fairy
creative type#. http://makeashorterlink.com/?L28B3289