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Enso
Submitted by Ville on Wed, 2007-08-08 19:07. Tags: Creative Design
Check out the video on the front page:
http://humanized.com/
I was VERY impressed when I saw this. I can program a bit but I can't understand how they did it? Don't you have to write some code to connect programs to that thing?
EDIT: I think it would be a semi-great idea to implement it as a one-line terminal with the feature that completes your words when it finds something similar (...whatever). Then you could make commands for it in all kinds of languages (bash, python, C...). The only problem is that it can't complete the arguments :(
Don't you have to Ctrl+C to get it to the clipboard and Ctrl+V to get it back?
Also, with bash you could edit the .bashrc file (it exists on Linux, don't know about Mac and BeOS):
gmail=firefox http://gmail.com
EDIT: the guy behind it has a lot of great ideas. Check out his Google Tech Talk:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6856727143023456694&hl=en
Sounds similar in concept to QuickSilver and it's clones like Katapult.
Actually its more based on Canon Cat, which is the brainchild of Jef Raskin, the maker of Mac...
I'm not at all surprised that you see a product like Enso coming out of the company that it is. The CEO is Aza Raskin, Jef's son. Very useful product, and the neat thing about BeOS is that it is probably (I don't know for sure) is easier to implement than on other platforms -- it's just a hook device into the input_server. Great idea for power users. :)
--DarkWyrm
I use it (trial) on windows and I seriously like it... Its window manipulating abilities are where the quasimodes really shine. Would love to see it on Be...
Yeah I saw this a while ago but forgot about it. I need to download it on Windows and give it a try. I'm sure after playing with it for a while I could write a clone for BeOS or Haiku.
One of the developers mentions that commands are written using Python, in my case I would probably use my scripting language of choice, Ruby.
With the input_server and all the easy inter-app messaging in BeOS it probably wouldn't be that hard.
But for the moment I'm busy with my WebKit port.
It's a lot more advanced than Quicksilver and Katapult. They can only open applications.
I couldn't get the sound but, what is shown in this video is a come-back of the commande line, mixed to the WIMP. Maybe you have read the anti-mac paper:
http://acm.org/cacm/AUG96/antimac.htm
Beside that, this video reminds me the main need that I consider missing in the current OS: some intermediate programs between the system and the user; I've called that "in-between".
Enso looks like such a mediator, though I couldn't heard the underlying reasonment there're at least two things there:
1) for some task or user's needs, the WIMP proces is too costly.
2) how to satisfy the most directly the user's will or wishes ?
The first point is a subjective matter: what are these needs or tasks? Since it's about the WIMP proces, is it not a Desktop matter ? (Not surprising that Enso targets the Windows' Desktop).
The second point involves the WIMP proces itself as well as the CLI. The WIMP metaphore is mainly about utility (e.g a typewriter is a wordprocessor; the trash bin represents the action to throw away but in the real one can do that in several way) and AFAIK I've never seen a WIMP interface which sticks in first to the action and then the thing(s) one uses for a given action.
One can do several things with a paper-sheet: some things with the sheet itself (a plane, an origami, cutting a shape...); some things upon the sheet (write a text, a formula, draw, paint).
Mainly, the paper-sheet and any tool are there instrumental but actually the functionalities can't be. So, consider that we start from a pile of paper-sheets, what would the interface look like?
Quicksilver can do *A LOT* more than "open applications". Unfortunately, it's quite complicated for a new user to understand how it works, and to discover what can be done with it. Ultimately most users end up using it as YAAL (Yet Another Application Launcher). Which is a shame. :)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8493378861634507068&hl=en
Google Tech Talk by the author of Quicksilver, mentions Enso and talks primarily about the ideas behind both products.
Hey lucmars... I like some of the ideas for UI design that you bring up. I suspect that some of your ideas could help inspire better designs for Haiku R2+. Is it possible to email you?
Hey lucmars... I like some of the ideas for UI design that you bring up. I suspect that some of your ideas could help inspire better designs for Haiku R2+. Is it possible to email you?
Yes, you can: lucmars-alt-orange-dot-fr
Looks like they're basically using the clipboard - if you select something, it gets copied the clipboard, their code grabs whatever the contents are, and manipulates it based on what you indicate from their list of commands, updates the clipboard with some new data, and pastes it back where you had selected text...