Usability is the difference between finishing a task in a few minutes with a low but reasonable learning curve, and spending hours without the ability to finish the same task.
Usability is the core reason that MS Windows pulled ahead of any other OS from 3.x onwards. Microsoft Press has published numerous titles regarding the "Windows User Experience," in order to educate developers and their managers on the importance of a user having consistent and adaptable experience throughout their use of a vendor's software. Compared to contemporary competitors, Windows 3.x was crushing in all aspects of usability and has since been top contender. Regardless of MS business practices, this was their real strength as it was always just a little more convenient to use their products.
Consider MS Office, while it is possible to have some considerable problems to have it do what you want, most users will never know of them as their use is streamlined to their expectations of something like a typewriter. This is supported with interface elements that meet this expectation rather than requiring more direct knowledge of the application. A user needn't enter the em value of their word spacing, or the point value of their tabs. They can drag the options to their needed value and get back to the important things. Sure, you can set all of these things programmatically, but to expect a user to do this is unrealistic. Mention VBA to them and they will correct you saying the fish-fry is actually at the VFW.
This is part of the brilliance of Mozilla Firefox mimicking IE in the placement of Internet Options and KDE and GNOME provoding a Start Menu. Users are far closer to being "up to speed" immediately and are more likely to stay and contribute to whatever application they use.
While improving, Linix is most useful to developers and still abandons many users that would otherwise be interested.
When it comes down to it, people that need something to work --- particularly those that depend upon computing for business --- view initial and even yearly licensing of $500 or more as small change in the face of spending 2 weeks picking up a previously unneeded skill. They may have lost many times that cost by the time that they acheive their needed results.
It should also be considered that many simply can't afford to participate in a MS monopoly. Populations that have the most to gain from Linux are left to learning an entirely new vocabulary on top of an unfamiliar method of production. I recently had a visit from a cousin of mine from the 'old country'. She had never seen a pool table except on the only TV in her villiage. This TV was the richest household in her villiage of about 250 people. I don't expect her to know anything of using any computer --- let alone figuring out how to configure her new Linux kernal.
While man and help pages are wonderful for seasoned *nix users, they are useless for those that are new to the platform. While many a *nix user will boast (almost angrily) that they can enter a command in seconds that commits system-wide changes and that is why it is the best and most usable.
Seasoned users simply forget while saying this that this is exactly what horrifies most users. The command that they misspelled, forgot exactly how to use, or forgot completely can cost them weeks.
In the mainstream, people expect a computer to act as any other appliance would in their home. They don't need to know how fast their spin cycles run in their washing machines and shouldn't mess with it either lest it put them in very serious danger while toying with the washer. A washing machine needs two dials to do the job and users benefit from it.
Jumping back to the thoughts of the requirement in Linux to use the command-line: what holds a developer (corporate or individual) from offering the ability to install a package in the place that a user wishes rather than default locations that are actually numerous, and offering it with the choices of "point and click" progression in place of command-lining rpm, or make, or anything. For instance, offer a command's options in the form of check-boxes at the bottom of a dialog box on screen. At this point a new user wouldn't have to study to again study to use another piece of software, they could simply install it to study the application itself --- which is the point, after all.
Possibly creating a machine-based disclosure of the host machine's packages or hardware, and so allowing the right build every time without any user ever editing a text file; requiring such an edit --- even customizing a script or config file after installation --- should be considered embarrassing. If Linux and other OSS is encourage migration, then the use of that software should be at least, encouraging rather than discouraging.
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Re:The Reason why
Posted by: nikolic on July 10, 2004 10:45 AMUsability is the core reason that MS Windows pulled ahead of any other OS from 3.x onwards. Microsoft Press has published numerous titles regarding the "Windows User Experience," in order to educate developers and their managers on the importance of a user having consistent and adaptable experience throughout their use of a vendor's software. Compared to contemporary competitors, Windows 3.x was crushing in all aspects of usability and has since been top contender. Regardless of MS business practices, this was their real strength as it was always just a little more convenient to use their products.
Consider MS Office, while it is possible to have some considerable problems to have it do what you want, most users will never know of them as their use is streamlined to their expectations of something like a typewriter. This is supported with interface elements that meet this expectation rather than requiring more direct knowledge of the application. A user needn't enter the em value of their word spacing, or the point value of their tabs. They can drag the options to their needed value and get back to the important things. Sure, you can set all of these things programmatically, but to expect a user to do this is unrealistic. Mention VBA to them and they will correct you saying the fish-fry is actually at the VFW.
This is part of the brilliance of Mozilla Firefox mimicking IE in the placement of Internet Options and KDE and GNOME provoding a Start Menu. Users are far closer to being "up to speed" immediately and are more likely to stay and contribute to whatever application they use.
While improving, Linix is most useful to developers and still abandons many users that would otherwise be interested.
When it comes down to it, people that need something to work --- particularly those that depend upon computing for business --- view initial and even yearly licensing of $500 or more as small change in the face of spending 2 weeks picking up a previously unneeded skill. They may have lost many times that cost by the time that they acheive their needed results.
It should also be considered that many simply can't afford to participate in a MS monopoly. Populations that have the most to gain from Linux are left to learning an entirely new vocabulary on top of an unfamiliar method of production. I recently had a visit from a cousin of mine from the 'old country'. She had never seen a pool table except on the only TV in her villiage. This TV was the richest household in her villiage of about 250 people. I don't expect her to know anything of using any computer --- let alone figuring out how to configure her new Linux kernal.
While man and help pages are wonderful for seasoned *nix users, they are useless for those that are new to the platform. While many a *nix user will boast (almost angrily) that they can enter a command in seconds that commits system-wide changes and that is why it is the best and most usable.
Seasoned users simply forget while saying this that this is exactly what horrifies most users. The command that they misspelled, forgot exactly how to use, or forgot completely can cost them weeks.
In the mainstream, people expect a computer to act as any other appliance would in their home. They don't need to know how fast their spin cycles run in their washing machines and shouldn't mess with it either lest it put them in very serious danger while toying with the washer. A washing machine needs two dials to do the job and users benefit from it.
Jumping back to the thoughts of the requirement in Linux to use the command-line: what holds a developer (corporate or individual) from offering the ability to install a package in the place that a user wishes rather than default locations that are actually numerous, and offering it with the choices of "point and click" progression in place of command-lining rpm, or make, or anything. For instance, offer a command's options in the form of check-boxes at the bottom of a dialog box on screen. At this point a new user wouldn't have to study to again study to use another piece of software, they could simply install it to study the application itself --- which is the point, after all.
Possibly creating a machine-based disclosure of the host machine's packages or hardware, and so allowing the right build every time without any user ever editing a text file; requiring such an edit --- even customizing a script or config file after installation --- should be considered embarrassing. If Linux and other OSS is encourage migration, then the use of that software should be at least, encouraging rather than discouraging.
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