[Edu-sig] would you use PythonCard?

[Roman Suzi]

On Sat, 1 Sep 2001 agauld@crosswinds.net wrote:

>On 1 Sep 01, at 10:24, Roman Suzi wrote:
>> >Maybe PythonCard has the better approach for occasional users.
>> Well, Alan, have you ever used HyperCard?
>
>I confess never to have used it "hands on".
>BUt I have project managed a Mac project where Hypercard
>was used and it was great for getting somehthing out
>quickly. But within 3 releases all the Hypercard stuff
>had been rewritten... But then 2 releases later the Mac
>version itself had stopped being produced but that doesn't
>mean Macs are bad! :-)

PythonCard is not a clone of HyperCard. As I understand it, it will allow
to draw what is drawable (visual GUI parts) and everything else will be in
Python scripts.

This allows people who do not like GUIs to easily wrap logic into visual
shell, making things "easier" for those who is accustomed to GUI.

And I see educational uses are best fit for PythonCard. Pure Tkinter is
NOT up to the task, because in this case people simply choose different
environment. PythonCard is planned to provide simple GUI environment for
those who greet things by clothers first.

>Most of my comments are based on general experiences
>with so called "higher level" GUI toolkits and a read thru'
>the stuff about PythonCard. They provide a powerful
>startup tool for straightforward apps but often run out of
>steam when we push the boundaries.
>
>But then there are a lot of straighforward apps out there.
>
>I wasn't meaning to be disparaging about either Hypercard or
>PythonCard, they are worthy products/ideals but I was simply
>expressing why a previous poster may have felt "yawn" at the
>thought of another GUI builder/environment.
>
>Also I guess pointing out that GUI RAD doesn't need to be
>visual. Python(and Tcl/Tk) has a very different approach to
>incremental GUI development.

It is verbal approach. For me personally it is easier to write apps by
language. But for those who learn it presents a great barrier.

>(IMHO Python is superior to Tcl in
>this respect but I'm sure Tcl fans would disagree). Native Python
>feels more like early Smalltalk than Hypercard to me, both are
>productive environments.

He-he! Hypertalk is also very much like Smalltalk, IMHO.
(I also think, that "talk" is there for that reason)

>> Your opinion on "GUI builders" is probably due to the fact that most of
>> them are lame.
>
>Thats possibly true!

And if we anderstand WHY exactly they are lame, we will see
that they have wrong border between drawable and scriptable
tasks + stupid object model.

>> And "occasional users" are those who come to Python from
>> successful encounter with superb GUI builder.
>
>I'm not sure what you mean by that. I think there are a lot of
>occasional users coming at Python from lots of directions -
>education, Sys admin, Web development and yes maybe
>GUI work too.

OK. Right now I can't show nice higher level GUI builder for Python. That
means that Python is out of reach for those educational users who need to
perform concrete tasks fast. THis is not good.

>> So, please, do not underestimate PythonCard potential!
>
>I'll keep an open mind, and probably even have a play with
>it - I usually do when these things come up.

PythonCard is in prototype stage. It is planned to
rewrite it completely at some future moment.

>Alan G

Sincerely yours, Roman Suzi
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