[plt-scheme] slideshow, sound

On Mar 3, 2008, at 8:03 AM, Matthew Flatt wrote:

> At Mon, 3 Mar 2008 07:04:03 -0700, Richard Cleis wrote:
>>> I think Slideshow will have to provide a new hook --- or some  
>>> general
>>> API to mediate the slide content and the slide viewer --- to make  
>>> that
>>> work.
>>
>> What about Slide Show GUI's?  Many applications in a laboratory
>> require only elementary UI's, but they have so many features that a
>> user's manual is paradoxically required.  Furthermore, many
>> organizations are (for better or worse) driven by power point
>> slides.  I'd like to make Slide Show Presentations that fit that
>> paradigm (for better or worse), yet operators could stop on a slide
>> near relevant material and run the equipment.  A few years ago, I
>> 'discovered' the thunk button in Slideshow and sent a few messages
>> (over a socket) to run equipment.  That satisfied the geek in me, but
>> more interaction is required.
>
> This much should already work fairly well with clickback picts, since
> you can get access to the whole `scheme/gui' (i.e., MrEd) toolbox in
> the callback function. In fact, the motivation behind an early version
> of Slideshow was to enable a talk about MrEd, where I use MrEd
> interactively during the talk.
>
> The missing piece is being able to control and reflect on the state of
> the viewer window that's showing the slides.

Is there a fundamental reason that would make it a waste of time for  
me to try to add the missing piece?

On the other hand, it might make more sense to figure out how to make  
UIs create slideshow pages (and Scribble, but that's for a different  
kind of user.)

Current operator interfaces are typically limited to running some  
sort of separate context for information; this a problem since  
attention can be diverted from the operations software, but  
communication does not always exist between the operations and  
information (to halt motion, for example.)  Another idiom is 'mouse- 
over' pop-ups.  However, one cannot learn to play chess, for example,  
simply by mousing-over the pieces to see what they do...

What I have in mind is more 'web-link-ish': slides that lead  
operators through learning processes to portions of UIs.  Eventually,  
they hit a slide that lets them do what they need... or get to the  
last slide which lets them do everything.

Which approach seems more likely to succeed... a UI that makes  
slides, or a slide show that 'interfaces users?'

rac


>
> Matthew
>