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What Should People Understand About Computers?
counterexample asks: "It seems to me that there aren't very many good books out there that explain to the layman what is really going on with computers. My mother cannot go to the bookstore and pick up a book that will make her understand the strange language that we IT people speak, or why her computer would be susceptible to a virus. So, I intend to write such a book. I have a fair idea of what should be in it (history of the Internet, how computers talk to each other, what a hard drive does, etc.), but I'm interested to see what you all have to say. What do you wish your users knew? What kind of questions are you so sick of answering because you hear them every week? What does the general public think they understand, but really don't?"
My ancestors (parents and grandparents) are a naturally inquisitive people. Any attempt to teach them things about computers may only leave them more confused and full of questions.
..." ..."
You are about to undertake a Herculean task in that you are now required to omit certain things which we may all know. I think your strategy should concentrate on figuring out how simply you can describe something without causing more confusion and questions.
I would suggest analyzing The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay because he does a good job at using simple illustrations and brought me up to speed on a lot of engineering ideas when I was only in fifth grade. I would try to mimic him and use his level of detail as a template into what the common person is ready to ingest.
Perhaps you should also change your strategy from "What do I include?" to "Where do I draw the line?" Start with a computer and describe the monitor, mouse, keyboard, box, printer, etc. in a high level. These are the obvious things you see. Then you can take and chapter by chapter explain each component down to as much detail as you want to. I would then have a chapter on communications and the internet that doesn't go all the way down to protocols.
Allow me to illustrate what kind of people you should aim this book at in this telephone call between me and my mother:
Me: Ok, tell me what the screen says now.
Mom: It's blue.
Me: What do you mean "it's blue"? What does it say?
Mom: It says, "9F D8 34 7B
Me: Um, that's ok, ma, I don't speak hex.
Mom: "... FA 25 3C A2
One more thing, I shudder at the possibility of the history of computers being taught to my parents. This is more information that isn't really pertinent to what a layperson needs to know about computers. I would suggest delving into this as little as possible but historical facts always make reading interesting if you want to include little side notes.
As with most projects undertaken--keep it simple, stupid!
My work here is dung.
The biggest problem I tend to face is that people don't know where the hardware ends, and where the OS Begins and where the OS Ends and the Applications begins. When they are doing something over the network or locally. They are just completely lost on the system. It it like they know how to drive but they don't know where they are now.
They will always blame the wrong part for their problems.
My Computer is Broken! When When MS Word fails to open.
Windows Sucks! When the system wont Boot because the computer hardware failed.
The Internet Is Down! When Windows somehow lost all its drives and fails boot.
My Computer is slow, I need a faster one! When there are 1000s of spyware apps running
What people need to know is what part of the computer does what type of job and how to at least say where the problem is.
They should know when the Harddrive is clicking away or when sending information over the network.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Assuming that's where you keep the manual for you car. All you really need to know about your car is how to operate it and how to take care of it (what kind of fuel, when to change the oil, belts, plugs, etc.). It's not really necessary to know much about how a car works to be able to properly use it. Such information is available to those who want to know, but it's not necessary to know the Brayton Cycle for example, to operate a car.
I would suggest that this be your state of mind when writing your computer manual. I.e. focus on how to use it and how to take care of it.
A goal is a dream with a deadline
I think that's the wrong approach - it's like asking a calc TA what questions he got asked most during the term. How do I do problem #3 isn't terribly useful to put in a book - next year they'll have to know how to do problem #4. So it goes with computers. Many questions can be "answered" without giving any real insight to the end reader/user. Be careful - you have to teach basics
That said...
I remember having to go through contortions to explain the concept of a "file" and "directory" to my mom. Just how technical *do* you get? "Any file is just a bunch of data" can be a bit confusing...
--LWM
A request for the format of your book - organise the explanations by things people actually use their computers for.
... and so on. This kind of task-based organisation should make it easier for the lay person to understand what is going on because they can relate it to something real they actually do.
- writing a letter: how a program starts, how different document formats work, how saving a file puts it onto the hard disc, how printing works
- looking something up on Google: how the internet works (good luck with that one!), how web sites work, how computers talk to each other over the internet, how firewalls work
Dunx
Converting caffeine into code since 1982
Most people think that computer attacks/hack attempts are personal and thus think 'Nobody would want to hack MY computer'. Explain that these attacks are not personal and are often carried out automatically by an infected computer. Explain that there are only ~4Billion possible internet locations the computer can search and it will only take a few days for a computer to search all possible locations on the internet. Remind them that a computer can do over a billion things a second which is why it can search so many computers locations so quickly.
Things you think are in the Constitution, but are not.
Maybe most people are capable of understanding computers but most geeks are such shitty communicators they just cant explain things clearly enough, often because they just dont understand the subject well enough themselves half the time.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
These two books are completely different and you should know which one you're writing, and not mix things up.
I personally would love a book that explains the basics of how RAM, TCP/IP, USB ports etc. work -- written in a way that somebody with no engineering background can grasp. But from the tone of your question I think what you're really leaning towards writing is a book that lets brand new computer users bypass the clueless stage. For this, you'd want to explain the differences between OSX, Windows, and Linux, and give users a good way to choose. You'd want to acquaint them with the main sorts of applications that exist -- word processors, spread sheets, browsers, etc. Then you'd explain a bit about each, like what a word processor is great at doing (things like on-the-fly spellcheck), and what it sucks at doing (book quality layout.)
Basically, you want to teach people the fundamentals of using each type of application, and keep them from using a screwdriver as a hammer (using Microsoft Word to typeset a book, for instance.)
You'd also want to write about the various peripherals you can install, like wireless cards, optical mice, and high-quality video and sound cards.
And finally, you'd want to make the writing engaging enough that people would actually read your book cover to cover. That's the biggest trick of all, and really, the only hard trick.
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
So I say forget doing a book at all (at least initially), and instead consider screenwriting a DVD video. People will be far more willing to give it a quick spin than check out a book. Also, it's much cheaper to duplicate, and you can distribute it over the Internet. (Technically, the same is also true of "books" in PDF format, but books are traditionally not thought of in that manner.)
If the DVD is a success, than you can go into more depth in a follow-on book (or just leave a PDF file on the DVD).
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
I don't understand how exactly a car works. I have a vague idea that combustion of gasoline creates pressure which is channeled into turning wheels, but that's about it. I don't have the foggiest clue how laundry soap works, or dry-cleaning for that matter. In the same token, I haven't the foggiest clue how to understand women.
There are levels of underestanding required for the use of anything. If you break it down, malicious software exists because some jerks out there are exploiting the fact that they understanding software deficiencies better than Microsoft or you. People don't *need* to understand 100% how things work. They could, but they don't care to. Over time as people age, they accumulate a list of things they "know" and their curiosity and desire to learn decreases (the more you know, the less you care to learn).
People care more about increasing the comfort level in their lives than in increasing the understanding of the world. Ignorance is bliss, and the more you learn, the more aware you become of your ignorance (ie, you are really learning just how much you don't understand).
Most people see computers as a tool, albeit an annoying, complicated, troublesome one. In fact, from the people I have talked to, if they could get away with NOT using computers in their daily lives, they would. They'd rather spend their time with family, or recreationally, etc. As a tool, computers are rather flawed - the mere fact that they break down so easily is proof of that. Instead of thinking of ways to make it easier to learn the tool, why don't we just fix the tool itself? Make it simpler, easier to use, more reliable. What you sacrifice in perfect flexibility, you gain in adoption. The best consumer technology is transparent technology.
------- "From bored to fanboy in 3.8 asian girls" ----------
Bullshit. Analogies with cars will always fall down. And anyway, people don't understand cars any better.
One fact about computers that even technical people often forget:
The job of the computer is to make your job/task easier - it is not the other way around.
Yes, there is a time and place to learn a particular interface for a specialized job, to configure a certain program to get a special behavior or download some patch or driver to get some random hardware to work. But these things should be the exception and not the rule. I think there's way too much software that forces the user to bend to its design/shortcomings, rather than the other way around.
Futhermore, I'm rather saddened by the fact that nowadays I notice most people are afraid of their computers. They don't explore or try something new just to "see what happens" - because everyone has been bitten hard by some bug or some unexpected behavior and lost valuable time and data. So they have a very simple and rigid routine, one they know "just works", even if it's completely convoluted and non-sensical. I'm sure most people here have observed the same thing.
http://www.talknerdy.org
I would leave all that stuff out because it is so 'today'. Every product you mentioned might help a user today, but unless they get updated with what the hip anti-malware program is 6 months from now their computer will be a mess again. Educating users about scams and malware in general should open their eyes and keep them open for years to come. My parents emailed me that they have been deleting emails from governament officials in Nigeria offering them money. Not because I taught them about 419 scams, but because I tought them about internet scams in general.
Bottom line is most people only use computers for a narrow, limited purpose. The rest start investigating on their own.
Right, analogies are key. I also have had great success with encouraging people like my mother to be more outgoing when it comes to GUIs.
Like most people who just "get by" using computers, she is terrified of messing with options, and jumping through menus.
Whenener she has a problem with a piece of software I've never touched (yet I'm expected to "fix"), I make it clear to her that I have no clue exactly how to fix it, but I tell her what kind of thing I'm looking for...a settings window, a configuration wizard, etc. And I explain to her quite clearly that she can't break anything by messing with these options...she can always undo something.
Now that she realizes that many programs offer similar basic features, but just present them in their own way, she is more confident with finding the solution to common problems she encounters (and calls me very rarely about problems).
It is all about the approach. I used to have to install GAMES for this woman.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
To go along with this, one key point : "Yes, it really is just ones and zeroes"
I think that a lot of people have conceptual issues when trying to accept that it is all just information. People I know are completely floored when they learn that they can do the same things to any JPEG. Whether they downloaded it from a web page on the internet, or scanned it, or got it in an email, or shot it on a digicam, etc. They are somehow convinced that the computer thinks it is something completely different, depending on where it came from. My friend recently got a scanner after having the photo developer give him a CD of JPEG's. He was convinced that emailing the JPEG's from his scanner would be a completely different process than emailing JPEG's from a CD.
Once you can convince people how simple it really is, how stupid the computer really is, how all the information is in a file, and all the files are just information, then you have come a *loooong* way in improving their ability to interact with the computer.
My dad seems basically unable to really grasp this. It comes up in sort of odd places, and catches me compoletely off guard in conversations. It really doesn't occur to me to make a distinction between a video file I captured from my TV card, or downloaded, or rendered, etc. The fact that I can use the same video player utility to play BBC programs as I use for ones I recorded here in Colorado is stunning to him. It just sort of won't fully integrate in his mind.
I would guess 99% of all people don't know the difference between memory and a harddrive. I once gave a speech about the basics of computer hardware and I found this analogy useful (although somewhat limited).
Imagine you are going to solve a problem and you have no long term memory. You have only a notebook, a calculator and a library.
- The CPU is like your mind and calculator: Fast enough for simple problems but you can't do everything in your head.
- The Cache is your short term memory. You don't need to reread things in the front of your notebook over and over.
- The Memory is like your notebook. You can look through it fairly quickly but it can only hold so much.
- The harddrive is the library. It holds vast amounts of information but takes a long time to find what you need. Once you find it you can photocopy things and add them to your notebook. If your notebook is full you will throw away old papers.
You can expand on this analogy to say that some books hold information while others hold instructions and references to other books.
"Haven't you ever heard of the Emancipation Proclaimation?"
"I don't listen to Hip-Hop!"