Ivan Enderlin 🦀The case for Nushell, https://www.jntrnr.com/case-for-nushell/.
Relevant article about shells, and how Nushell pushes the boundaries further. I highly recommend reading it.
Charlie Stross@hywan @Keltounet Question: "can the state of shells be improved enough to overcome the inertia of sticking to what you know?"
This is the wrong question. It presupposes zero cost of transition, while the cognitive workload of learning a new shell rises exponentially with age (hint: I'm nearly 60, shells are harder to adapt to than a new GUI). Stability and continuity are essential prerequisites to productivity!
Ollivier Robert 🇺🇦😷🌈@Keltounet @hywan Computing is not my job. It hasn't been my job for over two decades. Time spent learning a new shell or thinking about computers is time *wasted* from the non-compsci point of view.
Thing is, the question about the utility of switching to a new shell has embedded ideological assumptions that implicitly privilege computing over applications. To 99% of the world applications of computing are the priority; the machines and software are just an annoying drag on getting stuff done.
@Keltounet @hywan There's a deeper point: the past 70 years of computing have focussed on a spurious vision of progress that forgets to consider the utility of a stable platform. Operating systems in particular are driven by commercial goals (sell more software! Get more Linux desktops out there!) that are actively inimical to the needs of their users. Forcing users to learn a new way of working every year—even if they don't need to—is crazy. And it renders computers inaccessible to the elderly.
@Keltounet @hywan I watched my mother progressively (and completely) lose the ability to use her iMac during her final decade because Apple kept f*cking around with the Mac OS X user interface, the way Mail worked, the colour of the window maximize/minimize buttons, and stuff that probably looked trivial to a 30-something UI designer but was deeply disruptive to an 80 something with impaired memory. And by losing that access, she lost touch with friends (via email).
tshepang@cstross
I would agree many UI changes in all manner of tools seem to be change for its own sake (where improvements are not clear, or worse, where the UX feels worse), as if the decision makers need to feel productive
@Keltounet @hywan
I would agree many UI changes in all manner of tools seem to be change for its own sake (where improvements are not clear, or worse, where the UX feels worse), as if the decision makers need to feel productive
@Keltounet @hywan
@tshepang @Keltounet @hywan UI changes in corporate products seem to happen purely to justify the product manager's request for a pay rise at their annual review! And at Google, old products get killed ruthlessly to make way for new products because that's the only way a manager can earn promotion.
This shit is actively hostile to the users' interests, but it's ubiquitous.
I mean, Canonical think 5 years is "long term stable" for Ubuntu, which is bullshit: should be AT LEAST a decade.
Mark T. Tomczak@cstross @tshepang @Keltounet @hywan I remember from my childhood consuming all things Star trek that the TNG technical manual mentioned that among the features of the multifunction tactical stations on the Enterprise is that they recognized their user and could reconfigure to the version of the interface the user was most proficient in. Starfleet crew were expected to train on newer UIs as they came along, but compatibility with older UIs was maintained.
... if that isn't most indicative that they live in the Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communist future, I don't know what is.