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From: peter@sugar.UUCP (Peter da Silva)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.misc
Subject: Re: Icons, pipes, etc.
Message-ID: <409@sugar.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 19-Jul-87 00:58:13 EDT
Article-I.D.: sugar.409
Posted: Sun Jul 19 00:58:13 1987
Date-Received: Mon, 20-Jul-87 00:37:29 EDT
References: <8705190042.AA14664@cogsci.berkeley.edu> <9954@decwrl.DEC.COM> <66@laura.irb.informatik>
Organization: Sugar Land UNIX - Houston, TX
Lines: 28
Summary: You're misisng the point.

In article <66@laura.irb.informatik>, hmm@unido.UUCP (Hans-Martin Mosner) writes:
> In article <367@sugar.UUCP> peter@sugar.UUCP (Peter DaSilva) writes:
> >For building pipelines, a better way would be:
> >
> >[fairly involved method described]
> 
> Why do we have to use icons for everything ?

We don't. Some people, however, do. There are people (believe it or not)
who are not capable of dealing with anything more complex than a Macintosh.
If UNIX is to become a popular operating system (something I find desirable:
maybe you prefer everyone standardise on MS-DOS and the Mac), then there has
to be some visible advantage that anyone can see. My assertion is that a
graphical method for invoking pipelines would be something anyone can do.

Also, you can describe some pipelines graphically that you would have a great
deal of trouble expressing on a command line.

(awk)_______                                 _(one set of lines)
            \__(sort both together)|(grep2)_/
(sort|grep)_/                               \_(another set of lines)

Every now and then I come across something wierd like this I want to do.
I usually end up making temp files. Wasn't that the whole point of pipes
in the first place? You would end up with an extremely powerful dataflow
programming system.
-- 
-- Peter da Silva `-_-' ...!seismo!soma!uhnix1!sugar!peter (I said, NO PHOTOS!)