That would definitely help if Pharo shed some of its elitism with fancy names. Then it would have much more appeal for the masses (and definitely increase popularity of Smalltalk) but it is the intent of the community, that's the question.
On Fri, Apr 20, 2018 at 4:09 PM, Benoit St-Jean via Pharo-users < pharo-users@lists.pharo.org> wrote: > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: Benoit St-Jean <bstj...@yahoo.com> > To: pharo-users@lists.pharo.org > Cc: "s...@clipperadams.com" <s...@clipperadams.com> > Bcc: > Date: Fri, 20 Apr 2018 20:09:43 +0000 (UTC) > Subject: Re: [Pharo-users] Where do we go now ? > I concur with Sean's comments. The problem is not using names : the > problem is for new users. > > A very quick look at what's in Pharo 7 shows the following names : Iceberg, > Ombu, Calypso, Flashback, Nautilus, Renraku, Zodiac, Shift, Zinc, Hermes, > Beacon, Cargo, Hermes, Opal, Shoreline, Epicea, Balloon, BlueInk, > Commander, Fuel, Glamorous, Glamour, Gofer, Hiedra, Metacello, Moose, Ring, > Rubric, Shout, Spec, etc... > > How many Pharo *users* (not regular contributors!) know what those > tools/frameworks/packages do ??? Make the test and tell us how many out of > 30 names you were able to identify correctly ! > > Unless we *clearly* publicize/describe what those names are, there's no > way in a thousand years you could tell that BlueInk is not a package > dealing with fonts (that was my first guess) ! > > Newcomers and (developers in general) expect a few things. For instance, > there's a gazillion UI frameworks out there and, most of the time, the name > used for them is one of a famous painter. VisualWorks had Chagall for > instance. > > Or you'd expect some kind of hint from the name, e.g. XStreams, > ScriptManager, RefactoringBrowser. > > Or somethings as simple as Regex, the regex package from Bykov. Or > Announcements from the same guy. > > Or names that reveals something from an etymology standpoint, e.g. > TelePharo. > > The simple fact that someone had to create a file to describe all those > names/projects/framework on GitHub tells us a lot (https://github.com/ > AdamSadovsky/pharo-family/blob/master/catalog.txt) ! > > Unless we make it *EXTRA* clear and easily searchable and obvious what > those names represent, it's just more confusion for the newcomer. > > Do you know what Celery is? Probably not! But if I ask you the same > question for RabbitMQ, ActiveMQ, MQSeries, StormMQ, SnakeMQ, IronMQ, > ZeroMQ, MQTT and MSMQ, you probably figured out it's related to message > queues, right? Well, Celery is also related to message queues... See? > > There's nothing worse or more confusing than a bad/weird/unrelated name. > For example, the biggest company in Canada is called "Canadian Tire". If > you think you're gonna end up in a place specialized in tires, you're off > for a big surprise !!!! > > On the other end of the spectrum, you have something like iTunes. > Everybody knows iTunes. And I guess, even if you didn't know, you can > kinda easily guess it's related to music. Your grandma might not exactly > remember the name but she'll remember "Was it xTunes? zTunes? yTunes? It > was something 'tunes', to music" ! > > And comparing other "names" with Pharo names makes no sense. Nike, > Hibernate, Jenkins, Docker and Oracle cannot be compared to Epicea, > BlueInk, Flashback and Opal. They just don't have the same visibility and > public exposure. That is hopefully a problem that will vanish as Pharo > gets more and more attention and users and gets known more and more. But > in the meantime, those names merely help us differentiate implementations > of solutions, for us the *regulars*. > > Was it really that hard to replace the old workspace with Workspace2 or > WhateverWorkspace ? Or even better : get rid of the old Workspace and > replace it with Playground while retaining the name "Workspace" ??? Did we > really need to call it Playground and confuse every new Smalltalker out > there that has seen the term "Workspace" for Dolphin, Smalltalk/X, > VisualAge, VisualWorks, ObjectStudio, GNU Smalltalk, Amber, PharoJS, > Smalltalk MT and every other Smalltalk around *EXCEPT* Pharo? > > Why are we trying to complicate things when we could just make it > soooooooooooooo simple? > > Let's make it easy for **newcomers** to get their way around and know what > the named tools/frameworks do. Get rid of duplicate tools (do we need more > than one kind of Inspector? Do we need 2 compilers? Do we need 8 Delay > schedulers? Do we need 2 system browsers? Do we need the duo > Workspace/Playground) ? Make these extra tools available somewhere it can > be loaded from if a user *really* wants them in their image, but let's keep > those OUT of the image! > > > > ----------------- > Benoît St-Jean > Yahoo! Messenger: bstjean > Twitter: @BenLeChialeux > Pinterest: benoitstjean > Instagram: Chef_Benito > IRC: lamneth > Blogue: endormitoire.wordpress.com > "A standpoint is an intellectual horizon of radius zero". (A. Einstein) > > > On Friday, April 20, 2018, 10:09:13 a.m. EDT, Sean P. DeNigris < > s...@clipperadams.com> wrote: > > > Stephane Ducasse-3 wrote > > I like when developers are talking about names: > > They use a mac and not a computer, they were nike, lewis and not shoes > > and pants.... > > So guys can we focus our energy on positive things. > > IHMO this is certainly a positive subject because it highlights the > as-yet-to-be-resolved tension regarding understandability of the system > between having a unique name (good for googling, distinguishing between > versions) and a name that reveals what the project does/is for. What is the > plan to resolve this because it is a real problem? > > Nike and Levis are designed to stand on their own in front of the consumer > market. Is this true of Nautilus, Calypso, or Epicea? > > A more relevant example of products that are geared to be presented to > consumers as /part of/ another more-uniquely-named product come to mind: OS > release codenames: > - Mac - OS X 10.11: El Capitan and macOS 10.12: Sierra. Note that they > didn't just invent a random-seeming fabricated name and tell people to get > over it, they also provide a number which situates it in its domain. > - Interestingly Windows has moved back to boring release numbers and has > dropped the fantasy names > > Possible solutions: > - Make project tags /the primary view for new users when searching the > system. There is a lot of talk about students and having to explain > confusing things to them. Would it not be more straightforward to look for > a > "Class Browser" or "SCM" category?! > - If projects are designed just-for-pharo, maybe borrow another trick from > OS X - have a codename for development (like Fuji for Sierra) and then > change it to something more generic on release, like Browser3, although now > that we seem to be keeping tools in their own project repos, that might be > problematic > > I summary, IMHO it is important to provide both: > - A clear, searchable, pragmatic way to navigate/understand the system > - As well as the unique, google-able, but usually undescriptive way we have > > now > > > > ----- > Cheers, > > Sean > -- > Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html > > > >
