In the past in Pharo it was possible to open Spotter, type in the name of a
framework/project to load
from catalog, perform a search and just hit ENTER to easily install the project.
This was following the Spotter idea that it is easy to access most informations
of Pharo
with the Spotter tool.
There always was and still is a setting in "Settings" -> "Catalog" -> "Display
catalog projects in Spotter".
This setting is ENABLED BY DEFAULT but could be switched off in the settings
tool or custom preference
scripts if this is problematic for someone.
Now in Pharo 6 there is an additional class "GTSpotterExtensionSettings" to
activate/deactivate
Spotter extensions. While nearly all of the Spotter extensions are enabled the
one for the catalog
integration is DISABLED BY DEFAULT.
This leads to several effects:
1. While in the past it was possible in a fresh Pharo image to search and
install out of
the box it is (as of today in the not yet released Pharo 6) not possible
anymore to quickly
start by searching and installing from catalog using Spotter.
2. It is very confusing that in the settings "Display catalog projects in
Spotter" is enabled but a search
in Spotter gives no results. Most people will not not know about the
second setting and easily
get lost and think this behavior is just broken.
Also this second setting for the Spotter extension is much more hidden
between all the other
Spotter extension enablements very and hard to find.
3. Several of my youtube videos demonstrating Goodies like DesktopManager,
QuickAccess,
MessageFlowBrowser, ... directly start by loading the tools from Spotter.
Anyone newbee who will
follow these will not only be confused - but also stuck in trying Pharo
when he learns
from these videos.
I was asked several times on Slack and via Mail from people who were not
able to reproduce ... this
is really annyoing. Especially this gives the wrong impression to newbees.
Things should be easy
not complicated.
To my knowledge disabling the Spotter search in Pharo 6 came up due to some
Pharo teaching in regions
with slow internet connection. I understand that we would like to support these
Pharo users too as best
as possible in their out of the box experience ... but (without being able to
prove) I think that 90% or
more Pharo users have a regular internet connection. Otherwise it would be hard
to work with updates,
project loading, PharoLauncher, STHub or Iceberg/GitHub.
Also my own personal experience is that even on low bandwidth network this
Catalog Spotter search for
me was always fast enough (as I often use Pharo in trains with slow connections
or on a Pi with slow
connections and less processing power). I do not know about all others from the
community.
I invested hours in the past in developing and introducing the initial
configuration browser to Pharo,
later improved and helped shaping its replacement CatalogBrowser, also
contributed this spotter search
for the catalog items so things are more accessible, easy and enjoyable. That's
why I also invested
hours in udpating configs or pushing you to put things into catalog.
Because accessibility is key. Only when things are easy to access and
understandable people will
enjoy Pharo.
Currently in an out-of the box image this easy access to the projects via
Spotter is blocked.
Additionally I have to explain to anyone who asks me that there is a second
non-obvious/more hidden setting
leaving an unpleasant feeling how many others unknown to me will struggle with
this issue.
I see two solutions:
A) We enable both settings by DEFAULT to bring back the Spotter search and
installation
of catalog items - with the clear benefit of having
- the previous behavior in Pharo back
- the out of the box ability to search for catalog projects in any
fresh image
- no confusion among the user base anymore regarding the settings
- we have unbroken Youtube videos that newbees can continue to follow
- if a user asks (like often) how to get Seaside, Artefact, Mongo,
Teapot or other projects we can
just tell him "search in Spotter and you should be fine" as most of
them have a config in
the catalog.
Remember that not all of us know about all the github pages or nice
Metacello expressions.
So the easier things are found and accessible the better it is.
B) If A is still a "No go" for the community we should at a minimum switch
the defaults of
the two settings:
=> we ENABLE the Spotter extension (GTSpotterExtensionSettings perform:
#GTSpotter_spotterCatalogProjectsFor: with: true)
=> we DISABLE the catalog setting (CatalogSettings
displayCatalogProjectsInSpotter: false)
With this at least we have no confusion among the user base anymore
regarding the settings.
I would clearly and strongly vote for option A as my preferred one.
I agree there are regions/continents with very low bandwidth - but Pharo will
rival with state of the art
technologies where loading/installation megabytes from the web is often not
seen as an issue. There are
many package registries out there (from debian packages) up to Maven, npm in
JS, ... or look at Docker.
Shuffling megabytes around is a reality in todays technologies.
So to be honest I never understood this whole "bandwidth" discussion and even
if this comes up it could
be solved with a note in the download/welcome screen or pointing to a custom
preference script for low bandwidth
situations.
Sorry for having to bring this up again ... but I would like this to be solved
BEFORE Pharo 6 will
be pushed out of the door. Keeping it like it is without further actions would
be really stupid.
Thanks for you comments, ideas or votes.
Thanks
T.
