A desktop environment without graphics (tmux-like)

Posted by mustaphah 5 days ago

A desktop environment without graphics (tmux-like)(github.com)

156 points | 47 comments

qwertox 2 days ago|

  - [x] Change tilling options  
  let mut menu = Menu::new("Tilling");

Not sure if "tilling" is meant to mean "tiling"? Comes from "tile" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tile

ryao 3 days ago||

I do not plan to try this but I do wonder how well the terminal version of WordPerfect would work in this.

Also, if sixel support were added, it could support graphics. See:

https://github.com/taviso/wpunix/wiki/Terminals

If sixels somehow are already supported, then it does support graphics.

LeoPanthera 2 days ago||

Wordgrinder is a modern text-mode word processor. (Distinct from a text editor.)

https://github.com/davidgiven/wordgrinder

hliyan 2 days ago|||

This discussion is bringing back some memories. Particularly my first time using Wordstar 2000

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordStar

chiffre01 2 days ago|||

I want to live in a world where all the vintage Curses like apps work on modern systems. Just like Lotus 123

https://github.com/taviso/123elf

mxuribe 3 days ago||

Well, i remember a time when MS Word was run within DOS, yes, DOS as in the old operating system....so while i never used WordPerfect, i would not be surprized if such a thing existed.

This DE looks quite a bit like DOS - or at least the UI seen via apps within DOS. I didn't care much for DOS back in the day...but now, i like it...of course it might be simple rose-colored nostalgia. :-)

lproven 2 days ago|||

> i remember a time when MS Word was run within DOS

The penultimate DOS version of MS Word is freeware. MS released Word 5.5 as freeware as a Y2K fix for all previous versions.

It's quite usable. I've written articles using it.

You can run it under Linux or macOS easily using DOSemu, on 64-bit Windows with VDOS+.

I wrote about how, with a pic of it working:

https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/28/friday_foss_fest_runn...

Sadly, the last ever version, 6.0, is much better, with more keystrokes in common with Word 6 for Windows and Mac, and that's not freeware.

nunobrito 2 days ago|||

edit.com was a fantastic text editor. So easy, so intuitive. Never understood why nano wasn't able to compete. Anyways, I'm nowadays a user of "micro" on linux for text editing.

lproven 2 days ago||

I totally agree.

I use Tilde myself, which is very close.

https://github.com/gphalkes/tilde

I have written about it:

"Tilde, a text editor that doesn't work like it's 1976"

https://www.theregister.com/2021/12/17/tilde_text_editor/

Nobody got the gag in the title. 1976 was when Vi first appeared.

nunobrito 2 days ago||

Hey, thanks. I've installed and tried out. The opening menu explained the key settings and it was just Edit from MSDOS. Very good, they even improved to exit the editor using ^Q.

I really don't know why so many people are against having a bar with menus and using the arrows to navigate. It is intuitive and easy, that editor really hit the spot. Thank you for the tip.

mxuribe 2 days ago|||

Oh wow, that's so cool! And dig that blue background! Thanks for sharing!

technothrasher 2 days ago||||

> so while i never used WordPerfect, i would not be surprized if such a thing existed.

WordPerfect competed heavily with Microsoft Word back in the DOS days. I made money in high school with side jobs teaching people to use WordPefect for DOS, and making utilities to convert and process WordPerfect files for small businesses.

I wrote all of my high school papers on WordPerfect for the Amiga, which was basically just a straight port of the text-only DOS version.

lelanthran 2 days ago|||

> WordPerfect competed heavily with Microsoft Word back in the DOS days.

In my part of the world, on MSDOS, MS Word was not even in competition with WordPerfect.

It was only with the advent of Windows (more specifically, Win95) that MS Word started seeing non-fractional percentage of usage compared to WordPerfect 5.1

mxuribe 2 days ago|||

Yeah, i had heard that WordPerfect was by far the preferred or better software in those days, though i never used. (To clarify: i was too young to know better, and simply used what was available to me at the time...which was only MS Word.)

cestith 2 days ago|||

I think in the days of DOS, the main players were WordPerfect and WordStar. Probably more than Word or any part of MS Office, MS Works was a decent cheap option that I saw a lot of places.

lproven 2 days ago||||

> WordPerfect competed heavily with Microsoft Word back in the DOS days.

Ha! I'd say it was more accurate to say that MS Word tried to compete with WordPerfect.

It was only with the rise of Windows that Word became a contender, and WordPerfect was relegated to trying to compete.

> a straight port of the text-only DOS version.

Just out of interest: WP was a Data General app. The DOS version was a port, as was the Amiga version, SCO Xenix, classic MacOS, all the others. The native app was a DG minicomputer program.

Part of its competitiveness in the pre-GUI era was that WordPerfect was very portable and the company ported it to almost every OS going, complete with its massive suite of state-of-the-art printer drivers.

If you were not using a DG Nova minicomputer then you were running a port.

But as GUIs became standard, they almost all included printing subsystems, using soft fonts rendered by the same code that rendered stuff on screen. Printers' own built-in fonts became irrelevant: GUIs just dumped bitmaps to the printer.

So WordPerfect's best-in-the-industry printer drivers, which supported every printer in the world and could make it do backflips, became irrelevant.

Cthulhu_ 2 days ago||||

WP was still used for typing practice back in uuhh... 1998/1999, I think they intentionally used that instead of their Windows counterparts to minimize distractability.

mxuribe 2 days ago|||

Good on you that you made money that way in high school!

snozolli 3 days ago||||

This DE looks quite a bit like DOS - or at least the UI seen via apps within DOS.

I'm definitely getting Turbo Pascal 5 vibes. Not 6, though, because that added ASCII drop-shadows.

lelanthran 2 days ago||

> Not 6, though, because that added ASCII drop-shadows.

I see a drop shadow on a button; not sure if that specific console application had the button or if the button is part of the DE.

Scoundreller 2 days ago|||

WP5 was basically 40x60 (or whatever) in DOS. I still remember the royal blue background.

WP6 also ran in DOS but had a full fledged GUI. Ran a bit slow on the 486 but wow!

Narishma 2 days ago||

This is not correct. WP6 ran just fine even on a 286 and was still a text mode application.

lelanthran 2 days ago||

I use Vim with SLIME. Multiple splits, multiple tabs, multiple applications, can type stuff into a buffer and then SLIME can send that as commands to the applications.

For example, I use `psql` in a split, and doing `C-c C-c` sends the statement in my current buffer (delineated with newlines) to `psql`. I do the same with all other console applications.

lproven 2 days ago||

It looks impressive but it duplicates a tonne of existing functionality from TWIN, which has been around for about 25 years or more.

https://github.com/cosmos72/twin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_(windowing_system)

And both of them seem to re-implement their own, inferior, versions of the TurboVision text-mode "widget toolkit":

https://tvision.sourceforge.net/

https://github.com/magiblot/tvision

A merger could result in something greater than the sum of its parts.

Waraqa 2 days ago|

It would be useful if there are a comparison for their resources usage especially for people who need them in constrained resources environments.

lproven 2 days ago||

Hmmm.

I mean, I agree it'd be interesting. But useful? Compared to basically any form of GUI be it X11 or Wayland, the resource usage is I would think on the order of 1% as much, and maybe less.

iberator 2 days ago||

hehe it looks like DESQview]1] for MSDOS from 1985 :) Amazing idea!

1: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DESQview

nickdothutton 2 days ago|

I was a user of DESQview and DESQview/X. It was like having a superpower. Especially in the days of very expensive UNIX workstations (which I could no way afford).

mark_l_watson 2 days ago||

It looks like this just runs on Nix? For decades I have enjoyed doing development remotely on leased servers or VPSs, living in tmux and Emacs. This project looks like a good direction for some types of developers. I would appreciate if they added a quick start guide with different options for getting started.

nunobrito 2 days ago||

What are the key commands to use this TUI?

Don't find details and trying the usual suspects didn't work.

Also, it was needed to install a missing library: sudo apt install libncursesw5-dev

JdeBP 2 days ago|

It is based upon AppCUI. Try using your mouse.

nxobject 2 days ago||

I'm noticing that desktop-tui - at least over ssh - oesn't handle terminal resizing/SIGWINCH. Let me cogitate on why this might be the case.

xk3 1 day ago||

Reminds me of vtm

https://github.com/directvt/vtm

Protostome 2 days ago|

I like the idea, but almost everyone needs a browser these days... Unless you work solo and don't need MS Teams/Google Meet/etc

sebtron 2 days ago||

There's browsh, a version of Firefox that renders in a terminal: https://www.brow.sh/

nxobject 2 days ago||

That's wonderful – I have a VPS where disk space is a premium; I'd rather stick to the terminal for any required browsing than install a minimal graphical environment on disk!

(A note to Ubuntu users that browsh is incompatible with the default snap distribution of Firefox; you'll have to install it from a PPA.)

moondev 1 day ago||

https://github.com/fathyb/carbonyl should be perfect for this

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