[R-gui] Re: [R] Feedback about SciViews?

[Martin Maechler]

Philippe,

I think I owe you an apology for my initial remark
(paraphrased "I want platforma independence!") that may have
seemed much more negative than it was meant.
I'm still glad for the discussion that evolved even though I
agree that many things said were similar to the discussions
several months ago. 

I do agree with you and several other discussants that it may be
a worthwhile effort to provide one R gui on one platform to try
out ideas, get feedback, improve, etc. 
Hence a big "thank you" to the authors of the examples being done!

Contrary to what others have said here, I do believe however
that even in the front end (the GUI) many things can and should be
abstracted in a platform independent way -- even though other
things will be platform specific:
- The "U" part of the GUI is always a human, with fingers for 
  typing and clicking and the visual system. {Yes I do know that UIs
  for handicapped people are worth a big effort as well!}. 
- Even the harware part of the UI is relatively similar on all 
  platforms: Color Screen, keyboard, mouse {one problem being the	
  stubborn idea of Apple to keep one button-mice}.  
These are the reasons why there are several toolkits available cross
platforms. 

So thanks again to all the contributors of the latest
discussion -- and particularly to Philippe for his work on the
GUI web page, the mailing list in addition to the specific work
on Sciviews!

--
Martin Maechler <maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch>	http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler/
Seminar fuer Statistik, ETH-Zentrum  LEO C16	Leonhardstr. 27
ETH (Federal Inst. Technology)	8092 Zurich	SWITZERLAND
phone: x-41-1-632-3408		fax: ...-1228			<><