Re: Nautilus 2.6 - We're going all spatial

[Seth Nickell <seth gnome org>]

On Mon, 2003-09-15 at 23:27, Eugenia Loli-Queru wrote:
> >Even better, Windows and Mac used to have an OO model, and both switched
> >to a navigation model.  Did they do that just for fun or was it a
> >horrible mistake?  (And if so, why aren't they fixing it?)
> 
> Fully agreed with Ettore there.
> 
> History lesson:
> While most of you wouldn't like to hear of BeOS again, it is true that we
> can learn from history. BeOS had this OO design for its Tracker file manager
> windows (no navigational buttons, each folder is a new window etc) for
> years, and users were --literally-- shouting to Be engineers regarding
> Tracker's inability to open folders on the same window. People just didn't
> like it, and every time there was a news item about Tracker on BeNews.com
> back then, people will just troll and troll over that specific feature on
> our forums, among other Tracker weirdnesses they didn't like (despite all
> this, Tracker had other features that they were innovative and unique).
> It was only after the open source version of Tracker came out, OpenTracker,
> that people came to terms with Tracker. The *first thing* they changed/added
> on OT was the ability to open on the same window, plus to add a brand new
> toolbar with navigation buttons!! Yes, the guy who wrote Tracker (which is
> btw the same person who worked on Eazel's Nautilus and currently working on
> Finder at Apple!) was not happy about these changes people were doing in
> his... masterpiece. But the reality was, OT became much more usable after it
> got open sourced (yes, and more buggy too :) just because the users added
> what they really craving for, for years: the navigational model.
> Seth spoke about new users and experienced users, and I can tell you that
> while BeOS was an alternative OS, it mostly had non-developers and
> non-uber-power-users using it, and even them were asking for the
> navigational model, it was the No1 request back in the day, I remember.

BeOS mostly *had* power users using it by and large. They were what we
might call "intermediate users". 

1) BeOS was very much aimed at an enthusiast community, all very
sophisticated users compared to your basic office user. Linux has that
appeal right now, but I think there's a lot of interest in GNOME toward
appealing to a broader corporate desktop.

2) Almost anybody who's noisy is an enthusiast. You are assuming just
because 1000 people complained this indicates that pretty much all your
population loves navigation model. But you have major self-selection
bias: the people who complain are both technically proficient and
they're more apt to say something because they were not . Pavel was
probably right not to cave just because a bunch of people made noise.

-Seth