UNABLE TO GET IDLE TO RUN

[Terry Reedy]

On 11/1/2015 11:17 AM, Laura Creighton wrote:

> In a message of Mon, 02 Nov 2015 01:27:23 +1100, "Steven D'Aprano" writes
> a reply to Michael Overtoon:

He was actually responding to my proposal to warn about duplicating 
stdlib names when saving-as.

>> Users are inclined to ignore alerts, dialogs and error messages, and
>> applications try very, very hard to reinforce that tendency.
>
> http://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/4518/should-alert-boxes-be-avoided-at-any-cost

I read this and at least some of the concerns do not apply.

* IDLE does not spam users with alerts.  And I may move some of the rare 
ones to a new 'log' window. The only one I see with any regularity is 
'Save work before close?' and that I appreciate.

* 'Save-as' is not part of the regular workflow.  It is done once per 
file.  Experienced users who know to avoid stdlib names will not see the 
messages unless they accidentally duplicate one -- which is possible 
because there are now so many.  I personally would like being warned.

* The target of the message is naive beginners who have not read any 
docs and who may not yet even know about the stdlib and imports.  The 
*need* the info and may not be so jaded about alert messages.

One person suggested something I thought about: make the 'right thing' 
box bigger than the 'dangerous thing' box.

>> Good to see that IDLE is going to continue that fine old tradition of
>> degrading usability for the sake of a quick and easy non-solution to a
>> problem.

Doing nothing is also a non-solution.

> I have a professional carreer based on saying 'do not blather useless
> error/warning messages' at people.  I am pretty much always on your
> side of the argument.  But, here we are, first time in 22 years, and
> I am here arguing in _favour_ of a warning message. :)

Knowing that you are not a fan of such things makes your request stronger.

 > I very much want to convince Michael that my warning will be
 > sufficient,

If the message works half the time, I would consider it successful.

 > thus preventing people from writing out strings.py is unnecessary.

I will not absolutely prevent duplicate names unless Guido says to do so.

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy