Re: The new look. That looks fantastic. It was another thing that bugged me, but I decided not to post it because i honestly couldn't tell if I really disliked the design or if I've been looking at eclipse so long I was just having a case of the blame-the-unknowns.
Re: Multiple .app files in its own folder. Ah, I see. I picked the javase+javafx install which resulted in just 1 solitary app file. If NB plugin updates can cause more .apps to show up, then that makes more sense. Problem is that it'll still annoy a bunch of mac users. They tend to care (overly much?) about this sort of thing. Eclipse ships as just an .app, which you copy over yourself. The standard way of installing mac apps. So, it would be great if somehow netbeans figures out a solution to this problem, but I apologize for presuming it would be a trivial fix. That .mpkg installer is an instant turn-off. If all it does is add /Applications/ NetBeans and copy NetBeans 6.5.app in there, perhaps just ship the NetBeans folder instead of an .mpkg installer. People can then make up their own mind where they want to put it. Re: hg and its python dependency. On leopard, an hg-capable python is there already. I saw a 'python' directory in the .app package, so perhaps python is already shipped with netbeans? If its really a big download and hassle to ship hg, then offer, in the popup that says 'there is no hg!' to completely automatically download a plugin that contains its own python and its own hg. Or, at the very least, just a link to a simple tutorial about what to do with links to installers for the local platform. I had to manually go google for 'mac os x hg binary' and pray that it would all be compatible. That cannot be the right answer. It's in my $PATH, but applications do not look at $PATH, they look at ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist. Unless you start netbeans by going into the .app package and finding the actual netbeans executable, /usr/ local/bin needs to be in environment.plist for netbeans to find it. (which is only checked at login, hence the need to reboot/relogin). Re: The register later/never thing: Possibly I should not have moved the .app to another directory. The next time I give netbeans a spin, and its still happening, I'll file a report. Perhaps the files were somehow installed as owned by root instead of the actual user, so the writing of the file fails (but, fails silenty? Eh. Too late, its already off my disk). Re: 'toy project' being a harsh judgement. This might sound harsh but I think the iPhone and web revolution proves that this assessment is essentially correct. The basic flow for any tool needs to be absolutely perfect these days. The relative cost of these minor nagging bits is phenomenal when you factor in the odds that a user will abandon a software program over time. In the first 5 minutes you can lose everybody. If after a month of usage the tool really starts to annoy you, then you'll likely still stick with it because switching is such a bother. Possibly netbeans is annoying at first and proves itself later, but that's a real shame, because most of the world will never know about it. I feel slightly vindicated in this judgement by the big love for android and the iPhone by you and the rest of the posse. Both of those platforms really get this 'the first 5 minutes are crucial, and every needless configuration pain is a death sentence' thing. On Jan 31, 3:33 am, Tor Norbye <[email protected]> wrote: > On Jan 30, 2:43 pm, Reinier Zwitserloot <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > Even after the obscure segmentation fault I mentioned in another > > thread, netbeans is unusable on mac os x. I don't understand why the > > posse sings netbeans' praises so, especially considering that most of > > them have macs. > > > here's a list of things that bugged the hell out of me in the first 2 > > minutes: > > > - the install isn't mac-like. It creates a directory in /Applications > > and then puts in a single .app file in there. Why not just dump this > > in /Applications directly? That's what every other mac app does. Not a > > show stopper, but shows lack of trying on the mac platform. > > > - Nothing is remembered. Everytime I boot netbeans, it'll ask me to > > register. I can click 'never register' until I'm blue in the face. No > > luck. This is a show stopper. > > > - hg isn't shipped with mac os x, and it isn't in netbeans either. > > Why not? It's open source. Python's already there, at least on os x > > leopard, so it can't be that hard. Even if you do install hg, netbeans > > can't find it. You have to manually go to the terminal, create > > a .MacOSX dir in your home file, and then an environment.plist, add / > > usr/local/bin there, and *LOG IN AGAIN*. Even technical users > > shouldn't be subjected to that kind of abuse. > > > When your product takes over an hour to get working properly, you're > > doing it wrong. > > > Verdict: Netbeans on mac is a toy project. > > Hey now - concluding that it's only a toy project based on these > observations is a bit premature. > > First of all, your comment that Mac applications should install > directly into /Applications rather than in a directory under > Applications. I agree that would be a good thing, but NetBeans is by > no means alone in this. In my /Applications I have a folder for Adobe > (containing only Acrobat), and there's a folder named "iWork 08" from > Apple (with Pages and Numbers inside), and there's a Python folder > (containing IDE, Python Launcher, etc). These are all adding a folder > rather than just an .app because they are installing multiple > components. In my NetBeans folder I have NetBeans (a couple of > versions actually), as well as an install of Apache Tomcat, and an > install of Glassfish. > > By the way, speaking of being Mac like - check out the new Mac look of > NetBeans in 7.0 daily builds:http://blogs.sun.com/stan/resource/laf/nbdev.png > > Next, your comment that "hg isn't shipped with mac os x, and it isn't > in netbeans either. Why not? It's open source.". I'm not sure > NetBeans should be in the business of distributing hg. It would also > have to install Python for you since hg depends on it. In any case, > I'm not sure why NetBeans didn't find hg for you. I have hg in my / > usr/local/bin, and NetBeans found it without any problems - I didn't > have to do any of the plist, login/logout stuff you're describing. You > -do- have /usr/local/bin in your $PATH, right? > > I have no idea why you keep getting the registration screen. It > doesn't happen for me, and if it was happening to everybody I'm sure > we would be run over by bug reports. In other words, the problem isn't > global, and it would be great if you could file a bug report to find > out what's going on in your case. It's supposed to store a flag in > your userdir recording your preference. > > Eric, you shouldn't have to go to the File view to create a new > folder. Just do New (on a package in the Projects view for example, or > from File > New), and then choose "Folder" from the "Other" > category. I'm not sure what you mean by importing files into a > folder (import what from where? just a file copy? just drag & drop > from folder A to folder B), but if you gave up using the tool just > based on this I'd encourage you to look a little deeper - most of the > benefits in the IDE is not going to be its file manipulation > capabilities, but refactoring, quickfixes, profiling, gui building, > etc etc etc. > > -- Tor --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
