ANN: 'twander' 2.29 Released

[Tim Daneliuk]

'twander' 2.29 is released and available at:

        http://www.tundraware.com/Software/twander/

What Is "twander"?
------------------
"twander" is a Filesystem Browser which runs on both Unix-like systems
as well as Win32 systems.  It embraces the best ideas of both similar
GUI-driven programs (Konqueror, Windows Explorer) as well as
text-based interfaces (Midnight Commander, List, Sweep).

Why Is "twander" Different?
---------------------------
While the "twander" interface is graphical, all the major navigation,
selection, and execution commands can be entered from the keyboard,
not just the mouse.  This means Power Users who are strong typists can
minimize dependency on the mouse and materially speed up their
interactions with the system.

Moreover, unlike the other programs, "twander" does not have a
built-in set of commands (which typically cannot be changed).
Instead, "twander" supports a rich macro configuration language for
virtually limitless user-definition of commands.  The configuration
language provides a simple mechanism for communicating the list of
items currently selected in the GUI to the user-defined commands.

Each user is thus free to configure a command set unique and
appropriate to their needs.  As with the navigation commands,
user-defined commands can be invoked with either the keyboard (a
single keystroke) or the mouse (a menu selection).


Who Might Like "twander"?
------------------------
1) People who type well and find the mouse a distraction when working.

2) People who want to customize the commands available in their file
    browser to do things *their* way instead of the way the browser
    wants to do things.

3) People who wish to provide their less technical colleagues with a
    tool that has a limited set of "canned" features.  For instance, it
    would be trivial to use "twander" to automate ftp transfers for use
    by non-technical administrative staff.

4) People interested in the inner workings of a Python/Tkinter
    program.  The entire program is written in Python using the Tkinter
    GUI modules and is extensively commented throughout.  Additional
    program documentation is provided in Unix 'man' format, PostScript,
    html, and plain text.

5) Oddly, and as an unintended side-effect of the original design,
    "twander" will serve the visually-impaired very well.  Colors, font
    type, size, & weight, and window size can all be trivially set on
    the "twander" command line.  So, for instance, it is quite easy to
    run the program with very large fonts, thus improving readability.


Program Requirements
--------------------
"twander" runs on Unix-like systems (FreeBSD, Linux) as well as a
variety of Win32 systems.  It requires the presence of Python 2.2
(or later) and the associated Tkinter support for the target
system.  These are freely available from:

          http://www.python.org

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk
tundra at tundraware.com