[Mono-list] Re: Mono

[Chris Seberino]

Michael


Thanks for the detailed response.  I hope Mono
is successful and even that I can contribute.
My secret hope is that:

1. 3rd party MS-Windows app developers will
want to avoid any APIs that won't work across
Win/.NET & Linux/Mono. Why wouldn't they desire to be
able to run/sell their wares on another platform (Linux)???
(Oops, on the other hand they won't be Open
Source so maybe not so useful.)

2. 3rd party MS-Windows app developers will
say, "Hey, programming for GNOME is just
like Windows!" and consider GNOME in droves.

Thanks again,

Chris

On Sat, Sep 29, 2001 at 12:56:02AM -0400, Michael  Lambert wrote:
> Well, its not like GTK+/Bonobo don't have their own problems.  They are closely
> patterned after Windows. 8-0 In GTK+ you've got to choose between writing
> against the 1.2 or 2.0 API.  There goes source level integration, but your
> asking about the WinForms design.
> 
> WinForms is a pretty thin wrapper over the Windows API in some places. If you
> don't think the Windows is well written to start with then nothing in .Net is
> going to change your mind. Personally, I think it is going to be pretty hard to
> achieve 100% compatibility.  It takes a lot of work to remove the platform from
> the framework and appeal to developers at the same time.
> System.Windows.Forms.IWin32Window - Uggh!
> 
> I, also, believe that the closer the platform is to the standard the better.
> Where it diverges is somewhere in between but hopefully the software developer
> will never know.  Call it the curse of the Java Phuel. Also, the MS version is
> constantly changing and I would expect to see differences between now and any
> December/January release.  That said there are some nice design aspects to .Net.
> 
> The System.Drawing is pretty much a thin wrapper over Win32 so there is a large
> base of users who understand the API.  Although, this isn't evidence of a
> superior design it pretty much means that a lot of developers have successfully
> written applications that work. At any rate MS won't change the design to any
> significant degree in years to come.
> 
> The .Net, GDK, and Java libraries are very close in many ways already.  There
> are tons of new little bitty features in the members of many of the classes.  I
> think its easier to do Alpha Blending and Transparency effects.  You can pass a
> memory bitmap as a stream to a socket or file.  Makes serializing graphics from
> a web server very efficient without ever having to touch the hard disk.
> 
> Specifying Anchoring, Window Docking, and Windowing Styles (SDI/MDI/etc) are
> nicely designed. They are easy to use/specify.  Placing and organization windows
> within frames is again easy to do.  They are organized into collections and are
> easy to manipulate from your language's array syntax.
> 
> You get a few more kind of controls that are different, like PropertyGrid, than
> you do in GTK+/Bonobo. Compare GtkList and ListView. However, there are largely
> the same constructs in either library.
> 
> The .Net library is more like the Java library when compared to traditional
> Windows programming.  MS looks to have put in a lot of work to make it more
> generic.  Why not do this for the Mono version of .Net?  The event model for the
> .Net controls is more like signals and less like traditional WM_ messages.  Very
> simplistic and easy to adapt/adopt plus the coordination between the WinForms
> and the WebForms has been thought out in the .Net design.
> 
> There are many parallels that went into the design of the WinForms and WebForms.
> You have to respect the effort and consideration that went into the design of
> hierarchies that are so dissimilar.  When comparing WebForms with Tomcat, I find
> WebForms to have the better design.  WebForms is newer since Tomcat came out
> earlier. WebForms seems to have looked at that design and improved on the ideas
> behind it.
> 
> In short, I really don't think a comparison between WinForms and GTK+/Bonobo is
> really a good idea.  We are in the era of large frameworks and the features
> don't match always match up with features at such a granular level.  It is much
> more appropriate to compare .Net against J2EE or Mono/Linux as whole.  What in
> GTK+/Bonobo compares to these:
> 
> The applications that I've written so far have required very little code to get
> functionality into an application.  That's a lot of bang for a little buck so I
> won't end up with carpel-tunnel-syndrome at the end of the day.
> 
> I think the .Net resource/globalization design is nicer. More helpful when your
> packaging sounds and graphics with applications.
> 
> DataBinding (SQL, XML) classes are nicely designed and make it very easy to hook
> up a database query or cursor up to a WinForm and WebForm control.  Works great
> moving data between table oriented SQL data and tag oriented XML data.  Very
> little work on my part.
> 
> The manner in which you can introduce high availability (Load Balancing,
> Transactioning, etc..) features into a code base or "form" (through attribute
> usage) doesn't compare to anything in GTK+/Bonobo.
> 
> The WinForms and WebForms Designers are an incredible advantage over
> GTK+/Bonobo. They pretty much guarantees that your less sophisticated developers
> will be able to write software for either deployment model (Win/Web).  The VB
> generation of software design is really the first successful attempt at
> graphical software design.  Think of how you would use a UML product to do
> graphical software design? The VB pallet is what that is; however, your
> substituting ComboBoxes, Edit Controls, and Labels for Class Diagrams, Use
> Cases, and Messages.  Something to think about.
> 
> GTK+/Bonobo doesn't do a lot to provide language interop. Unless interop between
> C and C++ is nirvana in the programming world. There is always CORBA but that
> would have you nibbling on the barrel pretty shortly. :-(
> 
> The framework is where competition is taking place.  It is not in the Windowing
> (WinForms) arena.  That battle has been fought and everybody pretty much looks
> the same anyway.  New framework competition is in the WebForms arena.  Many of
> the tool developers, I know pretty much have the same opinion.  The big
> companies are beginning to provide the technology that delivers the web in an
> easier fashion.
> 
> We've seen the bottom fall out of the .COM (The Web not [D]COM/CORBA) market and
> much of the historical value is quickly eroding.  From my perspective, there is
> a real squeeze going on in the market since fewer and fewer companies are
> providing more and more of the framework.  In the past having 5% of the tool
> market was a pretty big share, not anymore.
> 
> I been stuck off doing other stuff and this turned into more of a rant so I have
> to apologize.  In one aspect .Net is a 'standard' implementation.   Having an
> implementation that matches the standard isn't a bad idea. I think a crew of
> developers is introducing System.GTKPlusBonobo library somewhere. Each platform
> has its own problems and if that isn't apparent then your not using enough
> computers.
> 
> Sincerely,
> Michael Lambert
> 
> 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Chris Seberino,,, [mailto:seberino@dt092n42.san.rr.com]On Behalf
> > Of Chris Seberino
> > Sent: Friday, September 28, 2001 4:03 PM
> > To: michaellambert@bellsouth.net
> > Subject: Mono
> >
> >
> > Michael
> >
> > Can I please ask you a question about
> > Mono/.NET's Windows.Forms people
> > seem to be implementing?...
> >
> > Is Win-Forms an entirely (& well designed???)
> > new GUI library GNOME people want
> > future GNOME apps to use???
> > Is it so different that you won't
> > be able to tell if it is implemented
> > with Win32 or GTK+/Bonobo for the most part??
> >
> > Is it nicer & *better* designed than GTK+/Bonobo? Why???
> > Aren't all the GTK+/GNOME library lovers going
> > to miss these APIs??? Please explain what is going
> > on here to a newbie.
> >
> > Sincerely,
> >
> > Chris
> > --
> > =======================================================
> > | Dr. Christian Seberino  || (619) 553-7811 (office1) |
> > | SPAWARSYSCEN 2733       || (619) 553-2564 (office2) |
> > | 53560 HULL ST           || (619) 553-6307 (fax)     |
> > | SAN DIEGO CA 92152-5001 || seberino@spawar.navy.mil |
> > =======================================================
> >
> 

-- 
=======================================================
| Dr. Christian Seberino  || (619) 553-7811 (office1) |
| SPAWARSYSCEN 2733       || (619) 553-2564 (office2) |
| 53560 HULL ST           || (619) 553-6307 (fax)     |
| SAN DIEGO CA 92152-5001 || seberino@spawar.navy.mil |
=======================================================