[H-GEN] User interfaces (Hi Doug)

[Harry Phillips]

My dream is to one day have MS go out of business, I am the local MS hater at
work (there's always one isn't there?) One guy was impressed with the profit MS
posted ($19billion from memory) I said that's because they are bleeding the
industry for as much as they can by suppling the crappiest products possible.

One point I always lose on and it made me think back to Doug Young's gripe about
*nix's is that users just want to use the computer as a tool to get a job done.
Linux and the like don't allow them to do that very well, not without ALOT of in
depth reading and analysis anyway. 

Most of the responses to Dougs query were of a technical nature but didn't
solve his problem. What Doug was looking for I believe was a step by step guide
to his problem and these are few and far between. I setup the same thing as
Doug wanted to do and had to read about a dozen HOWTO's before I was able to do
what I wanted.

The user interfaces need to be developed ALOT more before it will be widely
accepted. They need to be designed from the users point of view.

Image that you walk into a high rise hotel and walk up to the lifts and all
it has is an arrow pointing down? The lifts open and you have two buttons one
to the left, the other pointing right and a counter?

"But of course" says the concierge "you want the the lift to come down to you.
Then you want the drum to turn to the left or right to make you go up and
down. The counter is for how many floors"

Is that lift a bad design? No, it's user interface is developed from the lifts
point of view not the users. Linux and others (if they want to become more wide
spread) will have to have the user interface designed such that the user needs
minimal training (they will always require some) and be able to type up a
letter without having to go to Uni and studying for 4 years.

Regards
Harry

--


"My train of thought is a runaway"
	Calvin and Hobbes
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