Page 2 of 4

Posted: 2008-11-07 07:46
by ro
Mr B wrote:Maybe some of the preference comes down to if you are a "visual" person or "verbal" - so that some people will always feel more comfortable with a gui as opposed to cli; For myself I find gui aps easier to learn (or learn the "route" to a solution) than a string of cli stuff (partly because I don't know what most of it means (yet). That being said I do use cli for more and more stuff and it is fascinating to learn what is actual happening behind the gui front ends ( and of course there are times when it is a "life saver" as discussed previously).

As an illustration of the "visual" nature of how I use gui stuff I have managed to confuse myself several times when I have played about with icon themes etc and found that the different "look" means that I have to think twice about what I am doing.......

GUI or CLI - errr.........BOTH!!
I agree fully. I too am a visual thinker and conceptualizer and prefer a gui. It's why I can remember many configuration manoeuvres from Mandriva 10, like editing grub (or lilo or whatever it was) even though I haven't used it for years, while I tend to have to refer to notes for Debian.
edbarx wrote:The power of the CLI lies in its simplicity. A shell need not be complicated, it only needs to display text rather than elaborate graphics. This means, that in the case of system breakdown, the CLI is the tool of choice. It is not because it is faster or simpler, but because, it is simple to run and its power is unlimited. A Windows user can use recovery console, but that, compared to the Linux shell, is like a six month old!
Oh, we understand - it's just that some of us find CLI counterintuitive and much harder to use. It's a matter of neurology...

Posted: 2008-11-07 07:57
by ro
I forgot to add that I haven't voted because the poll reeks of stupid elitism.

Posted: 2008-11-07 08:17
by edbarx
ro wrote:
edbarx wrote:The power of the CLI lies in its simplicity. A shell need not be complicated, it only needs to display text rather than elaborate graphics. This means, that in the case of system breakdown, the CLI is the tool of choice. It is not because it is faster or simpler, but because, it is simple to run and its power is unlimited. A Windows user can use recovery console, but that, compared to the Linux shell, is like a six month old!
Oh, we understand - it's just that some of us find CLI counterintuitive and much harder to use. It's a matter of neurology...
Neurons have nothing to do with the CLI and GUIs can be counter-intuitive too! Designing a powerful intuitive GUI is not at all straightforward. And by the way, who told you that I am against GUIs? For your information, I use kde. I am defending the CLI, because, its power in case of system breakdown, is almost total. You can do everything without the interference of a complex desktop. That is what I mean by "simplicity". I am far from boasting that the CLI is simple in terms of remembering commands. This can also be said about human languages: no one learns to speak in a couple of days! The reason is that language is a complex ability. The same applies to commands of the CLI. The good news are, that unlike MS Windows, the commands are conservative, that is, they do not change unnecessarily. :)

Posted: 2008-11-07 09:18
by ro
Uh, where did I say you were against GUIs? I'm pretty sure I only said that some of us find them easier to get around than CLI. I know they add complexity that can cause things to go pop as much as I know the power and elegance of the CLI. I know the CLI is indispensable at times. I had to use it when I lost my desktops temporarily to a bug a few months ago.

I just wish I had the sort of brain that finds CLI easy. Neurology IS important because it determines one's reaction to stimuli. I feel it's a plausible reason why some users take well to the CLI. I remember things very much better if I have a picture. Maybe it's a matter of practice... :?

Posted: 2008-11-07 09:46
by edbarx
I misunderstood you. Please, excuse my misunderstanding. :oops:

Posted: 2008-11-07 09:52
by ro
That's OK - I'm famous for doing the same :lol:

Posted: 2008-11-07 13:09
by DtW
I don't care to vote but I'll describe my environment instead: KDE + Emacs + Iceweasel + XTerm (with screen). These are the ones you can see all the time on my two-monitor desktop. Of course I use other applications too but others are more like temporary tools.

I guess my point is that "GUI or CLI" is not very interesting question. With Linux I think most people use both. More interesting question is what kind of working environments people build for themselves.

Posted: 2008-11-07 14:12
by Lou
Maybe i don't see the gui/CLI problem clearly, to me speed and simplicity is the core of my preference towards the CLI.

Say you want to edit a file, (/etc/apt/sources.list) a file that is common and that you have to edit in Debian at least once in order to configure what you want.

So you launch a gui editor, gedit, conkeror or whatever, you hit the icon and presto you got it.
I press F1 in icewm or F6+c in ratpoison and get the terminal, by the time you reach for your mouse and find the icon, i got you beaten.

Now you have to write the file you want to edit in the gui <name of file>, same in the cli (nano -wx <name of file>, same speed, now you're in the file editing. You save/exit from both. Seems to me the only difference is how you launch the editor.

Now if for some reason once you launch debian and there is a problem entering the X system, you CANNOT launch a gui editor, what are you gonna do?

What if you don't know the address of the file you're looking (your neurons are shot to hell), you launch your editor and use 'locate' or 'find', simple, no?

$ nano locate sources

what so mind bogling about this?
I think it's psychological, the fear to abandon something you learn in Windows.

Of course this is all my opinion, and with it and a quarter you can buy a cup of coffee down here.

Posted: 2008-11-07 14:40
by anarchyinc666
Wow, now I feel a lot better. For the longest time I thought that Linux users had a stereotype were they refused to use windows in preferance of the more intimidating command line interface. You all have let me see the light. It is all just a matter of personal preferance, what you are more comfortable with and how fast one can do what needs to be done.

Almost every reply has been the same, we all use both. Thanks for showing me that the stereotype is nothing more than a stereotype.

Now, can someone tell me how to remove that gay poll?

Posted: 2008-11-07 15:00
by Mikuro
Text editing may seem like the classic CLI-friendly task, but I look at it from the other direction: A GUI text editor is basically just the same, but with some advantages that come with the mouse and menus. Like Lou said, the difference is not so much with the app as with the way of accessing the app. I frequently use the command line to launch GUI programs (including GUI text editors). Does that make me a GUI fan or a CLI fan?

I think it points to flaws in the design of individual GUIs, but not the GUI in general.

Posted: 2008-11-07 15:14
by MeanDean
not knowing the CLI and needing it is very different than knowing the CLI and not needing it

Posted: 2008-11-07 15:26
by Lou
Mikuro wrote:I frequently use the command line to launch GUI programs (including GUI text editors). Does that make me a GUI fan or a CLI fan?
We all do that at one point or another, the only difference is that in icewm and ratpoison i launch a Run Box:

IceWM: Windows key + spacebar
Ratpoison: ctrl + spacebar

especially, when i want to launch xfe as root (sudo xfe) in order to delete a file NOT in my /home.

I'm just playing with vimperator in iceweasel, having a ball, it has increased my productivity so far. The keyboard is faster in most cases.

Posted: 2008-11-07 15:35
by Mr B
ro wrote:stupid elitism.
Isn't all elitism stupid? :P :P :P :P :P

As I get more and more comfortable with Linux I wish I could make more use of cli - but I find it very difficult to remember the commands and being slightly dyslexic as well find it rather frustrating!

Posted: 2008-11-07 15:59
by vmclark
Regarding the visual versus verbal issue. Isn't it ALL visual. Don't you "see" the text?! I surely don't hear them.

I think it has more to do with picture form as oppose to words.

Posted: 2008-11-07 16:06
by jshipley84
Syntax highlighting is something that I've never been particularly fond of in emacs. It looks good enough, but sometimes it takes quite a while for emacs to update the highlighting.

Every other text editor that I've ever used that did syntax highlighting updated it instantly.

Posted: 2008-11-07 18:54
by Issyer
GUI is nice too. Python, Pygtk and Glade provide an ability for rapid application development. Surprising that we don't hear much about such projects. Supposedly they are issued not under GPL.

Posted: 2008-11-07 19:40
by debil
Mikuro wrote:Text editing may seem like the classic CLI-friendly task, but I look at it from the other direction: A GUI text editor is basically just the same, but with some advantages that come with the mouse and menus.
And yet there are editors where mouse (unnecessary, slow and distracting) and
menus (unnecessary and waste of space anyway) can be perceived as disadvantages.

Yes, I'm talking about (g)vim :)

Posted: 2008-11-07 23:51
by ro
Mr B wrote:
ro wrote:stupid elitism.
Isn't all elitism stupid? :P :P :P :P :P

As I get more and more comfortable with Linux I wish I could make more use of cli - but I find it very difficult to remember the commands and being slightly dyslexic as well find it rather frustrating!
I too am dyslexic. High five! I'm never sadistic enough to subject a reader to my unedited posts, though bits get through from time to time. And you're correct about elitism. :P
vmclark wrote:Regarding the visual versus verbal issue. Isn't it ALL visual. Don't you "see" the text?! I surely don't here them.

I think it has more to do with picture form as oppose to words.
I remember everything in pictures. When I recall text I immediately see a block of it on a page or screen in my mind. It's like having a stereotypical "photographic" memory, except that for me the words themselves are indistinct. Hence my need to refer to notes for CLI commands.

Posted: 2008-11-08 09:41
by DtW
debil wrote:
Mikuro wrote:Text editing may seem like the classic CLI-friendly task, but I look at it from the other direction: A GUI text editor is basically just the same, but with some advantages that come with the mouse and menus.
And yet there are editors where mouse (unnecessary, slow and distracting) and menus (unnecessary and waste of space anyway) can be perceived as disadvantages.

Yes, I'm talking about (g)vim :)
Yes, they can be perceived as disadvantages, and I agree, but they have their advantages too. For example, scroll bar is very good and intuitive visual indicator about where am I in the document. Mouse wheel is extremely good for scrolling when I'm just reading text. (These features sometimes available in good terminals and text-based programs too.) Menus are good when I'm learning some new major mode in Emacs because I have no idea of what key bindings (or even what features) are available. When I'm more familiar with the commands I use menus less and less but occasionally I pick some rarely-needed command through menus.

Tool bar is something I never use with Emacs or GVim. Tool bars usually contain only very basic commands which user quickly learns to access through keyboard anyway. So: "(tool-bar-mode 0)" and "set guioptions-=T".

The GUI versions of Emacs and Vim are nice because they have GUI features available but user can still do everything with keyboard. With these editors the question is not necessarily about whether to use mouse or not but more dynamic user interface for different tasks. I use them mostly with keyboard but sure it's nice to drag a text file from Konqueror (file manager) or desktop to Emacs window and have the file opened there immediately. When I read a long mail or Usenet news message in Emacs (Gnus) I sometimes like to scroll with the mouse wheel. It's usually quicker to mouse-click URLs in a messages than to open them with keyboard.

So, I'm arguing that it's not very useful to limit oneself to only mouse or only keyboard type of approach. Powerful integration between applications usually comes through desktop environments and their features, for example.

Posted: 2008-11-08 10:09
by debil
DtW wrote:The GUI versions of Emacs and Vim are nice because they have GUI features available but user can still do everything with keyboard. With these editors the question is not necessarily about whether to use mouse or not but more dynamic user interface for different tasks. I use them mostly with keyboard but sure it's nice to drag a text file from Konqueror (file manager) or desktop to Emacs window and have the file opened there immediately. When I read a long mail or Usenet news message in Emacs (Gnus) I sometimes like to scroll with the mouse wheel. It's usually quicker to mouse-click URLs in a messages than to open them with keyboard.
That's the great thing about "more advanced" editors (and a big bunch of other apps as
well and ultimately GNU/Linux itself). That is you can choose how you use the
software. Scrolling with mouse in Gvim is something I frequently do but that's about it.
You can disable or enable toolbars, menus, colors etc. if you like and so on. And if that's
not enough, you can hack the source code and write the feature you need by yourself (if
you've got the chops for it). Or just switch to another app.

My point being I take the best of the both worlds according to situation and mood I
happen to be at the time. And another point being it's all about the choice (except when you've broken your X ;)).