Marcel writes: > Announcement > =-=-=-=-=-=-
Ive been playing around with the new QPC and Smsq/e for a couple of days now, and I must say that Im very impressed! Marcel, Wolfgang and others have done a splendid job. Bravo! guys, and many thanks! I find it a bit sad that one of the biggest things to have hit the QL world in recent times has barely caused a ripple on this list. Lets assure these guys that they made the right choice in poring over their overheated computers in darkend rooms for the benefit of their friends and fellow nerds, instead of taking up fishing in the healthy fresh outdoors, or pursuing wealth and glory in the material world! I very much hope that we shall see some great new software that takes full advantage of all the new treats weve now got! The problem is that there are virtually no tools to make a programmer or user's life easier. We need tools to help creating styles, to pick colours, to design sprites and menus, and so on. Its going to be very difficult for casual programmers, such as me, to produce new stuff or upgrade old stuff if we have to do all the hard work by hand. I dont enjoy creating user-interfaces in a text editor! There are some promising beginnings, as was pointed out in a recent QL Toady. But it could take a very long time before some of these products become generally useful to the average punter. If the same level of collaboration could be achieved in developing or improving some of these tools, as was the case with Smsq/e, we might really get somewhere. This requires that programmers make clear what kind of help they need, and that people take them up on it. Things like the translation of manuals, reviews-cum-tutorials, sprites, add-ons, help, collaboration over standards, etc could all be useful. For those that feel they dont have anything to contribute, how about at the very least registering the use of a product with the author, or making your interest and appreciation clear, or even sending a donation, where this is wanted? C'mon guys! Weve all got things to do! Per
