Re: Good, easy to use, upstream defaults for zsh (i.e. improving usability)

[Keir Mierle <mierle@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 7/11/05, Nikolai Weibull <mailing-lists.zsh-workers@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
[snip]
> Why do you think that the defaults that are being set are going to make
> life easier for Zsh-converts?

As I outlined earlier, such simple changes as putting bold text in the
prompt would
be immediatly useful. Most of my friends don't even customize their prompt,
requiring them to clear their screen between invocations of commands that output
lots of text. Why not Do The Right Thing? Why not make it work right
out of the box?

> The global RCs shouldn't really be doing very much anyway, in my
> opinion. 

I disagree. I think they should do whatever they can, so everyone else
doesn't have to.

> I do agree that having completion set up properly by default would
> make Zsh a lot more appealing at first glance, but completion can be
> quite difficult to set up to a default that suits the largest number of
> converters,

So it shouldn't be done? Do you think most new zsh converts-to-be (maybe) are
going to spend the time with the extremely complex and comprehensive
completion system to set it up? Only the most die-hard customizers will do this.

And yes, good defaults are 'hard.' That's life. Usability is hard.
There's no two ways
about it. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be done or that it's not
worth doing.
Quite the contrary, I believe it is absolutely worth doing. With more
users comes
more developers, which few open source projects would complain about.

Thanks,
Keir