LWN: Comments on "Take notes with Tomboy (Linux.com)"

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

a1mint — 2006-11-02T16:50:37+00:00

> alternative to Java or Mono in Linux would be Python

What about Perl? More mature and stable than both Mono and Python.

> Python being used in Gnome and administration tools, which is great

That's not great at all. It's because of Python that things stop working, and makes Linux (Redhat at least) not stand up against time, meaning, once it's a couple of years old, you're forced to upgrade, which sucks for servers.

> Python has performance issues.

Sure, and the only ones I see that don't suffer performance problems is Java, Perl, C, and C++.

> The 'Bloat' Mono has is closer to C++ 'bloat' rather then Python in my estimation.

Complete wrong. Wrong. Way off. C++ is not 'bloat' at all. The weird and strange bizarre notion people have about that bloat myth that C++ has is so off, it ain't funny. C++ allows for great OOP for *very* little cpu cost. In fact, it's practically immeasurable the performance loss on the ++ part. So what if the 'this' variable gets passed along to methods. In C you often do anyway. And look at all that convoluted gabeldegook crap C code that's out there. Do in nicely structured C++ and logic will lead the way to more stable smarter constructs.

> The future of desktop applications is going to be a high level language.

But please, not mono or python, for crying out loud, don't people see how screwed up this is? What's the world coming to...

> less bugs then programming in C

Ha ha, as if. The amount of bugs I'm seeing in Python based apps is the highest I have ever seen in Linux.

> new gnome stuff is pretty slick.

Gnome is *NOT* slick. It's ill featured.
Beagle is unstable. My log files are full of beagle errors, it's insane.
Evolution, pff, Thunderbird for me.
Deskbar applet, won't use it, because it's written in Python, and Python sucks.
Tombay, won't go near it, because it's written in Mono.

I always switch to IceWM. Nice and light and configurable. The source is written in C++, and it's clear and clean enough that I can customize it all over the place by just editing the source code.

Oh and Vista. I'm actually glad that XGL is a preemptive strike on Vista, so they can't go and brag how they were the first with their stupid little transparent windows.
I think we both can't stand Windows, so at least we have that in common.
But we should hate Mono too, *THINK* about it, Microsoft, with lawyers, and crappy programmers without command lines and only dialog boxes, arg, so lame... And why Mono and not, say, Java? Java runs *fast*, is mature, stable, and has an enormous amount of libraries available. You can run all kinds of scripting languages in Java, like JRuby. Java has Java2D. Microsoft practically copied Java2D verbatim and called it GDI+.
People people use your heads already.

Mono, woof.

gnome vs. kde

nix — 2006-08-23T19:23:04+00:00

Oh, I agree that FUSE implementations are preferable, but you have a few
problems which can't be overcome:

kioslaves and gnome-vfs modules aren't restricted to POSIX interfaces (at
least not in theory): you could do things with them that you can't do with
POSIX. The interface for POSIX is (at least semi-)frozen.

And there's no way to make FUSE work on systems with non-free kernels. I
thought GNOME and KDE were supposed to work on non-free systems? There's
certainly effort going on to make them work under Cygwin (and both already
do to a considerable extent). You could fake FUSE under Cygwin, too, but
what about non-free Unixes? (Or do we just say 'increasingly irrelevant'
and forget about them?)

An Alternative

raytd — 2006-08-21T22:43:53+00:00

Now that's the best use of javascript I've seen outside of google.

Thanks for the link.

Mono libraries

zlynx — 2006-08-21T17:51:35+00:00

Heh. Ok, you are right. Pre-just-in-time compiling would be better called just "compiling".

What are you raving about?

adj — 2006-08-21T17:32:34+00:00

Try it again with windows-style ctrl-c, ctrl-v.
highlight the text you wish to copy.
ctrl-c
highlight the text you wish to replace.
ctrl-v
Simple.

*shrug*

Highlight text you wish to replace.
Hit spacebar.
Highlight text you wish to copy.
Middle click.
Simple.

Six of one... (but one less swap between mouse and keyboard.) If the app in question doesn't work the way you want, pick a different one. Better yet, submit suggestions or patches to its author.

What are you raving about?

drag — 2006-08-21T13:24:12+00:00

What am I raving about?

I will try to tell you.

Why is it broken?

In very simple terms each application controls it's own copy/paste buffer.

Example:
open up a terminal.
open up gedit.
Highlight some text.
close out terminal.
paste text into gedit.

Oh guess what? Nothing happenned. You have to keep both windows open or you loose your buffer. It just doesn't work in a way that makes sense. It may have made sense 10 years ago, but it doesn't work anymore.

Another example:
We are going to try to do a simple copy paste were we replace some text.
Open up gedit.
Open up a text file.
Highlight the text you wish to paste as a replacement for other peice of text.
Now attempt to replace a different block of text with the text you just highlighted.

You can't highlight it or you will loose your buffer.
You have to now paste into the middle or the right or the left of the text you wish to replace and then manually delete the original text.

Tell me why then nobody has yet been able to create a reasonable clipboard setup for middle click paste yet? There have been dozens of projects to attempt to 'fix' it, and nobody has yet to figure out a reasonable solution.

Try it again with windows-style ctrl-c, ctrl-v.
highlight the text you wish to copy.
ctrl-c
highlight the text you wish to replace.
ctrl-v

Simple.

Highlight middle click paste works great for terminals because the windows-style controls generally mean something other then 'copy' and 'paste'. But otherwise it's just not that usefull. I use it all the time personally purely out of habit, but even then it's still broken and I have to be carefull with what applications I try to use it with and how I use it.

gnome vs. kde

drag — 2006-08-21T13:07:49+00:00

But if FUSE is portable to other operating systems doesn't it mean that FUSE is portable?

Or in 'other operating systems' you specificly mean 'windows', right?

Because it works on OpenSolaris.. FreeBSD. This means it would work on NetBSD and OpenBSD also. And OS X if anybody cared.

I only say that Gnome and KDE should use FUSE instead of their own paticular VFS implimentations becuase..

KIOslave and Gnome-VFS are almost completely worthless unless your running a totally pure KDE or Gnome desktop. How well does it work when the majority of applications are not able to directly use what you setup via the GUI? It doesn't make any sense.

Why is it reasonable to expect that it's ok if I can access a share via Epiphany or nautilus, but not be able to access it via Amarok or Krita (and visa versa)?

How is a unknowlegable Linux user on some desktop somewere going to understand that if they access a Windows share via Nautilus that they still won't be able to use it with the vast majority of applications?

And even if I set it up so that I have both G-VFS and KIO I still can't use either with anything that isn't Gnome or KDE, which is a lot of stuff.

With FUSE it's instantly usable by EVERYTHING. Not just one or another paticularly tightly controlled desktop environment setup by some project-specific developers.

BIT compilation

man_ls — 2006-08-21T09:20:55+00:00

Yes, it can be a bit confusing. JIT stands for "Just in time" and is a technique whereby the bytecode is translated to machine code before execution. Old JVM's would just interpret bytecode as it came along, which performed very slowly for loops and the such; new JVM's (pioneered by Symantec IIRC) translate the machine-independent bytecode to machine-specific code and then execute that.

The convoluted term "pre-JIT" would stand for an optimization to do this translation ahead of execution; you might call it "BIT" or "Before its time" compilation.

Mono libraries

dark — 2006-08-21T09:02:09+00:00

I think you should get an award for the term "pre-JIT".

Take notes with Tomboy (Linux.com)

nix — 2006-08-21T08:33:46+00:00

basket looks cool, but, um, what if you need your notes and X is down?

'cat' always works.

gnome vs. kde

jamesh — 2006-08-21T06:41:16+00:00

Gnome has a virtual file system system similar to kioslaves.

It has a VFS backend that implements the standard SFTP protocol over SSH, which lets you copy files to/from machines via SSH. I am not sure what a proprietary protocol like "fish" would give you over SFTP though -- it is very rare to find a machine with SSH but without SFTP these days.

What are you raving about?

TwoTimeGrime — 2006-08-21T06:01:51+00:00

> Non-technical users LOVE it when introduced to it.

If by non-technical users you mean people who have never learned that you can cut and paste on computers, then yes maybe. Slightly more technical users, who know that they can select text and then type or paste to replace it, are annoyed by this "feature." It prevents someone from copying text, selecting a large body of text that must be replaced, and then pasting the new text in. In X what you get instead is selecting something that you want to replace, which puts it in the copy buffer. Middle clicking appears to do nothing except unselect because you are replacing the selected text with itself.

Mono libraries

zlynx — 2006-08-20T20:01:48+00:00

Mono and .NET do better than Java because they cache the result of the JIT. They can even pre-JIT the assemblies; Windows has a background service that does this.

This makes start-up time much better than any Java program. Maybe Java 6 will include it.

neat, but why?

Tobu — 2006-08-20T19:22:35+00:00

The main benefit is that it's a little wiki. You just linkify a phrase, or use a WikiWord, and you have created a new note. You can then expand and organise your notes, mindmap-style.

You also get good desktop integration in the form of an applet, an recent notes, and especially search.

Recent projects aim at making tomboy more networked:

exposing notes to the outside - networked tomboy,
synchronising them with mail or files - conduit,
another synchronization project - blog

With these, tomboy will become still more of a wiki.

gnome vs. kde

nix — 2006-08-20T18:00:11+00:00

FUSE could never replace kioslaves and gnome-vfs for two reasons. Firstly,
it's not as portable (though it has been ported to FreeBSD and I believe
OpenSolaris). Secondly, kernel mounts are much, much more expensive than
kioslaves on many Unixes (although not Linux to such an extent).

However, it is plausible that kioslaves and gnome-vfs could use FUSE :)

About Python

davidw — 2006-08-20T10:39:28+00:00

Java and C# have JIT compilers, making them somewhat memory hungry, but pretty fast once they get into the swing of things.

doesn't scale

gvy — 2006-08-20T09:52:32+00:00

One might consider some of the notes more important; they might have metadata (like due date or creation date) and one might benefit from being able to e.g. sort by them (it's not exactly robust with just a text editor).

There are other things which sometimes make good old ~/TODO just tired.

What are you raving about?

alextingle — 2006-08-20T08:30:21+00:00

> Unfortunately highlight middle click is pretty much broken by design

What are you raving about?

Highlight-middle-click is one of the few good distinguishing features that X has. Non-technical
users LOVE it when introduced to it. I know it causes GUI developers headaches, but that doesn't
make it "broken by design".

neat, but why?

b7j0c — 2006-08-20T07:09:08+00:00

why not just open note.txt in your editor of choice?

Mono libraries

man_ls — 2006-08-20T01:54:57+00:00

I don't really know much about mono. Isn't it just a compiler?

Unfortunately no; it is more similar to Java, where you have a compiler to bytecode and then a virtual machine that interprets that. On top of that you have a runtime environment which acts as system libraries (the java.* packages), and which are in theory cleanly isolated from your own libraries (which should go in reverse-site form, for instance com.yourcompany.project packages for project.yourcompany.com). According to Zawinski, Java is also a security model.

When people talk about "Java", they usually mix the language, the virtual machine and the system libraries. Sun encourages the confusion as "Java platform", which encompasses Java Language, Java Virtual Machine and Java Runtime Environment (JVM + libraries).

I just know Mono by references, but it seems it is a libre implementation of the .NET framework. As this is Microsoft's answer to Java, it contains similar things: a compiler (for C#), a virtual machine (CLI) and system libraries (class library). The bytecode is called Common Intermediate Language. At least here we have separate names for every layer.

The fact is that you need the runtime environment to run Mono applications, which interprets CIL.

Take notes with Tomboy (Linux.com)

trevor@infocentrality.co.uk — 2006-08-19T22:45:08+00:00

You could also use something like InfoCDB - I have to admit a bias - as
it was
an itch that I had to scratch - multi user note taker / Contactdb
application - a Python CGI application - see a demo at
https://www.infocentrality.co.uk/contactdb - use 'demo' as the username
and 'demo' as the password.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

TwoTimeGrime — 2006-08-19T21:07:58+00:00

> How would they have managed to force people to install mono?!

I don't really know much about mono. Isn't it just a compiler? So wouldn't Tomboy compile to native code just like something written in C or C++ meaning you wouldn't need to install Mono? I don't need to install gcc to run Firefox. Correct me if I misunderstand.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

TwoTimeGrime — 2006-08-19T21:05:21+00:00

I don't think he really wanted to use your quote. It was the sarcastic setup to plug his notetaking app. :-)

Take notes with Tomboy (Linux.com)

holstein — 2006-08-19T13:59:57+00:00

I second that.

I use Basket a lot to keep notes on "things-to-do-eventually", server installation notes, quick access to my documentation directory, etc., all neatly organized in it's "basket".

With it's "auto-hide" functionnality, it makes taking/reading notes really quick and unintrusive.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

louie — 2006-08-19T12:32:13+00:00

Oh, of course; I meant that I'm sure that laziness had been used as the closing clause before.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

oseemann — 2006-08-19T10:59:57+00:00

The original quote would probably be
"Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor

gnome vs. kde

drag — 2006-08-19T08:08:57+00:00

Gnome has the 'Gnome-vfs'. Allows you to abstract file systems such as ssh, ftp, smb, and such like that so it's all easily accesable via the file dialog stuff, and probably more. I think that probably KIO is more usefull though.

However I personally much much prefer FUSE file systems to KIO or Gnome-VFS. This is because it's used to create actual mountable file systems, so it will work for far more applications naturally then KIO or G-VFS wil.

One of my favorite is the fuse version of sshfs. It's very very fast. All the 'file server' needs is a capable ssh server were you have a account and it supports sftp (openssh is best, it seems like. The type of server affects stability of the file system).

How fast is it? For file copying and normal file operations it's faster then NFS on links up to 100mb/s. It's stable also. I've run Bonnie++ on it, without issues. But this depends on the server side. It's secure also. Uses standard ssh authentication methods so it supports kerberos, public/private keypair authentication, and password challenge response system authentication mechanisms. Also everything is encrypted.

FUSE is file system in userspace. It allows file systems without kernel modules beyond the actual fuse support. So that you can arrange it so that users can mount and umount and actually compile and create new file systems on the fly.

C, python, perl, and lots of other language bindings are aviable.

For instance other file systems:
beaglefs - mount beagle search results as a file system.
sshfs - mount sftp shares as file systems.
gmailfs - uses gmail for file system
ntfs-3g - 3rd Generation linux ntfs support for reliable NTFS read/write support. Does not require any propriatory bits like captive-ntfs does.
fusesmb - seemlessly browse smb networks.
afuse - fuse automounter
wdfs - webdav file systems. Combine with server running apache, webdav, and svn you get a distibuted network version control file system.
Run-Time-Access - access your program's internal data structures as file system
encfs - mount a encrypted directory as a file system.

And all sorts of stuff like that. Since it uses standard file system symantics it works with everything.
http://fuse.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/FileSystems

It's fairly Linux-specific right now, but there is a FUSE port to FreeBSD and it's quite possible to have it work on other operating systems also.

Also there is Gnome-VFS and KIO-slave bridges to make them mountable file systems.

I would realy realy like to see Gnome and KDE embrace FUSE so that you can achieve a much higher level of desktop compatability. Also it seems that FUSE is much faster.

About Python

drag — 2006-08-19T07:51:33+00:00

Seems like all the major python optimizing folks are working on this project.

Stackless python guy, the psyco guy. That sort of thing.

If they are realy successfull then it could be something very remarkable. A NEW thing. Maybe make python faster then C! ;-)

http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/news.html

About Python

drag — 2006-08-19T07:49:00+00:00

Oh I didn't want to disparage Python in any way.

I realy realy like python personally.

About Python

tekNico — 2006-08-19T07:27:35+00:00

> However Python doesn't realy have a stable ABI you can program against.
> That is if you write a program to work in python 2.3 and it's fairly
> complex it's probably not going to work out on Python 2.4 or Python 2.2.

Ehi, take the FUD down a notch, please. ;-P

Python is interpreted (actually, compiled to a VM bytecode), just like Java and C#, so the ABI concept is only relevant for compiled extensions.

More important: there is great effort spent on downward compatibility. If you find a program written for Python 2.3, that does not run on 2.4, it's a bug and must be fixed.

OTOH, making a program written for Python 2.3 run on 2.2 takes some compatibility wrappers, and some restraint on newer features, but that's a price one pays for language evolution.

> Also Python has performance issues. The 'Bloat' Mono has is closer
> to C++ 'bloat' rather then Python in my estimation.

While it's probably true that the CLR is somewhat faster that the Python VM, that's a rather blanket statement. There are several ways to speed up Python programs, and its speed is more than adequate for most jobs.

gnome vs. kde

astrophoenix — 2006-08-19T07:22:50+00:00

just curious... does gnome have anything like kde's IO slaves?

once someone writes an ioslave for a file type or protocol, pretty much any kde app can then use
data from that protocol.

my favorite is fish, which is the io slave for ssh. you can basically open up 2 konqueror windows,
each one with fish://user@host/path to a different machine, then drag and drop between them,
resulting in copying or moving a file from one remote machine to another. and of course you can
click on a file in a fish window, and open it in the default app for that type, or edit the file, with a
save resulting in the data going back over ssh to the remote.

oh, and in kde, you can control-c, control-v, and also use middle click too, for copy and paste.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

drag — 2006-08-19T01:45:20+00:00

The closest I think you can find as a alternative to Java or Mono in Linux would be Python.

We are already seeing a lot of Python being used in Gnome and administration tools, which is great.

However Python doesn't realy have a stable ABI you can program against. That is if you write a program to work in python 2.3 and it's fairly complex it's probably not going to work out on Python 2.4 or Python 2.2.

Also Python has performance issues. The 'Bloat' Mono has is closer to C++ 'bloat' rather then Python in my estimation.

Face it. The future of desktop applications is going to be a high level language. Application development is faster and those are generally going to have less bugs then programming in C. And in gnome it's turning into a C/Python/Mono mix. C for low level speed-critical apps and Python/Mono for the UI and such.

If you haven't realy explored it, new gnome stuff is pretty slick.
Beagle, (mono)
Evolution, (and the evolutoin beagle backend) (C)
Deskbar Applet (python)
Tomboy (mono)
beaglefs (Fuse, C)
Dbus (C)
etc etc.

All of it ties together and is pretty f-ing slick on how it does it. It certainly kicks the hell of out of Windows XP in terms of usability and just plain utility. Well see about Vista when it comes out.

But Gnome is pretty snazy now. Drag-n-drop is pretty much solved. (try it, drag-n-drop files and directories into gnome-terminal for instance) Copy and paste isn't a problem so much anymore, as long as your doing it windows-style. (Unfortunately highlight middle click is pretty much broken by design, hopefully the freedesktop people figure out the clipboard stuff). Menus and Mime type detection/application launching gets updated automaticly. You can search through nautilus filenames just by changing focus to a folder and type out the file name your looking for.

Search integration. Integration of IM, calendering, email, address books and such into your desktop. It's all progressing along likely.

Personally ya I won't use Gnome for older machine. XFCE is GREAT for that.
But if 'bloat' makes my life easier, makes it easier to get my information, makes my applications perform more sanely.. Then it's not realy Bloat in my opinion.

Of course I am not saying that everything is perfect. There is certainly room for improvement.

As for Mono vs Python. I think that the move for Gnome is practical. If you want to attract developers you have to make it easy for them.

Go to some large community college or University some time. You'll find rooms and rooms full of people wanting to learn how to use C# and .NET because of Microsoft. There are books and books of it. Corporations are training their employees how to use it. That's all.

That's kinda why Mono exists in the first place, IMO. It's not so much that it's a wonderfull idea to do .NET for Linux, but that it's a wonderfull way to lower the bar for entry for new developers.

Take notes with Tomboy (Linux.com)

edlenz — 2006-08-19T00:13:09+00:00

http://basket.kde.org/ deserves a try.

[]´s

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

louie — 2006-08-18T22:59:58+00:00

Sure. I'm sure it has been said before, though probably not in this context :)

Take notes with Tomboy (Linux.com)

BradReed — 2006-08-18T22:25:34+00:00

I rather like NoteCase (on SourceForge.net) for taking notes. Just requires GtK2 rather than Mono. It has built in encryption if desired too.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

tomsi — 2006-08-18T22:22:46+00:00

Because of the Microsoft open source proxies and pupets. Some people are still doubting about their existence :).

I'm not against Microsoft bashing, but they have done one thing right since they started in the early 70's. And that is the C# language.

I really like the C# language - it combines the best bits from Delphi, C++ and Java. It is a pragmatic language without the hassles of "language lawyers" and "the big idea". Microsoft, being who they are, keeps muddling it with marketing speak etc; the Java fan boys calls it a java look-alike, and the C/C++ crowds sees it at "Java second edition".

For once, Microsoft did a sensible thing and got the C# language approved as an ECMA standard. So it is safe to use; in our world it's called mono.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

kornak — 2006-08-18T22:05:17+00:00

>> "Never ascribe to evil what you can ascribe to laziness."

That was a brilliant comment. Can I use it? I will save it in my note taker
under the "quotations" section:

http://notemeister.sourceforge.net/

An Alternative

PaulDickson — 2006-08-18T21:18:20+00:00

TiddlyWiki (http://www.tiddlywiki.com/) is better if you want more than capturing text. It does however require a web browser.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

louie — 2006-08-18T20:28:49+00:00

Or alternately because people hate writing in C, and the author likes C#. (He was unemployed at the time he wrote tomboy, IIRC, and is now a vmware employee- where his day job is C++.)

Never ascribe to evil what you can ascribe to laziness.

Tomboy is wrong wrong wrong.

sylware — 2006-08-18T20:25:40+00:00

Indeed: Tomboy is deprecating sticky notes. Why didn't they improve sticky notes?
Because of the Microsoft open source proxies and pupets. Some people are still doubting about their existence :).
Indeed, Tomboy from now, and only for this little app that doesn't bring significant improvement over sticky notes, will make the official gnome desktop dependent on one of the worst bloat that ever existed: mono, another disaster created by one of our beloved MS copycats. Of course, it was out of question to improve sticky notes! How would they have managed to force people to install mono?! Oh yes... I forgot their best argument: "you don't know how to code, use mono.net!" and we will have lean, fast, elegant and beautifully coded apps in the core of our desktop like... Beagle!
Well... everybody knows that's only the beginning of the end for gnome.
The Novell Blog System will push hard to make gnome "the .net desktop".

People seem not to understand that if you want to "sell" the gnome desktop to big companies, putting mono (.net) in it, is a commercial mistake. Any key deciding people in big companies knows that "Leader of .net technos=MS" (Like JAVA=Sun). To generalize, you will be merely crushed by MS sales people in any bid, and won't be able to sell your services around the open source desktop.

And why that bloat? We have plenty of bloats that do not have the same political-strategical-commercial issues: C++/python/ruby/perl etc etc...
So why choose the worst one???
Hopefully, gnome mainstream distros packagers will work in order to let us choose to install this ugly bloat or NOT.