thanks for your input, fletcher

[Bowerbird at aol.com]

hey fletcher, thanks for your input here.        :+)

and -- quite obviously -- your program will be
whatever it is that _you_ think that it should be.

of course.

the thing is, i am certain that i have been clear
that the feature that i believe will be "killer" is
on-the-fly formatted display.   that's my stand.

and i'd say my reasoning has been equally clear,
namely that this will make markup dirt-simple.
the feedback loops were heretofore too indirect,
too far removed between writing and rendering.

based on the reception "marked" has received,
it's plain to see my belief is essentially correct.

but "marked" involves a workflow with two apps,
so although the feedback is now more _speedy_,
it's still more obtuse and clumsy than necessary.

consolidation into one app solves that problem.

and i'd believed -- based on your early betas --
that that was the approach that you were taking.

and i made a fair number of posts here that were
written with that assumption playing a major part.

so it seems to me that if i was mistaken in that,
you could have informed everyone here earlier...

but hey, no harm, no foul.   composer is what it is.
and it will be what it will be.   best of luck with it...

but _i_ am still disappointed with it.

because it lacks the feature that i consider "killer".

i bought it to review, so i'm not really "a customer",
and i can't say that i'd be a disappointed customer
if i was, because there's a lot that i like in the app...
and due to that, i still give it good word-of-mouth.

but as a light-markup fan, who'd hoped "composer"
would zoom acceptance of markdown, i'm just a bit
disappointed that this first version is so lackluster,
at least compared to what i was expecting from it...

but i continue to hope that it continues its successes.

and if you won't bring the killer-feature to markdown,
i hope somebody else will...   again, no harm, no foul...

***

having said all that, let's resolve a few stragglers...

fletcher said:

>    Nope --- it takes a single keystroke to display. 


that's weird...   because on my copy, the shortcut to
summon up the preview window is control-apple-p,
which the fingers of my hand count as a three keys.
three hard-to-remember overloaded keys to boot...



>    I've never found it useful 

>    to have an "as I type" preview. 


i have.   i've found it to be _tremendously_ useful.

well, i prefer if there's a slight delay in the update,
so it doesn't trigger _while_ i'm writing, but rather
after any pause, the length of which is user-chosen.

(does anyone here remember the "showdown" site?)



>    I've never found it useful 

>    to have an "as I type" preview. 

>    Therefore it's not in Composer.


again, it woulda been nice if you told us that sooner.



>    Again, plenty of other apps offer this 

>    if that's what you want. 


they do?   who?   where?   i would _love_ to see them.



>    If you use Marked for your preview, 

>    which is the preferred method


it's not _my_ "preferred method".



>    since Marked is much more detailed 

>    of a preview app than Composer will ever be


ok.   if you say so.   you know what your plans are.
and what they are not.   so i have to believe you...

but you're killing what could be your killer-feature.
in my opinion.   (do i really need to add that phrase?)



>    Nope. Just use the key command 

>    any time you want an update. 


yeah, i see that (just as i hoped) i was wrong there.

it's because i sometimes had "marked" activated,
unbeknownst to me, and that was confusing me...



>    If you're working on a long document, 

>    it's not realistic to expect an as you type live preview

>    - the performance just won't be there.


i'll wait to challenge you on this assertion until i see
just exactly how well my app works in such situations.

but all the evidence i have so far indicates to me that
i can make things workable, with trick or two or three.



>    Perhaps you were expecting a different application?


um, well yes, that's exactly the point i've been making.

i've been expecting an app that did on-the-fly display.



>    these are the "killer features" 

>    for which Composer was designed.


like i said, they're nice.   i wouldn't call 'em "killer",
but they are nice, and you implemented them well.

and they'll appeal to people who are markdown-savvy.

but an app that does on-the-fly display in real-time
will make markdown appeal to _everybody_else_too_.
and that is a _much_much_ bigger audience of people.

which is precisely why _that_ feature will be _killer_...



>    Composer is about the writing, not the previewing.


sometime in the future, you'll realize that's a mistake.

-bowerbird
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