this post was submitted on 06 Apr 2024
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I'll switch to Linux when Visual Studio Community (NOT Code) works on it and I never have to touch the command line ever again.
As someone who genuinely loves the command line - I'd like to know more about your perspective. (Genuinely. I solemnly swear not to try to convince you of my perspective.)
What about GUIs appeals to you over a command line?
I like the CLI because it feels like a conversation with the computer. I explain what I want, combining commands as necessary, and the machine responds.
With GUIs I feel like I'm always relearning tools. Even something as straightforward as 'find and replace' has different keyboard shortcuts in most of the text-editing apps I use - and regex support is spotty.
Not to say that I think the terminal is best for all things. I do use an IDE and windowing environments. Just that - when there are CLI tools I tend to prefer them over an equivalent GUI tool.
Anyway, I'm interested to hear your perspective- what about GUIs works better for you? What about the CLI is failing you?
Thank you!
Not OP. Used Linux since the late 90s. My daily driver is NixOS. GUI here is synonymous with TUI.
I like the GUI because I can see what options the tool can execute in this state. I don't have to pass
--helptogrepor keep several man page sections open. The machine knows what it's capable of and I direct it.With CLIs I feel like I'm always relearning tools. Even something as straightforward as 'enable a flag' has different syntax. Is it
-flag?--flag?--enable-flag? Oh look, a checkbox.Not to say that I think a window environment is best for all things. When using an IDE, I have the terminal open constantly. Programmers are as bad at visual interfaces as they are module interfaces. If no UX designer was involved in displaying complex data or situations, I'm likely to try to fall back to the commandline. Just that - when there are GUI tools I tend to prefer them over an equivalent CLI tool.
tl;dr GUIs can represent the current state of a complex process and provide relevant context, instead of requiring the user to model that information (with large error bars for quality of the UI).
Anyway, I hope you take this in good humor and at least consider a TUI for your next project.
Absolutely. I see what you did there... 😉
But seriously, thank you for your response!
I think your comment about GUIs being better at displaying the current state and context was very insightful. Most CLI work I do is generally about composing a pipeline and shoving some sort of data through it. As a class of work, that's a common task, but certainly not the only thing I do with my PC.
Multistage operations like, say, Bluetooth pairing I definitely prefer to use the GUI for. I think it is partially because of the state tracking inherent in the process.
Thanks again!