D2 GUI Libs

[Nick Sabalausky]

"dsimcha" <dsimcha at yahoo.com> wrote in message 
news:hg0ffj$2baj$1 at digitalmars.com...
> == Quote from retard (re at tard.com.invalid)'s article
>> Sat, 12 Dec 2009 05:10:24 +0000, dsimcha wrote:
>> > 2.  Native look and feel.  IMHO this is very overrated.  I've never
>> > found that a Java-ish or GTK-ish or whatever look and feel instead of a
>> > native Win32 look and feel got in the way of me using a program
>> > effectively.
>> The win32 look and feel doesn't look native on linux/mac/solaris.
>
> Right, the implication here was that I mostly use Windows and I've never 
> really
> cared if an application I use has a GTK-ish or Swing-ish or whatever look 
> and
> feel, as long as the application is well-coded, responsive and does what I 
> need.
> I'm speaking purely from personal opinion/experience here, but I don't 
> understand
> why people care so much about platform-native look and feel as long as it 
> works
> and is usable.

For me, it's things like this (in no particular order):

- Non-native controls flat-out ignore my system settings. Doesn't matter if 
it causes practical problems or not, there is absolutely NO excuse for that, 
period.

- It implies a certain "taking over the user's system", just like a website 
deciding on it's own that it wants to open things in a new browser window. 
These sorts of behaviors are insulting.

- If every program insists on having it's own different look, then my system 
suddenly looks like a horrid mess. Purely an aesthetic issue, yes, but #1, 
it's my own fucking system, so *I* and I alone should be able to have total 
control over how it looks (if it wants to allow alternate skins, then fine, 
but make that shit an *option*, not the default and *certainly* not the only 
choice) and #2, I *like* the look of the theme I've set up.

- Non-native stuff often includes completely unnecessary steps backwards. 
For example:
   - On windows, normal "greyed-out" and separator lines have a 3d-ish 
effect that is perfectly legible on any color scheme. But most non-native 
stuff uses a single-color grey instead that becomes nearly-illegible, or 
even downright invisible, on many color schemes, including my own.
   - GTK apps are ridiculously chunky and waste an enormous amount of screen 
real-estate. Which *is* a practical concern.
   - Many GTK apps use the absolute *worst* and most impractical file dialog 
boxes I've seen in over 15 years. This is never an issue with native apps.