Ever since the 80's, I've been appalled at how many people actually think the click-and-wait interface (GUI) is superior to the command line. I suspect that can be explained by most of them never having used any shell other than the atrocious DOS window, but it still amazes.
So I'm pleased to report that I found a very interesting blog post that I could identify with heartily. Here's a sample:
I do believe that command line will never die.
Take a look in TRANSMISSION, a bittorrent client.
It has daemon, library, command line use and graphical interface(both for QT and GTK).
Well, both GUI camp and CLI camp would love it. I think than every human "need" shell be in the 4th(of TRANSSMISION) or at least as library(so other developers can extend it to UI).
I'm a developer, and using common CLI, because I think it's easier for me to perform my own made scripts("compile"), and so on...
97% of my time on my Debian machine, a GNOME/Xfce terminal is opening, and if not, or I want do something in background, I can always type F9, and then Compiz Fusion widget layer is displayed. A command line waits for me(the cairo-dock CLI) whenever I need it.
I think a combination of GUI and CLI is the best approach.
Even when today GUI is getting smarter(multi-touch and full body), it's always recommended to save an icon in the panel for command line.
It depends on your vantage point. In our office we would get very little work done if we did not have a terminal window on top of our desktop environment, ie we need both. For end users, it is an uphill battle to ask them to use a CLI only.
Hi.
Along the same line, an essay: http://www.cryptonomicon.com/command.zip at C R Y P T O N O M I C O N by Neal Stephenson ... cheers, drl