> That GUI is more efficient because it limits you to navigation commands
While indeed limited, it’s not limited just to navigation. Here’s a GUI that appears when I press Alt+F7 in a GUI file manager: http://const.me/tmp/tc-find-gui.png
It exposes combined functionality of many Linux shell utilities: find, grep, lsattr, xargs, fdupes, iconv, mountavfs/fusermount, etc.
For example I click “{Alt}+(F7 r t) test {enter}” to find all files containing “test” in all files and subdirectories, including content of archives. That’s 9 key presses. Can you do equally efficient in a command line shell?
Not only it saves key presses, its also less stuff to remember and therefore much easier to use. I only need to remember Alt+F7, the rest is obvious because labels, and by convention, underlined letters in them mark {Alt}+{Letter} shortcuts. You don’t even need to use keyboard, mouse is even more accessible (but not touchscreens, for them entirely different GUI is required).
That screen is limited to navigation; having a different screen for other tools is also possible in the shell (using modes - like Vim). It has really nothing to do with being a GUI or not.
Can you do equally efficient in a command line shell?
Well, of course; that's what aliases are for.
Not only it saves key presses, its also less stuff to remember and therefore much easier to use.
No argument there; I was disagreeing with a specific point, not making a case for the overall superiority of the shell.
> It has really nothing to do with being a GUI or not.
That screen is not limited to navigation commands. By using keys other than enter, I can copy, rename, delete, e-mail, pack, etc. that de-whatever directory. Each of the operations would take just a couple extra key presses.
Technically you can do the almost same with TUI (but not CLI) but still less efficient because sometimes file icons and especially previews deliver valuable information to the user.
> Well, of course; that's what aliases are for.
How easy is gonna be to write a command for that alias that does same as “{Alt}+(F7 r t) something {enter}” in the above GUI? The GUI supports zip, rar, tar.gz, cab, and many others out of the box, plus plugins for other archives (I only have 7-zip).
Another thing, a single alias is not enough to replace the GUI, because behind that not so complex looking GUI there’s a functionality with 20 parameters just on the first tab page. Even if you’ll create that alt-f7-r-t alias, next day you’ll need to do same but search for UTF16 and/or regexp and/or case sensitive. How you’ll deal with the exponential explosion of complexity? With equally complex CLI with arguments like -rwe2hoc18m? Not many people use advanced searches every day, so memorizing the switches is not worth it. Most users will have two choices, read manual each time, or write commands instead of using that search alias. Both options are significantly slower than using Alt+F7 GUI screen.
> By using keys other than enter, I can copy, rename, delete, e-mail, pack, etc. that de-whatever directory. Each of the operations would take just a couple extra key presses.
The shell also uses keys other than enter; in fact, the enter is only use once per command :)
Some will be more efficient, others will be less. Copying a file in the same directory, for example, means pressing the first letters of its name, then CTRL+C, then CTRL+V, then F2 (or whatever "rename" is bound to), then the new name, then Enter. In the shell, it's "cp ", then the first letters, then Tab, then the new name, then Enter. Not really that different.
> How easy is gonna be to write a command for that alias that does same as “{Alt}+(F7 r t) something {enter}” in the above GUI?
From what I can tell, that operation does the equivalent of "grep -R something ." no? Why would that be hard to write an alias for?
> The GUI supports zip, rar, tar.gz, cab, and many others out of the box, plus plugins for other archives (I only have 7-zip).
You can use 7z on the shell to do the same. Why would you think that's specific to the presentation mode?
> Another thing...
You keep insisting on discussing the overall merits of the shell vs GUI. I told I'm not interested in that, I was only disagreeing with a specific point. Yes, the GUI is more discoverable, I already wrote "no argument there".
I know, and I was answering to your statement “That screen is limited to navigation”. It’s not.
> that operation does the equivalent of "grep -R something ." no?
No. With “search archives” checked you can run that in a directory with multiple archives of different types, some of them containing other nested archives, it’ll recursively unpack everything (in a streaming manner, without wasting HDD with temporary files), and produce a list of files (possibly files inside these archives) containing that text.
Technically you can use 7z+others, write a huge script to combine them together for similar functionality, but it’ll take hours to develop.
While indeed limited, it’s not limited just to navigation. Here’s a GUI that appears when I press Alt+F7 in a GUI file manager: http://const.me/tmp/tc-find-gui.png
It exposes combined functionality of many Linux shell utilities: find, grep, lsattr, xargs, fdupes, iconv, mountavfs/fusermount, etc.
For example I click “{Alt}+(F7 r t) test {enter}” to find all files containing “test” in all files and subdirectories, including content of archives. That’s 9 key presses. Can you do equally efficient in a command line shell?
Not only it saves key presses, its also less stuff to remember and therefore much easier to use. I only need to remember Alt+F7, the rest is obvious because labels, and by convention, underlined letters in them mark {Alt}+{Letter} shortcuts. You don’t even need to use keyboard, mouse is even more accessible (but not touchscreens, for them entirely different GUI is required).