first interactive app

[Tim Arnold]

hi,
I want to write a tiny interactive app for the following situation:
I have books of many chapters that must be split into volumes before going
to the printer.
A volume can have up to 600 pages. We obviously break the book into volumes
only at chapter breaks. Since some chapters make a natural grouping, we want
some human interaction for where the volume breaks occur.

Not having experience with interactive apps, I'm asking for advice about how
to go about it. The data I start with is just a dictionary with chapter name
= ending page number. I figured I would first show where the volumes would
break with no human interaction, with the begin and ending chapter
names/pagenumbers for each volume.

From here I thought about having a slider for each volume, but the number of
volumes could change during the session.
Or maybe I should just ask 'enter the ending chapter for the first volume'
and recalculate, etc until all volumes are defined.

Any ideas on a simple interface for this?
thanks,
--Tim

 

[Miki]

Hello Tim,

I want to write a tiny interactive app for the following situation:
I have books of many chapters that must be split into volumes before going
to the printer.
A volume can have up to 600 pages. We obviously break the book into volumes
only at chapter breaks. Since some chapters make a natural grouping, we want
some human interaction for where the volume breaks occur.

Not having experience with interactive apps, I'm asking for advice about how
to go about it. The data I start with is just a dictionary with chapter name
= ending page number. I figured I would first show where the volumes would
break with no human interaction, with the begin and ending chapter
names/pagenumbers for each volume.

From here I thought about having a slider for each volume, but the number of
volumes could change during the session.
Or maybe I should just ask 'enter the ending chapter for the first volume'
and recalculate, etc until all volumes are defined.

Any ideas on a simple interface for this?

How about something like:

Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
------ 001-300 300 ----
Chapter 3 (300-450 150)
Chapter 4 (450-500 50)
------ 300-450 250 ----
Chapter 5 (500-600 100)
------ 500-600 100 ----

Where the user can move the divider up and down to create new volume,
they can also add and delete dividers.

The program will not allow to drag the divider above the 600 page
limit.

HTH,

 

[castironpi]

Hello Tim,









How about something like:

Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
------ 001-300 300 ----
Chapter 3 (300-450 150)
Chapter 4 (450-500 50)
------ 300-450 250 ----
Chapter 5 (500-600 100)
------ 500-600 100 ----

Where the user can move the divider up and down to create new volume,
they can also add and delete dividers.

The program will not allow to drag the divider above the 600 page
limit.

If you're a WISIWIG editor, you can select text by
- typing STRNG
- editor overlays IDs on every occurence
- repeat or select number

I'm looking at debugging, and you do get:

<string>(1)<module>()->None

(Pdb) s
--Call--

<stdin>(1)f() (Pdb) s
<stdin>(5)f()

(Pdb) s
--Call--

c:\programs\python\lib\io.py(1235)write()

-> def write(self, s: str):
(Pdb) l
1230 return self.buffer.fileno()
1231
1232 def isatty(self):
1233 return self.buffer.isatty()
1234
1235 -> def write(self, s: str):
1236 if self.closed:
1237 [snip]
1238 if not isinstance(s, str):
1239 [snip]
1240 [snip]

allowing you to see what you want, adjust, and keep a mind's-eye
representation of the program.

Are you complaining that the mouse is too slow? That the GUI is too
distant? Closest lexical: 'editor sucks' and 'console sucks'.

I think a SmartConsole would take A.I. I want a multi-column console.

I'm not sure how generally you can harness today's GI on a keyboard,
but tomorrow's certainly can. (scrollbar2 up>up>up), and I think
you'd get console gi primitives pretty quickly. (graphical/spatial
interface.)

You're thinking of mimetic/conceptual zoom. How does this look?
Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
------ 001-300 300 ----
Chapter 3 (300-450 150)
Chapter 4 (450-500 50)
------ 300-450 250 ----
Chapter 5 (500-600 100)
------ 500-600 100 ----Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
------ 001-200 200 ----
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
Chapter 3 (300-450 150)
Chapter 4 (450-500 50)
------ 300-450 150 ----
Chapter 5 (500-600 100)
------ 500-600 100 ----Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
------ 001-200 200 ----
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
Chapter 3 (300-450 150)
------ 200-450 250 ----
Chapter 4 (450-500 50)
Chapter 5 (500-600 100)
------ 450-600 150 ----

But us mortal humans, temporal beings, get confused quickly with what
section is where, so we'll mis-specify eventually. ("No, the -other-
up!")

Did everyone know that the graphics blits in BASIC were 'get' and
'put'?

You could probably pick a recommended contextmanager out of the box;
it could learn what you wanted by when you said 'no'. You'll want a:

which isn't clear at all how to translate into CS in a rigorous way,
and its varying meanings for different structures.

And each page length change notifies 'Upon', cf. Observer.

I feel like the way from point A you mention and the actual
implementation would be useful. Python shows promise for 'rollback'
potential too.

Somehow, your data are still around during console session-- exception
doesn't kill a console. This one generates a console of a dictionary
and lets you assign to it.

--> a= 2
--> print( a )
2
-->

def con():
while 1:
try:
yield input( '--> ' )
except:
print( 'exception.' )

glos, locs= {}, {}
for inp in con():
exec( inp, glos, locs )

We might have to mark our objects live / "on the air", to notify
generators of change in conditions, rerun at every step. I think you
need live primitives.

 

[Tim Arnold]

Hello Tim,
How about something like:

Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
------ 001-300 300 ----
Chapter 3 (300-450 150)
Chapter 4 (450-500 50)
------ 300-450 250 ----
Chapter 5 (500-600 100)
------ 500-600 100 ----

Where the user can move the divider up and down to create new volume,
they can also add and delete dividers.

The program will not allow to drag the divider above the 600 page
limit.

HTH,

Hi Miki,
that looks nice, simple, and intuitive. thanks for thinking about it.
Now to dive into some gui coding!

thanks,
--Tim

 

[Miki]

Hello Tim,

that looks nice, simple, and intuitive. thanks for thinking about it.

Thanks, glad I could help.

Now to dive into some gui coding!

IMO you can pull it off as a web application and then you won't need
to worry about cross-platform,
upgrades and all that interesting stuff.

HTH,

 

[castironpi]

Hello Tim,


Thanks, glad I could help.


IMO you can pull it off as a web application and then you won't need
to worry about cross-platform,
upgrades and all that interesting stuff.

Chapter 1 (001-200 200)
Chapter 2 (200-300 100)
------ 001-300 300 ----

Does anyone want to see it under a graphics layer?