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	Mon, 1 Sep 1997 21:45:16 +0200 (CEST)
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Date: Mon, 1 Sep 1997 21:45:16 +0200
From: Peter Korsten <peter@grendel.IAEhv.nl>
To: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: sysinstall (was Re: Conclusion to "NT vs. Unix" debate)
References: <7098.873094588@time.cdrom.com> <199709011221.IAA19858@chai.torrentnet.com>
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In-Reply-To: <199709011221.IAA19858@chai.torrentnet.com>; from Bakul Shah on Mon, Sep 01, 1997 at 08:21:55AM -0400
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Bakul Shah shared with us:
>
> [extensive explanation of frames ommited]
>
> PS:  Frames were first described in a 1975 paper by Marvin
> Minsky -- I believe you can get a scanned copy of this paper
> from some mit site.  They are also described in some Lisp
> books.  Frames are almost always implemented in Lisp but I
> see no reason why they can't be implemented in other
> languages or why such a rich data structure should be left
> alone for the use of AI heads :-)  In C you can't define
> functions on the fly but that should not be a problem in tcl
> or perl.

This reminds me of the Installer on the Amiga. It had some sort of
Lisp-like language with an awful lot of parentheses.

At the start you (usually) could choose to actually install or
pretend to install (for the paranoid among us) and choose one of
three levels: beginner, intermediate or expert. The programmer of
the installer script could choose to disable some of these options.

The sequence then looked somewhat like the wizards that came since
Windows 95, except for the 'Previous' and 'Next' buttons. As the
programmer, you could implements buttons, lists, text boxes, check-
boxes, radio buttons and file requesters. The contents could come
from an external sources, like a list of devices.

It was implemented with the standard Amiga gadgets (widgets), but
could as well have been implemented with a text display in mind.

This frames approach sounds like a good approach to me.

- Peter