[beachstartup]

> We (BitKeeper folks) did our GUI interfaces in Tcl/Tk years ago because it meant we could have one gui person and get the same gui tools on Windows, Mac, Unix, and Linux. Yes, somewhat clunky (less so over the years), but as a small start up it was great not having to have a developer for each platform, both for initial coding and for ongoing maintenance.

hey, that describes my very first development job! i wrote a cross-platform tcl-based installer for a desktop application at the first company (a small startup) i ever worked for. it was really easy to write (i was literally 17 years old) and there were fairly solid libraries for doing windows-y registry-ish things and unixey install things too. one of the senior guys on the team took my code and integrated it into their cross-compiled build system and it spat out a very decent product that helped our users install the program on i think 3 or 4 different platforms (win95, linux/X, and solaris, possibly HPUX or some other weird platform). that was my very first significant contribution to any software project.

i seem to remember that at the time the shrinkwrapped installer licenses cost $10's of thousands for commercial use. it probably took about 60-80 hours of my time at $17.50 an hour... clearly a bargain.