[Sugar-devel] [IAEP] turtle art: 2 instances, no?

[Gary C Martin]

Hi Bill,

On 7 Sep 2009, at 12:09, Bill Kerr wrote:

> I can't see any way to load 2 instances on the SoaS version
>
> If I have a project loaded, saved and named
> Then go into the journal and try to load an older saved version then  
> it doesn't load but puts me back to the current open version
> I have to first close the current version and then open the older  
> version to get it

This is not a bug with TurtleArt. It's (in my view) the major design  
backfire that is the "Keep" button... Keep is not like a copy,  
duplicate or 'save as' file operation in other OS environments. Sugars  
"Keep" is actually a (bad) attempt at "Keep version snap shot",  
unfortunately no where in the Journal UI is this visually indicated/ 
referenced. Think of "Keep" a little like non-linear undo states  
stored to Journal.

The problem with all this is that Sugar currently treats all versions  
you "Keep" from an activity as the same activity. You can only have  
one of the versions active at once, this is what you're seeing when  
you try to resume (what you think is another old activity is actually  
a version) and Sugar switches to the current version of it you already  
have open.

To create fresh new activities, you need to:

1) start new activity
2) create masterpiece
3) stop activity
4) goto step 1

If you ever find yourself clicking "Keep" give your self a small jab  
in the hand with a sharp protractor ;-)

In every release of Sugar to date, "Keep" == horrible design failure,  
even for the upcoming 0.86. The problem is "the real deal" (true  
versioning) is always just over the horizon, like the pot of gold at  
the end of the rainbow, and the blasted button some how makes it  
through (and causes way more grief then it ever solves as the common  
use case is "I want a duplicate copy of this").

Regards,
--Gary

> Also if I am working on a project and remember an idea from a sample  
> project then I can't just load the sample view the idea and then  
> quickly return to my current project to implement there
> I have to close current project, then open sample and view idea,  
> then close sample, then reopen current project, etc.
>
> Please correct if I am wrong about this
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