Subject: CCL:Anybody agrees with me?

From: "Tamas E. Gunda" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 11 Feb 2000 10:26:05 +0100

I think that *some* unofficial standardisation of the GUI could be
beneficial, for example:

manipulation of a structure with the mouse:
left-click + drag: x and y rotation of the structure,
shift left-click + drag : zoom up/down,
shift right-click + drag : z rotation,
ctrl right-click + drag: x y translate,
etc

However, it must be taken into consideration that a scientific software is
not the same category as text editors like Word or WordPerfect etc., and is
not intended for the use of secretaries and typists. Consider for example
the programs, which offer an interface to MOPAC or has a built-in MOPAC
module. MOPAC has several dozens of keywords and parameters and options, the
number of combinations is immense. These programs usually offer a few
general options for an average geometry optimalization and the calculation
of a few properties. But MOPAC knows much more, and if one wants something
different, the use of  keywords is inevitable. Many people hates this type
of command line input and wants "some user-friendly" method, but how could
it be done? If a MOPAC interface would appear with two hundreds of buttons
and drop-down menus and input boxes on the screen, it would also be regarded
very unfriendly.

As somebody wrote, "...the more an interface can do, the more difficult it
is to make it user friendly". I think that the planning and realization of a
good interface is usually more complicated and time-consuming as the program
itself. On the other hand, the most contraversary thing is that the
interface should do many-many things (therefore it tends to be complicated),
but most people hate reading manuals and online helps. Therefore many
features, options and bells-and-whistles of the program remain unknown to
them, thus they start with another program and so on.  An interface is not
complicated if one takes time to get aquinted with it.

Dr Tamas E. Gunda
Research Group for Antibiotics of the Hungarian Acad. Sci.
L. Kossuth University, POBox 36
H-4010 Debrecen, Hungary
tel.: (+36-52) 316666/2472
fax: (+36-52) 512914
e-mail: [email-masked]
home-page: www.klte.hu/~gundat/gunda.htm

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From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 11 Feb 2000 12:30:00 +0100

> Maybe you will argue that every software has its own advantages and
> disadvantages. I agree. But this should not be the reason why those
> softwares are so different in interface! I have experience in using quite

Sure, standardization had advantages. But standardizing in some
evolving field can also limit improvements significantly. I don't
think that interactive modelling software already has already reached
the point where everyone agrees how things should work and
disagreement is only over minor details. So my answer is: not yet.

On the other hand, something that should be more standardized is file
formats. If data could be interchanged freely, people could use
different programs together more effectively. As a first step, all
producers of scientific software, academic and commercial, should
document the file formats they use. And then they should get together
and agree on standards. And I mean well-defined and usable standards,
to prevent chaotic developments as we have seen with the PDB format.
-- 
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