[Bf-committers] Pupmenu conventions. (Was: CVScommit:blender/source/blender/src edit.c)

[Douglas Toltzman]

It sounds to me like Robert has covered all of the bases.  In this age of
ALU's that process millions or billions of instructions per second, it
seems silly to stick with a piece of code because it saves a few
instructions for the computer.  If the old users can use their familiar
keyboard shortcuts and we can improve the usability of blender for
everyone in the future, it just makes sense to do it.  Eventually, we're
going to run out of hot-keys, so we are going to have to deal with these
issues, whether we'd like to, or not.  A UI should work for a beginner,
however slowly, by offering hints and guides along the way, and should
allow the user to work faster as their experience level rises.  Since an
intuitive interace is probably out, given the complexity of 3D modeling,
we can at least work for consistancy.

BTW: I researched the namespace issue and discovered that C++ builds the
namespace into the symbol table of the object code, so the only namespace
we could declare would be our own, and we'd probably have to do it
throughout the codebase in order to make it work for us.  Given the size
of the codebase and the range of compilers we are using, this is obviously
not a practical solution.

I've met my income goal for the year, and I'm trying not to take on any
new projects right now, so I should be able to make a contribution to the
codebase soon.  I really appreciate all of the work you guys have been
doing on Blender.  I'm not generally one to stand on the sidelines, but
I'm afraid that's about all I've done this year.  I'm really excited about
this opportunity to get more involved in development.  After 20 years as a
professional software developer, I've got some skills to bring to the
table.

Douglas Toltzman