[CF-Devel] RE: GTK editor

[Yann Chachkoff]

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     ===== Original Message From <
      
      andi.vogl at gmx.net
      
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     Chachkoff Y. wrote:
     
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      A GTK editor is under development. Should reach beta-test stage
     
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      in a couple of  weeks.
     
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     Why are you developing a GTK editor?
     
     Because quite some people asked for one.

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     Then we have two editors and the development effort is split
     
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     in half.
     
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     The idea behind the Java Editor was to have one editor for
     
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     everybody. With a GTK editor, the linux guys will maybe work
     
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     on the GTK and the windows guys on the Java Editor.
     
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     And just like with the clients, whenever there is a new feature
     
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     we have to update two map-editors instead of one.
     
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     And GTK runs only on linux/unix systems, does it? 
     
     Untrue. There are ports of GTK to Windows and they are quite complete and 
up-to-date.

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     That means,
     
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     even if you create a super-fantastic GTK editor, you reach only
     
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     half of the user-base. And maybe there's even linux-systems without
     
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     GTK installed. 
     
     That is also true with Java, isn't it ?

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     Not to mention how unpredictable the future of a toolkit like GTK can be.
     
     The GTK toolkit seems to be quite widespread today and should not disappear in 
the next years.

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     I don't want to stop you developing this editor. And I'm certainly
     
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     not mad with you for doing it.
     
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     It just makes me a little bit sad to see how Crossfire developers
     
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     never cooperate on anything.
     
     
You don't understand the problem: It is not that I don't like the Java editor 
(I already expressed on this), neither that I favour GTK/Linux over anything 
else (personally I do prefer QT) - And for the question of the programming 
language used, I definitely find Java cleaner and more portable than C.
But...
What some mapmakers already expressed is quite easy to understand: In its 
current form, the Java editor is "too heavy" for their computers (either for 
speed or resources consumptions). Attempts to improve this have given little 
results so far. I admit that having just one java editor is indeed the best 
way - But if people are still using the old crossedit just because they can't 
run smoothly the Java editor, there is clearly a demand for such a tool. (I 
could simply have said to them "buy a new computer", but they strangely found 
that solution unsatifying).
If I was able to find a solution to make the Java Editor faster/smaller, I 
would never have started this. But since it would have required the rewriting 
of the Swing GUI toolkit, I was unable to do anything.

Chachkoff Y.

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