In case you don’t want to read my pedantic ramblings here’s the link…
Ya jerk
Rapid Environment Editor
All joking aside, it’s simple to use, no bloated UI, it’s functional for exactly it’s intended purpose.
The best part about the application is it’s almost entirely self explanatory. On the left is your system variables. On the right is your currently logged in user variables.
Don’t forget to click the restart as administrator button to be able to modify the system variables! I’m sure you wouldn’t miss that though ;P.
Here’s a snapshot in to the right click context menu.
As you can see in this immaculately illustrated screenshot. You pretty much have everything you need to continue on your way. You’ll select add variable to create the name, and add value to do just that as well.
Here’s the bottom bar. Inspector you saw in the initial screen shot. This is just a handy little cheat sheet.
This is under the options menu under “file”.
Still pretty minimalist following the design of the rest of the application. Which is entirely the right choice by the developer.
Honestly, I never ended up using this menu. So umm, have fun?
Anywhoooo.
You get some extra options available to you by selecting edit in the tob tabs.
(what are those tabs called again???)
For my purposes though my usage never really extended in to needing to use this. I’m fairly confident for the average user, it’ll be the same way. As well as an amazing feature! BACKUP! Whoo. i mean it’s probably not too complicated doing it manually. This is just nice and convenient.
Throw down a right click inside the boxes of either the User or System depending on your need to add variable.
After assigning the proper name you can add a variable and it has two convenient options for a single file selection or a directory. Or you can just start typing to input your own value.
Ahh gotta love the classic file browser.
Now here’s is the INCREDIBLE part!
Not really don’t get excited.
Seriously it’s going to be disappointing..
Warned you at least!!
Artistically draw your way over to the save button.
Woah.
Beautiful!
Alright here’s actually my favorite part about this simple little tool.
If for some reason the path is no longer accessible on your system. It’s impossible to miss the moment you open the application. In this instance i just deleted it manually.
Well that’s about all there is to it. I don’t think i could elaborate more on it if i tried.
Pedantic ramblings below this!
This is a perfect example to describe how simple tools can be better than feature rich. I believe that a lot of creators, beyond just the software development world. Fail to consider that the more features you add to something. The more complex in nature it becomes. Especially for your end users. It all boils down to the user interface. I’ve seen some excellently designed, feature rich, applications. That someone managed to just pull it off. Yet, this isn’t usually the case, nor will it ever be. It’s extremely important when developing software to focus just as much on how your end user will interact with the product. You can’t allow yourself to solely focus on what your product is capable of. You could design the most incredible application, loads of features that everyone would love. If they can’t intuitively navigate their way around your product though. Without needing to do extensive reading or being trained. Your product will fail, indefinitely. It’s an inevitable truth, the world doesn’t care about what your product can. They don’t care about all the effort you made, the time you invested, how passionate you are about it. What matters is how usable your product is.
In today’s world the expectation is for every software product to be intuitive enough to pick up and navigating around the product should be muscle memory. It’s a struggle of coming up with a concept novel enough that it attracts consumers and stands out from the already huge market of software. Yet it needs to be able to be used like it’s the same as every other product out there. It needs to feel as casual as an instant messaging platform. Yet capable enough to sustain an individual’s means of income. There is always going to be a company who can do it better, has more capably employees, and has the funds to supply that workforce.
Well uhhh, have fun!
And i’ll leave you with a depressing quote that doesn’t have to be.
“human beings are the most selfish of all. even when someone dies, you shed tears only because they are no longer around to provide you with whatever they had been for so long.”1
Yo i figured out a footnote! Also i got this from tumblr when i was much younger. Was posted by another users teacher apparently. It’s still an incredible quote that sounds so bleak. Yet you don’t need to let it be that way. No matter how fundamentally true it may be.
