I agree. I frequently have an application running on one side of the screen with the debugger on the other. The alternative is multiple monitors, but widescreen takes up less desk real estate, and I would feel a bit silly on the road with my laptop and an additional monitor.
I would have to agree. This book is certainly not for all tastes, but Tolkien didn't aim for the widest possible audience. He aimed for what he found interesting.
Would he have released the book in its present state? Probably not, but for completely different reasons than the reviewer would imply.
Tolkien was a perfectionist. He had an absolutely incredible attention to detail and consistency. He went through massive rewrites of sections of Lord of the Rings to makes sure things like the phase of the moon was correct when the story takes place in different areas, but at the same time. Perhaps that level of attention is why he appeals so much to software types.
Tolkien's style reflects his original motivation. He wanted to create for England an ancient mythology similar to the Greeks. The fact that he wrote in an arachaic style is one of the strengths of his works, not a weakness.
I used the Shneiderman book in a UI class and found it pretty thorough.
The main things I got from studying UI is how much you DON'T know the user. And no matter how much you want to blame them for screwing up, it is your fault as the user interface designer if the user doesn't understand how to use the system.
You need to spend lots of time just watching users. As an excercise sit around watching people use a vending machine and try to document all the ways problems develop. Then think about how much more complex your own interface is.
Another thing that came up in class was the use of paper prototypes. When mocking up a user interface a user is much more likely to critique something written down on paper than something they think you put a lot of time into (even though drawing the interface out on paper is probably more work than using a software tool). However, I would have to say I generally don't have the "problem" of people not asking me to change stuff.
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I agree. I frequently have an application running on one side of the screen with the debugger on the other. The alternative is multiple monitors, but widescreen takes up less desk real estate, and I would feel a bit silly on the road with my laptop and an additional monitor.
I would have to agree. This book is certainly not for all tastes, but Tolkien didn't aim for the widest possible audience. He aimed for what he found interesting. Would he have released the book in its present state? Probably not, but for completely different reasons than the reviewer would imply. Tolkien was a perfectionist. He had an absolutely incredible attention to detail and consistency. He went through massive rewrites of sections of Lord of the Rings to makes sure things like the phase of the moon was correct when the story takes place in different areas, but at the same time. Perhaps that level of attention is why he appeals so much to software types. Tolkien's style reflects his original motivation. He wanted to create for England an ancient mythology similar to the Greeks. The fact that he wrote in an arachaic style is one of the strengths of his works, not a weakness.
Older readers? Hitchhiker's Guide was born about 30 years ago. So I tend to think its primarily familiar to those of us over 40. Ow, I'm over 40?
I used the Shneiderman book in a UI class and found it pretty thorough. The main things I got from studying UI is how much you DON'T know the user. And no matter how much you want to blame them for screwing up, it is your fault as the user interface designer if the user doesn't understand how to use the system. You need to spend lots of time just watching users. As an excercise sit around watching people use a vending machine and try to document all the ways problems develop. Then think about how much more complex your own interface is. Another thing that came up in class was the use of paper prototypes. When mocking up a user interface a user is much more likely to critique something written down on paper than something they think you put a lot of time into (even though drawing the interface out on paper is probably more work than using a software tool). However, I would have to say I generally don't have the "problem" of people not asking me to change stuff.