Re: [Usability]Re: Short article on OSS usability

[Lars Clausen <lrclause cs uiuc edu>]

On Thu, 30 Jan 2003, Michael Toomim wrote:
> Calum Benson wrote:
>>>From this month's Usability Professionals' Association periodical:
>> http://www.upassoc.org/voice/vol5no1/open_source.htm
> 
> This list of topics sounds familiar...
> 
>  > When there is some look into usability, the discussion often centers
>  > around one of the following topics:
>  >
>  > - Here's my new widget, what do you think?
>  > - Here's a screenshot, what do you think?
>  > - Users don't want that.
>  > - Users want this�
>  > - Duplicating a major vendor's approach can't be wrong"
> 
> Now, is this bad?
> 
> - Is it bad to post a screenshot of your program on the usability list
> and ask for advice?

Not really, but you're missing a lot of the actual interaction in a
screenshot.

> - Is it bad to offer an educated opinion about what users want?

If it's educated.  Which it rarely is, unless you're writing for
programmers.

> - Is it bad to imitate the approach of a major vendor which already
> puts an enormous amount of effort into perfecting the usability of
> their approach?

That's assuming that a) that vendor *has* put an enormous amount of effort
into usability efforts, and b) that that effort is reflected in the program
we see.  And besides, c) if we go that way, we'll always be second best.

> Or is the author saying that *other* beneficial types of usability
> discussion are conspcuously absent from our mailing lists?  If so,
> what kind of discussion would be more useful?

Yeah, I was missing that as well.

A sidenote:  I need to play more computer games.  Neverwinter Nights showed
me some interesting UI ideas.

-Lars

-- 
Lars Clausen (http://shasta.cs.uiuc.edu/~lrclause)| Hårdgrim of Numenor
"I do not agree with a word that you say, but I   |----------------------------
will defend to the death your right to say it."   | Where are we going, and
    --Evelyn Beatrice Hall paraphrasing Voltaire  | what's with the handbasket?