h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

*chuckles* ... Reminds me of my Dad while we were searching for the first machine. He did that at the stores.

(Thank goodness, only I was around to see it. )

Might I suggest (in the absence of a "go to where I haven't read" option) that we move any active conversations in this thread to new ones?

Oi! I'll second that! This is a MESS!

One person I know was given a computer by her brother. She was fine until it came to needing to go out - she couldn't work out how to turn it off and didn't dare/want to leave it on. So she phoned me. After many questions I ascertained it was Windows 95 TM and so told her how to use the Start button and shut down. She did so and got the customary blank screen as the computer powered down automatically but the monitor remained on. So she pressed the power button on the monitor AND the power button on the computer. She subsequently phoned me again because the computer was making funny noises and the power light was on. It took me ages to work out what had happened and then to convince her that the computer was able to turn off its own power, and that she should not press the power button, but that she did need to turn the monitor off, and finally I got her to shut down and turn off the monitor.
Weeks later, I was visiting her and she was using her computer; when it was time to go out, she just turned off her monitor. I asked her if she was going to shut down, and she said that she thought she had! Another half hour explaining the difference...

If it's any help, I'll third it, and I am unanimous about that!

Yes, Ms Slokum.

Isn't that "Mrs Slocombe?"

We could always transfer to the F&S entry. So it's farewell to this thread.

No more will I go to Blandford Forum and Mortehoe
On the slow train from Midsomer Norton and Mumby Road
...

For some good views on "stupid users", read "The Inmates Are Running the Asylum" by Alan Cooper and "The Design Of Everyday Things" by Donald Norman. Designers of computer-based things make heavy demands on the intelligence of users. They could choose to design for interaction simplicity, but don't, because they think everyone should be as "computer literate" as they are. Also, designing good interactions requires more work of the programmer, who generally organises his software product to make his own life as a developer easier. It's a form of nascent fascism to demand great expertise of users, when these gadgets are supposed to be for our everyday convenience. Stuff you buy shouldn't humiliate, infuriate and intimidate you, whether or not you're proud of your innumeracy!

The fragrant honeysuckle
spirals clockwise to the sun
and many other creepers do the sam
while somne climb anticlokwise
the bindweed doe, for one,
or convolvulus to give her proper name


Have you ever heard the recording of the Grand Prix do Rock, with Peter Ustinov and others?

Speaking as a software developer, we don't all design interfaces like that because we want to. Sometimes it's historical (e.g, retaining some level of compatibility with an earlier interface). Sometimes the interfaces come out badly because that's what we were told to write, either by the customer or by our management. Sometimes we just don't have the time to put into developing a really good interface.

Personally, I have only been involved in one project where the software team (at that time I was it) created a prototype, showed it to the users and asked, 'Is this what you need?' The users were amazed at being asked, but very pleased, and had some really good feedback.

So, please don't blame the designers. Yes, some of them out there couldn't design a blank piece of paper, and there are others who have never been trained in good interface design. But there are also a lot of us out there who would love to do things right but never get the opportunity!

PS a number of us have agreed that this thread has got too long and complex. How about posting your response on 'Stupid users II'?

Sorry, friend Bat, I missed this post in the rambling chaos which is this thread

Open the KeyCaps applet, choose your current font (whatever it may be) and then hold down the modifier keys - Command/Apple, Option/Alt, Control and so on - watch the display change to reflect the characters you will get. Note that some appear with grey boxes round them, for example E. Going Option E latches the acute accent, so then if you type another letter which can have an acute accent (such as I) you will get the acute.

All of which sounds far more complex than it is

To get é, press Option+E, E. To get í press Option+E, I. You remember most of the common modifiers fairly quickly.

On some newer PCs you can type Ctrl+Alt+E for é, but à is still Alt-0224, and ì is Alt-0236 - they are in a fairly unpredictable order. The result is you end up going to Character Map every time, whereas on the Mac you usually get it on the first guess

SUII? Where's the fun in that?

I think you are partly right and partly wrong about programmers and interface design. There is a substantial body of programmers (and web designers for that matter) for whom the technical cleverness of an effect is of more importance than ease of use or clarity. They *know* how the software works, so making it simpler is just not a priority.

back SUII but maybe a 'Arrogant IS "Expert"' thread as well. I work in a large UK government organization and am a "user" ie I do not work for our over staffed, largely overpaid, IS organisation who seem to think we are there to provide them with work, not the other way around. Added to theis there are many "contractors" earning well over the ammount our Chief Executive pays himself, who have been around for 5+ years. All officially their own companies and therefore bending the tax rules to breaking point.

I know for a fact that I can do as good as if not better job than a lot of them. Indeed have writen applications that have now got 100+ users in my spare time.

The general attitude has in the past (it's slowly changing) is that users can just about manage to switch on a PC and thats about it. There is very liitle encouragement to users to actually be told basic stuff like run scandisk once n a while, good file management, how to recover deleted network files without puting in help desk calls. If most users were told these things they would actually do them. Bearing in mind at least half of our staff our Degree educated.

Cheers, see you on SUII, if it happens.

CH

These are the people I was on about when I said that some couldn't design a blank piece of paper and some hadn't had the right training. The first lot don't want to do it right and the second lot don't know how to.

I am speaking as a software developer too. Read the books. You are one of the software designers who there is still hope for, by the sound of you. Join the righteous. Check out www.cooper.com too.

It has happened:

http://www.h2g2.com/forumframe.cgi?MESSAGES[(THREADID*23234?forumid*19585)THREADS[(THREADID*23234?forumid*19585?subset*0)#

I'm not arrogant. I'm RIGHT

3:-þ

*ahem*

You are here:

X

http://www.h2g2.com/forumframe.cgi?MESSAGES[(THREADID*23234?forumid*19585)THREADS[(THREADID*23234?forumid*19585?subset*0)#

This is the same industry that releases products before they're finished, must release "Patches" for bug-fixes, and, in the case of Microsoft, designs products that are mutually incompatible generationally....in addition to being unneccessarily difficult to use.

Did you ever read of GM's rebuttal to Bill Gates' remarks at the Comdex Conference several years ago?


Fruitbat