Is this guy an idiot?
http://mpt.net.nz/archive/2004/02/16/os-x
To things he says are either features, or he's just not getting it, or he's complaining about something I don't even care about.
What's the deal with him?
To things he says are either features, or he's just not getting it, or he's complaining about something I don't even care about.
What's the deal with him?
Comments
I'm not sure if you knew that, or if you thought it was just some random joe trying OS X for the first time.
Also, I think this particular article has been discussed before.
sorry if you've discussed it before.
http://mpt.net.nz/archive/2004/02/17/black
Now I guess they should have banned me rather than just shut off posting priviledges, because kickaha and Amorph definitely aren't going to like being called to task when they thought they had it all ignored *cough* *cough* I mean under control. Just a couple o' tools.
Don't worry, as soon as my work resetting my posts is done I'll disappear forever.
Originally posted by stevegongrui
sorry if you've discussed it before.
It's not a problem and I've no wish to be a forum nazi about it, I just thought you might like to know as repeat threads generally get less enthusiastic responses.
previous thread: http://forums.appleinsider.com/showt...threadid=38372
Consistency is important because it prevents people from having to deal with quirks/special cases/etc. The author exposed a number of inconsistencies, however minor, in OS X and assorted programs.
Inconsistency is one of the biggest barriers to ease of use in software. Even minor things - like not being able to set a color label on a disk - can cause frustration among average users.
To take AirSluf's example:
I like brushed metal, but it's a usability catastrophe for a number of reasons. With brushed metal, windows look different. Users do not know or understand why. Some people will swear that the same window appears in brushed metal 1/2 the time and regular aqua 1/2 the time. They're most likely wrong, but the mere fact they could think that signals an interface defect.
Brushed metal windows behave differently. You can drag the iTunes window from anywhere, but regular windows can only be dragged from the title bar. Users don't know why, they just know some windows work one way and others work another way. They likely won't associate the behavior with the brushed metal look unless someone tells them (usually 3 or 4 times).
Controls appear different too. Again, this just serves to confuse and/or annoy users. And so on.
Any interface discrepancy - no matter how minor - gives the user one more reason to be confused/frustrated/scared by their computer. If you don't believe me, go into tech support (real tech support; helping your friends + family does not count).
Think of it this way: would you be comfortable driving a car if you thought the gas pedal was sometimes on the left side and sometimes on the right, and you didn't know under which conditions it was on which side? The key word there is "thought". Truth doesn't matter, perception of truth is the important thing. Inconsistencies and discrepancies lead to misperceptions. That is why Apple should fix the problems, and why the article has merit.
Take, for example this scenario:
My dad is listening to a new cd he bought he has already encoded it in iTunes. He tells me the songs are very nice. I want him to send me the album
He doesn't know where to begin. He doesn't know where the song is, he'll say "it's in itunes".
He has to locate the file first, which is a couple of levels down from the music folder, and then drag the folder to my name in iChat. He could also right click on the song and show song file and then drag it, but lets say he does show song file but wants to send me the entire album...how does he go one level up without knowing the feature of command clicking on the menu bar? He can drag a bunch of songs to the desktop but then he must put it in a folder.
I think UIs today have a lot of improvement that could be made.
UI inconsistancy for me is a very minor thing compared to something like the aforementioned.
What do you guys think?
Originally posted by stevegongrui
What do you guys think?
The problem with that idea is that it could facilitate the *evil* music pirates who are trying to undermine society as we know it so Apple couldn't possibly add such a feature.
This is one of the reasons i like open source software, you find that many user-interface problems are actually intentional e.g. companies trying to lock you into their proprietary formats, force you to buy their for-pay version, or slowly expanding their apps feature set to attract new users rather than cater to their current clientbase.
What's even sadder is that there are perfectly valid reasons for wanting to send songs to someone else via iChat or Mail yet the software assumes you are guilty just like my MiniDisc player assumes anything recorded on it is copyrighted and won't let me make perfect digital copies of my own recordings.
say I like a cd and my sister likes a cd. we live in the same family. we are not going to buy the same cd twice, that would be just silly.
and sometimes friends send me music just to show me their musical tastes. these are songs I wouldn't buy anyway, so it's not like the industry is losing money.
And guess what, an apple guy was doing an iTunes demo in our MUG meeting. And hmm.... he had songs that didn't have any id3 tags that were called
"T-3330008-Carly Simon - Nobodydoesitbetter (1).mp3"
interesting...
Originally posted by tonton
That's way faster than being locked into the misguided idea that you need to hunt down and send the original files from your iTunes database. Think outside... you know.
I think you've missed the point. If Apple weren't trying to suck up to the RIAA (understandable but meh...) then you'd be able to just select the songs within iTunes and use a menu item called "Send via iChat..." or similar, just like you can send via email in iPhoto.
If you're going to build these database backed apps as portals into your data then you need to allow them to do everything. If you start acting like a nanny then you'll confuse your users even more as they'll no longer know where the files are when they need to work around your restrictions.