On Monday 25 July 2005 05:04 am, james@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote: > On Mon, 25 Jul, 2005 at 10:46AM +0200, Mario Lang spake thus: > > That is the point, I absolutely dont feel reading up on something > > is necessarily a bad thing. My hair stand up if I watch > > a typical no-clue windows user more or less randomly hitting > > buttons in the interface until "something" works. > > I do feel this > > "it has to work out of the box without me having to know anything about > > it" attitude is childish. > > Seconded. I'd like to respectfully disagree, or at least put forth a different opinion. I believe that, eventually, the level of computer and domain knowledge (for various domains) and the simplicity of computer human interfaces should converge such that a typical person with "non-computer" knowledge of a specific domain, will be able to operate many computer programs without reading a manual. In fact, I'd even suggest that as a goal or a criteria to rate the human interface of programs. (Thus, in this case, a musician with general computer knowledge and non-computer musical knowledge (or knowledge of "tape recording"). Or, in a slightly different example, if a computer user understands how to use one (mainstream) word processor, he should be able to quickly understand and use at least the main features of other mainstream word processors (if there are more than one). (And further, a goal or criteria of a word processor human interface would include how many of the more subtle features of a different word processor a newbie user can pick up without the manual.) Are we there yet? Of course not. Can we get there? I have to believe we can (or don't the Star Trek series serve as good predictors of the future? ;-) Randy Kramer
