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48 Hours Enduring Ubuntu 5.04
ceswiedler writes "Matthew Thomas lists 69 interface issues he has with the new Ubuntu release "Hoary Hedgehog", ranging from desktop and Nautilius behavior to Firefox and Evolution. They're serious interface issues, he claims, but he also says that Ubuntu 5.04 "is the first Linux-based system I have encountered that is tolerable enough for me to use for everyday work." That's a rather backhanded compliment...the suprising thing is that he's an interface designer working for Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu." As Thomas mentions, "Many of these flaws probably exist in other Gnome-based systems, and some of them also exist in Microsoft Windows and/or Mac OS."
Apparently, usernames are design flaws: "The login screen uses the term "username"." As is rebooting the computer: "The login screen uses the term "reboot". (My shoes are fine as they are, thanks.)"
http://unelite.freelinuxhost.com - Rock/Scissors/Paper and RPGs shouldn't mix.
The guy is a genius. Sometimes I feel like compiling a list like this myself, but I rarely install a system from scratch, so it is difficult to point them back to a single source.
:-).
But Linux needs more people like. Interface bugs are bugs, because the confuse the user, and (thus) the software does not work for them. Calling the user "stupid" wont help either, because you are still stuck with the same user
The most obvious UI bug I remember is the GNOME pop up box when you exit a program without saving. They keep changing it, but it still makes me hesitate every time. It is just extremely nonintuitive. (Yes, and MacOS also took many revisions before they got it right. Microsoft this didn't get it...) Openoffice is a lot better, as is KDE.
Now if the developer would take these issues serious and fix them, Desktop Linux would be a lot closer already.
Judging from the complaints I'm seeing so far in the postings to this story, the issues that have been brought up over and over again with respect to usability in F/OSS software are still alive and well here.
Which is, of course, not a surprise to anyone literate.
The thing with this list, and I'll agree that TFA is pretty picky, is that they are all little things that, much like the Uncanny Valley, are the key to making the step from half-baked to user-friendly. Bear in mind, please, that I am writing this from a 96-hour old installation of Hoary, myself, and I'm quite pleased with it. However, the issues he has mentioned overlap rather thoroughly with issues that I've had.
I'd like to see more open source software make it in the real world -- I've tried to get my girlfriend to use this laptop, but, well, I've lost that battle from the first time she had to ask me how to make movies play (and we're not talking about someone clueless here, either!). So, something with a bit more polish is going on here this weekend, and I'm back to using the laptop for only web surfing and movie watching.
Anyway...
Seriously, guys. Yes, he's a nitpicker. But he's also right. Polish is everything, and polish means picking at every little thing.
C
--
Democracy would work just fine if people weren't so goddamned stupid.
because for someone so keen on user interface, I can't seem to figure out where on that page I'm supposed to click to get to the home page of his own website...
Defect reports are by and large nitpicks. Many of these are even bigger than nitpicks. But that's what UI polish is all about. You get your car detailed, you don't expect them to leave a few streaks and smudges here and there, do you?
And he wasn't exactly using multiple exclamation points or making comments on how this rendered the whole thing unusable or shoddy. He simply listed defects and sometimes the reason this constituted a defect.
It's pathetic, the way some people create this personal attachment to software like this. It's not like he whitegloved your damn homes. If the GNOME developers share the reaction of the slashdot crowd, then frankly I too think he should shut up -- because he's otherwise wasting time and effort on a project that doesn't deserve any.
I am no longer wasting my time with slashdot
He does have a few good points though, such as:
"15. Dialogs themselves are not modal: they let you continue to use the parent window. This allows such nonsensical situations as a "Save as JPEG" dialog for a Gimp image that no longer exists, and a Print dialog for a Web page that is no longer open or even still in Firefox's cache."
Fair enough, but sometimes dialog boxes should be modeless (a find/replace dialog box in a text editor for instance). Remember Larry Tessler (from Apple and PARC) used to wear a t-shirt saying "DON'T MODE ME IN" - in general, modal interfaces (including dialog boxes) suck. They have their place but noone who knows anything about user interfaces should make such a blanket statement.
"16. The mouse pointer does not hide itself when it is stationary and I start using the keyboard. As a result, it frequently gets in the way of what I am typing or reading."
Hiding the mouse pointer completely is usually a pretty stupid idea. It's quicker for the user to move the pointer out of the way than it is to find a hidden pointer when they need to use the mouse again...
That you are accustomed to it doesn't mean it is a good way of doing things.
Unless someone can convince me I'll be more productive with the new system, I'm going to do things exactly the way I am. Forcing a new system on me will force me to find a way around it. I'm efficient the way I'm doing things now. Requiring me to learn a new system will result in lost productivity.
For example: Remember when GNOME switched Nautilus from tree-based to "spatial", or whatever it is that they call it? I still use GNOME, but I've stopped using Nautilus to browse with. Instead, I use gnome-terminal. It's faster and more efficient for me to have presences in multiple locations on my filesystem via a tabbed terminal than multiple windows.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
1. Every window that has menus puts them in a separate menu bar inside the window. [...] Ubuntu is not entirely ignorant of Fitt's Law
What he neglects in his analysis is that (1) that's where most users expect menu bars to be, and familiarity usually trumps Fitt's law, and (2) Fitt's law is a red herring anyway. Designing a UI based on Fitt's law is like picking a car based on the size of its spoiler or picking a girlfriend based on the size of her boobs--someone may have enough of a fetish with it to do it, but that doesn't make it a good idea.
While a few of the comments suggest minor useful improvements (e.g., multiple new windows should be cascaded, not stacked), much of rest of the analysis is filled with many more similarly irrelevant comments. And many (most?) of those comments apply to proprietary desktops as well.
The question isn't how many nits one can pick with Ubuntu, the question is whether it is good enough for regular users, and I think it is. In fact, one can even argue that it is easier to use and more consistent than the proprietary alternatives.
As evidenced here on Slashdot, he's an expert in his field who is ignored because he doesn't care to explain to all you non-experts why what you are doing is shit. Instead he says here's my professional opinion: fix this, this and this, and here are my credentials, to which people say nah, I'm just going to ignore your expert opinion because I think my uninformed gut feeling is better. How could you not leave in a huff?
How we know is more important than what we know.
Actually, he missed out on one UI bug in Evolution that makes me laugh. I wish I had a screenshot, but on fairly regular occasion, Evolution gives me an error message with a label saying, "Error: Success." Gets me every time :)
No comment.