UserInterfaceRequirements.Imported @ jos.sf.net

General Features/Requirements

WindowingSystem should be written in 100% Pure java for the first release, meaning we can begin work on it NOW!!
Preferably both TUIs and GUIs should be segmented into two parts. See DocumentViewPattern. These sections allow for maximum reuse of code and stem from the same package (jos.ui - for example)
They should be swappable for the first release but 'hot swappable' in the future.
GUIs should be totally based on JFC/Swing using UIFactories for styling
Preferably GUIs should be based on the JFC segmentation model (found in JFC documentation)
L&F functionality directly from JFC/Swing

TimTaylor StefanBorg, 4 Nov 1997

-- IanDavis, 4 Nov 1997

I'm not a programmer, but i think i have an important issue to raise. I'll raise it here since it seems the most obvious place to post it. (Please redirect me if it's not.)

Having done a lot of word processing, spreadsheets, etc., in Arabic and other languages, i've come to feel that most systems came to handle right-to-left languages such as Arabic and Hebrew only as an afterthought. This has led to applications that perform sub-optimally in right-to-left mode. Even the (official) Arabic edition of Microsoft Word running under (official) Arabic Windows 95 does buggy things when you try to use a hyphen in a mixed text of Arabic and English. Other Windows programs often have problems with numeric input (which is left-to-right even in Arabic) and tabulation in right-to-left mode.

Also, the user should definitely have choices for keyboard layouts for different languages. What's more, they should be able to create their own keyboard layouts, as has been possible in all versions of WordPerfect since i started using it in DOS. Customizable keyboards allow users easy access to characters the programmer didn't think (s)he would need. Furthermore, not all users of a language are actually familiar with that language's standard keyboard. As many papers as i've written in French, i've done them all on a QWERTY keyboard layout optimized for Western European languages. (Frenchmen use an AZERTY keyboard, not QWERTY.)

In the same vein, Macintosh uses its own non-standard Arabic layout. (¡And boy is it a challenge to have to switch back and forth between the two!) Users should have choices in the layout they want to use. I imagine these are issues for several if not many other non-Roman alphabet languages.

Hope i haven't taken up too much space on this topic. But with Java's utilization of Unicode, JOS has the potential to be nternationalizable from the ground up.

02/14/98 (Happy Valentine's Day to all.)

LestonBuell
bulbul@ucla.edu

Leston, you sound like just the right person to help us internationalize JOS! We all welcome you to the JOS team.

BradNeuberg, 2/15/98

I'm really excited about this project. I only wish i new more about programming. (I am working on that.) I hope i can be of help. This would also give me a chance to learn more about writing system areas i'm not so savvy about, such as input systems for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean.

If anyone's interested looking at a keyboard mapping utility, i've always really liked the one used in WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS.

I'm interested in seeing how the SlangSoft Java multilingual text editor handles non-Roman languages. I'll be receiving a demo soon.

LestonBuell
02/15/98

I think Netscapes IFC, or a clone of, should be incorparated into the GUI, for total compatibility of nonJOS Applets and Applications

--DigiGod

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