[Gambas-user] C Code character manipulation - alternatives

[nando]

If you're looking for something CAD
OpenOffice comes with Draw
which is very similar to Corel in many ways.
I use it to make PC Boards and drawings/etc.  It works very well!!
You might not have a link to it, so at the text prompt, type oodraw
-Fernando


---------- Original Message -----------
From: Doriano Blengino <doriano.blengino at ...1909...>
To: mailing list for gambas users <gambas-user at lists.sourceforge.net>
Sent: Sat, 23 May 2009 20:13:05 +0200
Subject: Re: [Gambas-user] C Code character manipulation - alternatives

> Benoît Minisini ha scritto:
> >> In some message some day ago, KhurramM proposed a single package of
> >> gambas for linux, and someone else replied that a source distribution is
> >> the more practical one. It is true - sadly. I think this situation is
> >> bad - remember, Unix means "unique, one for all". As long as the
> >> architecture does not change, it would be very practical to have binary
> >> packages for all the distributions - instead, linux on PC is a mess. I
> >> used to compile my kernel every time, on every new machine. Then, I
> >> discovered that there was nothing to gain for my average desktop machine
> >> - it was exactly the same to compile my customized kernel or to use the
> >> full bloated one which came with the distibution. If it works for the
> >> kernel, it could work any other application. But every distribution
> >> creator think he is doing better than the other, and the more it does
> >> different, better it is. Simply wrong. The author of the message than
> >> spoke about windows '98, XP, 2000. Well, they are different operating
> >> system. But 99% of applications developed by me with delphi run smoothly
> >> on every windows machine I tried; the remaining 1% were secondary quirks
> >> easily solved. I think this is the target of Unix/Linux world. This is
> >> freedom, without having to mess around with makefiles and configure
> >> scripts that get bigger than the original source itself. I suspect that
> >> Benoit spends a lot of time to adapt the sources to all the different
> >> distributions, which all share the same kernel, same libraries, and all
> >> have a packaging system that keeps track of dependencies...
> >>
> >> Best regards,
> >>     
> >
> > Nowadays, distributions mainly differ by their packaging system, the way they 
> > run services only. The file system organization and many other things that 
> > were different in the past seem to converge.
> >
> > I had a bug once in SuSE that I solved by implementing the shared library 
> > preloading feature, but I guess that this feature is not needed anymore.
> >
> > As for the way program are packaged, you have to let a distribution manage the 
> > packages, because:
> >
> > - They sign them: nobody can easily insert some trojan inside without notice.
> >
> > - They update them.
> >
> > - They manage dependencies. If a security hole is found in a library, all 
> > programs using that library will be fixed.
> >
> > On the contrary, for me, Windows is a nightmare: each program must take care 
> > of being updated itself, by going to the network, checking that an update is 
> > available, downloading it, and so on. What about all the programs installed by 
> > your OEM? Do they have holes? Are they updated? And when you have to reinstall 
> > your Windows?
> >   
> There are few persons on The Earth who hate windows like I do. That 
> said, we must admit that windows has some pros too, and linux some cons 
> either. If the average windows user had the average linux user maturity, 
> even windows would have less problems. From DOS 2.11 onward, through 
> windows 95, 98, 2000, and now XP, I never used an antivirus on my 
> machine, and I never reinstalled my operating system. Why? Because I am 
> not the average windows user - I always look critically at windows, and 
> I am careful about everything happens to my computers. I repeat - I hate 
> windows. But windows has automatic updates like linux, windows has an 
> installer like linux, and so on. There are very few things linux can do 
> that can not be made on windows - the problem is elsewhere, in the 
> background philosophy: closed sources, the idea that computer 
> technologies must bring money. Everything that must bring money, that 
> becomes a businness, suffers from dark sides.
> 
> But we should take a look at some linux problems. First of all, the 
> quality of applications; average windows apps are better than average 
> linux ones. It is true that linux software is normally free but, apart 
> from few exceptions, there is a lot to do. I am very satisfied of Open 
> Office, The Gimp, Gambas, KiCad, Firefox and companions, Synaptic. But 
> try to find something like Dreamweaver, Corel draw, Delphi, Orcad (an 
> electronics CAD like KiCAD), Cakewalk and others I can't remember now. 
> Think this: I still have to find a text editor which does not annoy me. 
> I even poked Gambas to add some feature in the editor.
> The other problems of linux are the same of windows - sometimes you 
> install something, and it screws up something else. No news here. Last 
> time I upgraded xorg, I spent about half a day to correct the problems.
> 
> I dream a Linux world where things are more unified, like windows, but 
> keeping the open source basis, the underlaying community and the freedom 
> of choice. But freedom does not mean that everything must be compiled 
> from sources. Freedom means that if I find something I don't like, I can 
> change it. Or, if I want to see how things are made, I can take a look 
> at the sources. This also spreads knowledge in the strategic field of 
> software.
> 
> > On Linux everything is centralized and you can manage your system in a few 
> > clicks.
> >   
> Are you really really sure you never used "you favorite text editor" in 
> /etc/...?
> You are true about the package system, which does not exist in windows 
> (who knows why? perhaps because you have to pay...).
> This is an important point, ok, but you will not find in your packages 
> everything you need. In fact, in this thread we are discussing about 
> distribuiting software by sources...
> > On the contrary, the work is more difficult for the packager. I tried in the 
> > Gambas IDE to make a packager easy to use, and it was not easy to do! I had to 
> > deal with the difference between rpm, deb, tgz, and the little details between 
> > distributions using the same package format.
> >
> > Having a common package format need to know all the differences in the 
> > organization of all distributions. You cannot force that, because you will 
> > destroy the diversity. Just wait, things are slowly converging.
> >
> > As for the GNU autoconf/automake system, I admit it was a nightmare for me 
> > too. I think now that all distributions have the concept of "development 
> > packages", a configure script should be able to tell the system the libraries 
> > it needs, and the system should install them automagically. That's all. No 
> > thousands of long tests to run before starting compiling.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> >   
> You are right, things are slowly converging - a little too slowly I 
> think. A superior commission (GNU perhaps?) dictating some good 
> standard, and much more good behaviour of the whole community would 
> help. You talk about development packages where the package tells the 
> system what it needs, and the system provides it. Well, this is 
> fantastic for cross-platform but, for a single architecture (say, 
> i386?), why use this complication? The final result of such a 
> compilation would not differ so much from a computer to another. Several 
> times I compiled a program on a computer and ran the executable on 
> another, even crossing from debian to slackware to fedora. As long as 
> the right libraries are in place, it works. If the right libraries are 
> not there, even the compilation normally fails (gtk > 2.0.25 required, 
> signature libc xxx not found, libqt3-mt blah blah blah) and the process 
> of compiling introduces even more difficulties (this source expects a 
> gcc prior than 4.0, this one instead wants gcc > 4.1, not tested with 
> 4.02 but should work... and so on).
> 
> Where are those big differences from a distribution to another? RPM vs 
> APT, KDE vs GNOME (and hence QT vs GTK), latest kernel instead of the 
> pre-latest. Full stop. So in my machine I have both RPM and APT, both 
> GTK and QT, and so do many many users like me. I use KDE but, to install 
> certain programs, I should install almost the whole gnome system. If all 
> the distributions could take an eye on each other compatibility, having 
> "libc6.0.rpm" instead of "libc-6.0mdk.rpm" for example, all we users had 
> an easier life.
> 
> Sorry for this long email, best regards.
> 
> -- 
> Doriano Blengino
> 
> "Listen twice before you speak.
> This is why we have two ears, but only one mouth."
> 
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------- End of Original Message -------