[Tfug] Speaking of desktops (little 'd')...

[Paul Lemmons]

Bexley Hall wrote:
> What are the "inexcusable sins" encountered in current
> "user interfaces" (sorry for the imprecision but intend that
> to encompass all sorts of interactive devices).
>
> E.g., highest on my Piss List is "never steal the focus".
> *I* should decide what I am interacting with, not "the
> machine".
>
> Aside from that, other "PC desktop" (windowed environments)
> issues that I'm undecided about include things like
> - focus follows cursor (in some cases, I like this; at
>   other times, it is a nuisance.  Maybe the application
>   should convey this to the window manager as a 'preference'?)
> - auto raise when in focus (I consider this A Bad Idea in
>   almost all circumstances)
>
> I also dislike having menus, toolbars, etc. *in* the application
> windows.  I liked the way the old MacOS handled this -- though
> I suspect that it has gone away in OS X (?)
>
> But, what about the other "channels" used to convey information
> to the user.  E.g., should any app be able to "make noise"
> whenever it wants?  Or, should the noises that it is allowed to
> make be tied to where the user's focus resides?  Etc.
>
> --don
>   

I have stayed out of the war on whether Mac's rule , Linux is dead and 
long live an obscure spin-off of BSD absurdity. If we are not careful 
this will wad up like that thread did. I think that there is an 
important point that is being missed here, though. It may have been 
addressed in the afore mentioned thread but I quit reading after a 
while. That point is that there is an ephemeral and elusive element 
required to create the perfect desktop, user interface, OS, whatever, 
that simply does not exist. That is a complete knowledge and complete 
respect of a user's preference.

For example (Not to pick on Don, the example just happens to be handy):

"...highest on my [] List is "never steal the focus"..." 

is a preference. It is not a natural law. There are no physics to say 
that this is the way it should be. It is the way Don thinks. Don is 
absolutely and unequivocally right, but only for Don and the people that 
agree with him. Personally it drove me crazy when I upgraded from GG to 
HH. In GG when I clicked on a link in T-Bird it would whisk me over to 
the browser on another screen to show me my results. In HH it quit doing 
that. It would open the page in FF but I had click to it to see it. I am 
as happy as a clam in the sand that II has brought this feature back.

So, one of us, Don or I will most likely be unhappy because one of us is 
not going to get what we want. What is a programmer to do? We can offer 
configuration options. But wait, my wife hates having to configure every 
little thing. Ok, a theme? Maybe but there will be elements that the 
designer thought made perfect sense and I think are the dumbest thing 
since candy cigarettes. Programmers do try hard but it is not a battle 
that can actually be won.

Approaching this from the other side, as a user, I can ask the same 
question. What is a user to do? The answer I give is find what you like 
and use it. My wife chose Windows. It would be a very poor choice for 
me. She likes it. It is right for her. I like kubuntu. I am even getting 
to where I like KDE4. I have one son that likes Vista and another that 
likes OSX. (I thought I raised them better ;-)). Every one of these 
people are intelligent people who have made their choices based on what 
they like; not something that can be quantified and measured.

I have used all of those systems myself. They all have strengths and 
weaknesses. Some I like more than others. None of them are "wrong". I am 
not sure there truly really *is* a "right" and "wrong". I do, however, 
think there is a "Like" and "Dislike" and no amount of math, science or 
in-depth studies, education, evangelism, brow-beating or name calling 
will ever change that.

This turned out to be more of a rant than I had intended when I started 
it so I am going to top. My apologies. All I really wanted to say is I 
like what I like and for the life of me I could not tell you why. I can 
say that most of my choices are not based on technological reasoning.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: smime.p7s
Type: application/x-pkcs7-signature
Size: 3296 bytes
Desc: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature
URL: <http://tfug.org/pipermail/tfug_tfug.org/attachments/20081111/8948421b/attachment-0002.bin>