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Tags: Site-related
evanmeagher
Computer-illiterate people bring software down for the rest of us
Most people will agree that one of the most annoying things about Windows Vista is how it prompts for confirmation before embarking on any task with the slightest semblance of administrativeness. For example, if you want to install a program or open up msconfig, it asks if you’re ABSOLUTELY SURE you want to do so.
Generally speaking, if you’re one of the people who finds this incredibly annoying, then you are fairly adept at computing. When Vista dumbly asks you if you really want to do something, you most likely know what you’re doing and don’t need to be arbitrarily warned of the profoundness of your potential actions.
That being said, this is an example of software being designed for the people who don’t know what they’re doing. Linda Luddite is going to come to a Vista confirmation prompt and only then become aware of how her subsequent actions can possibly negatively affect her future dealings with her computer.
Thinking globally, this is all well and fine. Computing systems should be designed to be fully usable by everyone, including those lacking finessed expertise. For years, many people have been afraid of technology mostly because of their inability to deal with and use it.
This usually isn’t their fault, though. The software industry has always been, to varying extents, plagued with confused menu systems and shoddy user interfaces. I blame this for my fathers pessimistic dislike of computers as a whole. His only experience with them has been with Windows, and thus he attributes computers to having to struggle to do what he wants.
However, for technologically-knowledgeable people this kind of thing does nothing but slow us down. We know what we’re doing, and we don’t want some bullshit popup to impare our ability to efficiently do it.
Often as user-friendliness increases, as does the tendency for software to talk down to the user. The key is the find the balance between toning things down for the computer-illiterate while maintaining full usability for the rest of us.
Windows Update Upset
Being back home for the holidays, I took it upon myself to update my parents’ Windows box. I leave Windows Update off so they don’t get inundated with bullshit update popups and opt instead toward periodic manual updates.
After using Ubuntu for three months, the Windows XP update system comes off as an absolute chore. It requires that you use Internet Explorer as opposed to Ubuntu’s native update manager. The update packages take much longer to download and install than those of Ubuntu (granted, they’re usually much larger). The overall experience is frustrating and not nearly as streamlined as it could be.
The icing on the cake was the driver that Windows Update suggested for the Radeon 9200 graphics card in my parents’ computer. I queued up all the suggested updates and went back to help set up the Christmas tree. After rebooting the computer, Windows booted in 800x600 with pixelly, distorted 8-bit color. In a nutshell, everything looked like shit, thanks to the POS driver that Windows Update suggested.
The problem wasn’t hard to fix. I got ATI’s latest driver from their website, installed, and rebooted to find everything back to the usable norm. What bothers me is that if a relatively computer-illiterate person encountered this problem after being told by Microsoft that their system was dandy and up-to-date, they would have been dead in the water.
Not everyone would know to go fetch a legit driver from their graphics card manufacturer’s website, let alone who their manufacturer is or even that the problem is with the graphics driver. Bottom line, one should design systems to be usable by those who are least proficient with them.
mLw wins GameSpot Team Fortress 2 Tourney!
I’m happy to announce that my Team Fortress 2 team, MaCHinE’s Least Wanted, has won GameSpot’s Mutilation Madness tournament. ‘Grats to each and every member of mLw and thanks especially to The MaCHinE for providing servers and the best gaming community on the internet. Playing was a lot of fun, in and of itself, and the $200 Best Buy gift card is a fitting cherry on top of our figurative gaming sundae.
The final match can be viewed on GameSpot’s Tournament TV. (I’m the medic, [#mLw] EliteMongoose)
gg to Ron Paul 2008 and the rest of the teams we played. Glad to see TF2 has a good userbase after only a few months.
Tags: Gaming
Excited for Android
After watching the Android developer videos on YouTube, I’m starting to get excited. Not only because it’s the best thing to hit the mobile industry, arguably ever, but because its success will partly depend on people like you and me writing quality applications.
This is exactly what the mobile industry needs right now. Openness, cooperative development, and hope for releasing itself from the stranglehold of the telecoms.
I can’t wait.
Here are some of the videos that I mentioned:
Tags: Tech
