<html>
<head>
<style><!--
.hmmessage P
{
margin:0px;
padding:0px
}
body.hmmessage
{
font-size: 12pt;
font-family:Calibri
}
--></style></head>
<body class='hmmessage'><div dir='ltr'><p sab="211">About “E-Hg Tech.Report”, received some interesting remarks, of potential general interest.</p><p sab="211"> </p><p sab="215">"<font style="font-size: 10pt;" size="2" face="Courier New,sans-serif" sab="439">> from a user's point of view... but I feel that that's somehow like going against the stream."</font><br sab="216"> Much more than that, in my intention. <br sab="217">In my intention this would be a little, tiny “revolution”. A witness of how a high tech. product is perceived and lived by a Mr. User turned from a passive “subject” to a free and responsible citizen of his Computerland.</p><p sab="215"> </p><p sab="219">"<font style="font-size: 10pt;" size="2" face="Courier New,sans-serif">> it is huge (170 pages!)</font> "<br sab="220"> That is dictated, imposed by the very maniacal complexity of the tool. <br sab="221">When a Mr. User is to face a new tool he is, necessarily, unbiased; each and all of the available commands and options are equally unknown to him and, therefore, potentially equally relevant. No prejudicial preference, of course.<br> That's why I've tried honestly and fairly to test, and understand, and describe each and all of them. So “discovering” how abnormal they are.<br></p><p sab="225">A possible explanation is that Mercurial in itself is not a tool, it is a language, sort of. Not to be used in itself, but to be used to build “real”, practical VC Systems tools making a sensible, severe selection and use of its inner mass of commands and options. I mean, with a resulting tool hopefully comprising four or five commands at most, with no more than a handful of options.<br sab="228">VC Systems should be almost “transparent” to be a practical and friendly tool, not a monstrous confused messy set of senseless commands. </p><p sab="229">VC Systems should be perceived as an aid, not a burden to designers.</p><p sab="230">There is another possible explanations for such senseless complexity: lack of effective management. A project carried on by a committee. </p><p sab="231">It was with that in mind that I proposed the section “E-Hg Primer – Versioning in Practice”, just to be of help to the poor fellow Mr User. But the </p><p sab="232">real solution should be another: rewriting from scratch the whole user interface, taking seriously into account the real, practical needs of Mr. </p><p sab="233">User.</p><p sab="234">Your thoughts welcome.<br sab="235"> - P.M.<br sab="236"></p> </div></body>
</html>