SciTE, GUIs, desktop real estate

[Gavin Wraith <gavin@...>]

I apologize if this is the wrong forum for this post - it should
be the SciTE interest group, but that involves joining a Google
group, something that I have so far managed to avoid.

As a dedicated Lua user, and as a newcomer to Windows XP, I have been
delighted by SciTE, especially its configurability by Lua scripts.
But the Windows version has a fundamental drawback (I do not know
if versions on other platforms suffer the same): you can only view
one file at a time. I say "view", not "open". The whole purpose of a
desktop GUI is to be able to read information from various sources
simultaneously. I do not want to obscure the window in which I am
writing when I am consulting information in other windows; I need
to see all of them, at once. Lots of text-editors for Windows seem
to deny the purpose of a desktop in this way. Why is this?

Another gripe is the hypertrophied toolbar which takes up valuable screen
real estate. Maybe this can be configured, so that all the Lua-debugging
tools only appear when I want them? As tiny notebooks and handheld
computers become more popular, screen real-estate, and its sensible
economic use according to the wishes of the user, will become more
precious. Perhaps we might even get away from the jumbo-jet-cockpit
syndrome that seems to afflict most Windows applications? Less is more.

-- 
Gavin Wraith (gavin@wra1th.plus.com)
Home page: http://www.wra1th.plus.com/