From: Michal Suchanek <hramrach@...>
Date: 2011-09-02T07:21:25+09:00
Subject: Re: GUI programming

On 31 August 2011 22:23, Alexey Petrushin <axyd80@gmail.com> wrote:
> I believe right now it's better to stay with console, there's no Ruby
> GUI, only hacks.
>

It seems every time I turn to GUI programming I am digging into a pile of bugs.

It's not that there are not bugs outside of GUI toolkits. It's just
that any decent GUI toolkit is composed of many little bits that have
to act all in concert, and any application but "Hello World" is going
to use quite a few different bits of the toolkit. And if any of them
breaks you will definitely notice ;-)

On the other hand, a terminal or 'console' application can demonstrate
whatever you were trying to do with very little unrelated stuff
needed.
That's why one should venture to GUI only when there is good reason.
It's way more boring then console. The amount of boilerplating to get
a simple GUI application done is enormous compared to writing results
to stdout whatever toolkit you choose.

Of course, learning how to do a GUI is a good reason but then you
still need to find some problem that can be solved by a GUI
application at all. Many GUI applications try in vain to solve
problems that need a shell utility or equivalent to be solved
decently.

Thanks

Michal