From: Peter Castine ()
Date: May 17, 2008
Subject:
Re: Re: Max5 == Physical Pain
Rounded corners for object boxes seems to be a Grundsatzentscheidung... a fundamental decision. One might want to call it a religious decision or, in less loaded terms, a philosophical decision.
I have gathered, from some comments David Z. made, that one of his concerns was the basic problems beginners have in grasping the distinction between object and message. From many years of teaching, I can only say the man has a point. This is definitely one of the big hurdles for beginners, and the most common mistake I see are messages written inside object boxes & vice versa. You can explain the difference until you're blue in the face, but people just need time to absorb it. For some people it takes a _lot_ of time.
So, Max5 is aiming to optically underscore the distinction by giving object boxes and message boxes clearly different looks. Not a bad idea at all. The distinctive characteristics are also immutable... which is what the experienced users are complaining about.
I dunno... I just can't get het up about the change in the look. And I wonder if people would be anywhere near as upset if Max had always had rounded corners on object boxes. No one is complaining about the change from two thin lines top/bottom to a colored 3-pixel frame all around.
Anyway, it seems that the resolve at C74 for a "pure" object-box-has-rounded-corners design is hard as granite. Zen teaches that attacking granite with a sword of steel only breaks the steel. On the other hand, running water over the granite will, eventually, wear a hole through the stone. It just takes a while. A word to the wise.
-- P.
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Peter Castine
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