Re: [Usability]too much choice?

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On Sat, 22 Feb 2003, Jeff Waugh wrote:

> Date: Sat, 22 Feb 2003 23:17:36 +1100
> From: Jeff Waugh <jdub perkypants org>
> To: usability gnome org
> Subject: Re: [Usability]too much choice?
>
> <quote who="Christopher Warner">
>
> > In relation to the user the same should be true but in this case the
> > programmer has the power to make those options available or not. IE: some
> > of the items/features, past just the steering and control of the plane, in
> > the 757 are useful and for pilots that know how to use them they should be
> > made available.

I was going to say something a bit like that (we have a
grill/oven/microwave combination and it was complicated but i took the
time to learn how to use it.  i may not use the grill but the oven
feature is almost essential now).

You cant really please everyone.  But you can please most of the people
most of the time.

It makes a lot of sense to target the biggest audience, but it does not
make me want certain features any less (but there is no point complaining
about metacity here).

> Are you suggesting 'difficulty' levels in the user interface, such as
> Novice, Intermediate and Advanced? Been there, tried it, have the scars.
> Read the archives of nautilus-list to see why it was removed (Nautilus used
> to have user levels).

The Nautilus attempt at seperating things into levels did not work.
80% of the users only use 20% of the features, and I agree that in most
cases levels wont work as it is very hard to decide what to leave out and
what to leave in.

There are some things that Microsoft does well.  Customisable toolbars and
menus and Macro recorders allow ordinary users to make programs like
Microsoft office massively more complicated, but there are reasonable
defaults.  I guess 'Basic' or 'Custom' are not really levels.  I realise
many gnome programs are highly configurable but editing config files or
changing gconf/registry settings is intimidating for ordinary users.

I think both Havoc and Mosfet made good points but neither meticulously
pinned down and limited their arguements (which is quite reasonable) and
if you follow either arguement too far it does not make sense.

Sensible defaults with a minimal feature set makes sense, but hopefully as
Gnome2 moves forward there will be room to add more features that users
can easily enable without sacrificing clarity and maintainability.
With clean seperability of various parts and distinct plugins
Gnome should be able to be more flexible.

I am looking forward to more of Gnome 2.  I will wait and see (and gently
nudge in places).

Sincerely

Alan H.