----- Original Message -----
From: "James Jones" <james@freedomnet.co.nz>
Well said. I write scripts all day long to perform automation on networking equipment. A device needs to have a CLI, but if you have a GUI too make for darn sure that I can access all features in either one.
It is a relatively well established (though not always *followed*) principle of software design that you should build a CLI that can do everything, and then *build your GUI on top of that*. Among other things, this design pattern makes it easy to capture the commands generated by a GUI session, and script them for later use. Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth Baylink jra@baylink.com Designer The Things I Think RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates http://baylink.pitas.com 2000 Land Rover DII St Petersburg FL USA http://photo.imageinc.us +1 727 647 1274