IDE inspectors should reveal all properties

[Wilhelm Sanke]

On Wed, 26 Nov 2003 Dave Cragg <dcragg at lacscentre.co.uk> wrote:

> One reason for lack of feedback on Xavier's additions to the MC
> development environment may have been a perceived lack of need by
> many MC users. Not that we don't see shortcomings in the IDE, but I
> imagine each user has his/her own ideas for what would constitute an
> improvement. And as modifying the environment or making additions is
> relatively easy, many have probably made their own "improvements". In
> my own case, many of these changes are made ad hoc. Typically, I'll
> make a utility stack for each project I work on which lets me poke
> and pry to my heart's content. These utlities won't win prizes in the
> interface stakes, but they get the job done. It's this kind of
> flexibility that endeared me to Metacard. (And probably turned others
> off.)

On Wed, 26 Nov 2003 "MisterX" <x at monsieurx.com> wrote:

> In brief, you get a hierarchical view of all your controls, with 
> editors for
> content, scripts, all the props and a cool custom props browser. Any
> property
> has it's own menu with all the possible values (color, bool, etc...)
> story and screenshots on my site (compared to MC's old control browser)
> Note the story is one year old. Imagine if I had had more feedback where
> these features could take you today!



Like Dave said, a few of us have developed their own sort of browsers 
adapted to their specific needs, which we also have "advertized" here 
and there - among them Geoff Canyon, Richard Gaskin, Klaus Major,  
myself, and of course the ominous MisterX - so this may explain part of 
the lack of feedback to MisterX.

My own Rev and MC browsers,  two years old and available for free, have 
also elicited a limited number of responses - maybe somewhat less than 
with MisterX's tools ( but I do not keep track how many people download 
from my ftp site).

My browsers include a very quick and elaborate script search feature, 
which I  use quite often if I analyze stacks or have to adapt stacks 
that are somewhat complicated in their structure.

The browsers have been mostly unchanged since two years. An addition 
that will be available shortly is a special groups' card where even 
"unplaced" backgrounds will be listed and can then be edited. There were 
requests for such a feature on the runrev lists.

Regards,

Wilhelm Sanke