Another Debian based distribution

Raphael Hertzog

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Jul 8, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/8/99

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Hi people,

FYI I've just read on a french web site dedicated to linux news
that there's a new Debian GNU/Linux based distribution.

It's called Stormix and it's here :
http://www.stormix.com

And they have developed a tool that can run in both console and X11 mode
using a special language (SIL) which describes the interface ...

There are screenshots of the install process :
http://www.stormix.com/about/screen_shots.html

Everything is GPLed so we may take a close look at it and use things
that we find good ... the people working on the graphical installation
in particular.

And something amusing, their logo is also a kind of swirl in 3D. :)

Cheers,
--
Hertzog Raphaël >> 0C4CABF1 >> http://prope.insa-lyon.fr/~rhertzog/

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R Garth Wood

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, Raphael Hertzog wrote:

> Hi people,
>
> FYI I've just read on a french web site dedicated to linux news
> that there's a new Debian GNU/Linux based distribution.
>
> It's called Stormix and it's here :
> http://www.stormix.com
>
> And they have developed a tool that can run in both console and X11 mode
> using a special language (SIL) which describes the interface ...

Close, Simple Interface Language. I have produced a spec for SIL 2.0 but
it's not quite finished. Check out our web site in a few weeks time
for more info.

> There are screenshots of the install process :
> http://www.stormix.com/about/screen_shots.html
>
> Everything is GPLed so we may take a close look at it and use things
> that we find good ... the people working on the graphical installation
> in particular.
>
> And something amusing, their logo is also a kind of swirl in 3D. :)

Purely coincedence, actually. We had ours 1st, though! :>

Jason Gunthorpe

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, R Garth Wood wrote:

> On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, Raphael Hertzog wrote:
>
> > And they have developed a tool that can run in both console and X11 mode
> > using a special language (SIL) which describes the interface ...
>
> Close, Simple Interface Language. I have produced a spec for SIL 2.0 but
> it's not quite finished. Check out our web site in a few weeks time
> for more info.

Is this a general GUI tool or is it just a fancy 'dialog' program for use
by shell scripts?

Jason

R Garth Wood

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, Jason Gunthorpe wrote:

> > > using a special language (SIL) which describes the interface ...
> >
> > Close, Simple Interface Language. I have produced a spec for SIL 2.0 but
> > it's not quite finished. Check out our web site in a few weeks time
> > for more info.
>
> Is this a general GUI tool or is it just a fancy 'dialog' program for use
> by shell scripts?

It's very general. You can use it with perl C shell, anything that
has a "print to stdout". One of the design parameters is that
it would be able to draw an interface using any language.
Think of it as a superset of html. html is static while
with the Storm Administration System(SAS) you can have a
dymanic interface. SIL 2.0 will have an html widget.

Here's a quick example:

# this and everything after '#' on this line is a comment
window("w"); # create a window object 'w'
w:title("Hello SIL"); # set the title attribute of w
button("w.b"); # create a button 'w.b'. note "the object path"
w.b:label("Hello World!");
show(w.b); # note that we do not have to specify where w.b should be packed
show(w);
display(); # tells the display to "flush" the changes to the screen

Also you connect over the network. This means that you can install
or administer over the network(not in the alpha).
I am currently adding SSL support to SAD(Storm Administrative Daemon).

Stormix will be telling all as it where at the July 19th VanLUG
meeting. I hope to have a pretty functional SILamp(ala winamp)
then.

Let's see dialog do all that!

Joey Hess

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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R Garth Wood wrote:
> # this and everything after '#' on this line is a comment
> window("w"); # create a window object 'w'
> w:title("Hello SIL"); # set the title attribute of w
> button("w.b"); # create a button 'w.b'. note "the object path"
> w.b:label("Hello World!");
> show(w.b); # note that we do not have to specify where w.b should be packed
> show(w);
> display(); # tells the display to "flush" the changes to the screen

So what happens if you want to make UI elements that are linked? Ie, you
check this check box and this other text input box that was inactivated
becomes active. Or you type an IP address in one text box, and another text
box is updated on the fly with a calculated default gateway. Is this type of
thing doable with SIL? If so, it's a great step forward. If not, it is
identical in capabilities to the Debian configuration management protocol
documented at http://debian.org/~wakkerma/config6/

--
see shy jo

R Garth Wood

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Jul 9, 1999, 3:00:00 AM7/9/99

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On Fri, 9 Jul 1999, Joey Hess wrote:

> R Garth Wood wrote:
> > # this and everything after '#' on this line is a comment
> > window("w"); # create a window object 'w'
> > w:title("Hello SIL"); # set the title attribute of w
> > button("w.b"); # create a button 'w.b'. note "the object path"
> > w.b:label("Hello World!");
> > show(w.b); # note that we do not have to specify where w.b should be packed
> > show(w);
> > display(); # tells the display to "flush" the changes to the screen
>
> So what happens if you want to make UI elements that are linked? Ie, you
> check this check box and this other text input box that was inactivated
> becomes active. Or you type an IP address in one text box, and another text
> box is updated on the fly with a calculated default gateway. Is this type of
> thing doable with SIL? If so, it's a great step forward. If not, it is
> identical in capabilities to the Debian configuration management protocol
> documented at http://debian.org/~wakkerma/config6/

If you clicked on the checkbox and there was a signal attached
to that event a signal would be sent to your application
but no signal is sent otherwise(to conserve bandwidth,
SIL is meant to be networked).
Your application could then update the interface like so:

text_input:config(inactive); # set the text inactive
display(); # flush the changes to the display.

Note that this signal is not implemented yet. You must understand
that time to market IS an issue for us. Features
like this will get done but on a "as needed" basis.
Look for this and other features in SL 2.0 . Probably
next year this time.