[IPython-dev] Quick question out of interest...

Thomas Kluyver takowl at gmail.com
Sun Jan 26 22:07:16 EST 2014


On 26 Jan 2014 18:46, "Carl Smith" <carl.input at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Ray's comments, it is obviously helpful to have a ready view of
imagery when doing certain kinds of work, and Thomas also mentioned having
an overview of things like the contents of files and directories. I
personally prefer something shell-like, but with the ability to open useful
secondary interfaces, like critically a text editor, in maximised views, so
there's always just one interface in view at a time, basically tabs with
different UIs in, though for something specialised like NeXpy, it probably
does make a lot of sense to do it the way you have.

More specifically, I think multiple panes are kind of the ultimate form of
multitasking. Eye movements are the quickest and most effortless way to
switch contexts. For information that's closely connected, like different
levels of detail on the contents of a file,  that can make a lot of sense.
But I often want to prevent my brain from switching to something else too
easily. As an aside, I sometimes think modern computer interfaces are so
good at multitasking that it impedes focussing on a single task.

Also, perhaps the notebook ui is not all that different - although it's not
in panes, it interleaves code editing, result viewing and note taking in
the same view.

Thomas
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