This article was a serious waste of time. The author didn't offer any new or innovative ideas providing only a seriously myopic framework.
There are many issues in human-computer interfaces that the author left untouched. The first, and most obvious, is a change in paradigm from personl to (what has been coined as) ultra-personal computing. Who is to say that we'll spend as much time (or any time at all) sitting in front of a desktop or laptop computer? I'm not the only (or first) person to consider the idea that the personal computer will evolve into a function of a cellphone or similar technology (think: your phone as your computer) [Dropping it into a dock (or what-have-you) to gain access to a larger display, kybd, mouse, etc.? Tiny projected displays/input devices?] If computing does take such a turn, what kind of interfaces would we be looking at? How would we perform common tasks such as spreadsheet/word processing? Would we use different kinds of applications to achieve the same ends? Would we access and information in different ways?
Another issue is accessability. At present it is difficult for blind users to access computers. All the existing solutions are clumsy and don't interface well with our vision-centric computing environments. A 3d interface would make this much worse! I've always thought that the data and the presentation should be separated. Consider a website with the data in one area and a visual presentation defined in another. It would be simple to add a non-visual presentation definition in the same object -- allowing blind users [or users with tiny displays (cellphone users?)?] to access the same information in a more effective way. This was promised by the web, but thats all changed now. Websites 'designed for 800x600' etc. started to appear (killing a major feature of html -- it's ability to be rendered on disparate displays). Now ajax, 'dynamic web content', and other technologies further decay the users ability to access information on devices other than desktop style computers using a GUI. Decoupling the information from its presentation could change all of that without killing the benefits these new technologies bring us. (? Think different kinds of documents: static, form, application ?)
The author also seems to focus on a single aspect of computing: content retrieval. The auther implies that the user interface is nothing more than the method by which information is located by the user and says very little about how information should be presented other than some content should be 2d instead of 3d. When I use a computer, there are certain things I want to be able to do. I want to locate data, create or modify data, and interact with data. The author doesn't seem to what to do anything other than organize his data to make it easy to locate.
My appologies if I rambled a bit. Computer interfaces are a very complex topic that I don't feel the auther did justice to. I'm also annoyed that the author seems to be pushing his own 3d interface product instead of tackling a real computing issue. (That and his reference to the four color problem, which he doesn't seem to know the name of.)
My first harddisk was 40mb. The manual that came with it was for the 20mb model -- there was a single loose-leaf insert that gave the specs for the 40mb model. I ran a BBS (yes, it had LORD) on a 286 with a 1200 baud modem (which I thought was elite awesome). I remember in the early 90s when I added a second 512mb HD to my machine to get an amazing 1gb of disk space.
Those were not the days... those days sucked. [I picked up an IBM Aptiva (66mhz) a few months before a friend of mine got his new machine (75mhz). I was sad.]
The good old days (for me) were the mid 80s. I had a C64 (with a Floppy Drive!) that replaced a coleco Adam (horray!). You could write a game on that thing which was just as good as the commercial stuff in just a few weeks during your spare time. Computer magazines almost always had code that did something cool. There were even 'which-way' style books (the 'micro adventure' series) that had computer programs for you to enter and run (brought you into the action).
For an excellent (and certainly more through) account of the advent of the personal computer you should check out Fire in the Valley by Paul Freiberger and Michael Swaine. It's one of those rare non-fiction works that truly engages you in the story. It even includes a copy of the letter Bill Gates wrote about software piracy (c. 1976).
What would stop you from using seperate windows? In FireFox, I get a new window by default -- not a new tab. When I right-click on a link the first option I get is to "Open Link in New Window" *followed* by "Open Link in New Tab". If you've used a browser that supports tabs before you'd know this. My contention is that you've never used a browser that supports tabs and are simply afrade of change.
Apple gains effective control of the portable digital music market and leverages that to restrict end-user choice by blocking competitors' products. Conclusion: Apple=Good
How is Apple "blocking competitors' products"? I don't need an iPod to use iTunes. There are services other than iTunes I can use to buy digital music. There are pleanty of digital music players that are not made by Apple. Apple is in no way restricting end-user chioce! I don't know where you got that idea.
D. Knuth, The Art of Computer Programming (Volumes 1-3) D. Berlinski, A Tour of the Calculus D. Berlinski, The Advent of the Algorithm G. Polya, How to Solve It P. Beckmann, A History of Pi G. Lakoff & R. Nunez, Where Mathematics Comes From Aho & Ullman, Principles of Compiler Design (1st Ed.) Aho & Sethi & Ullman, Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools P. Freiberger & M. Swaine, Fire in the Valley: The Making of The Personal Computer H. Sheldon, Boyd's Introduction to the Study of Disease C. Petzold, Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software
Anyone of these would have made a good gift for me -- and I'm sure other geeks would appreciate these as well. That is, if they don't own them already.
On a related note: The conference proceedings from the ACM SIGCSE add quite a bit to my library every year. The membership is very affordable and makes an excellent gift (provided, of course, that the geek in question is not already a member of the ACM). I'm not sure about the other SIGs, but you certainly get your dues worth out of SIGCSE.
My appologies -- though I can't be certain that Cliff coined the phrase. I first read this quote in the Reader Digest (though I forget what issue). Subsequent searches for the origional author returned only anonymous sources. Also, I figured that this little joke was so well known that it wouldn't be assumed to be an origional work -- I did not intend to pass this particular bit of wisdom off as my own creation.
Ugh, I'm really tired of these posts. If you want to see preaty naked women there are many more direct ways than watching second rate movies with female protagonists hoping to see a nipple slip past the censors.
1) Rent a Porn 2) Go to a Strip club 3) Go to a Bar (a trendy one)
I'll guarantee that you see naked women and/or half-naked women -- on occasion you'll even see women that look as good or better than Charlize Theron.
Oh! and you might even get a chance to actually *talk* to a woman! How cool would that make you huh?
[All jokes about Coke and Columbia aside] This is just the kind of thing that happens when companies outsource good American (e.g. U.S.) jobs. Demand that your next bottle of pop (soda, whatever) is bottled in the Good Ol' U.S. of A. by a red-blooded American.
Buying American products means good jobs for the folks here at home. Don't support Communism with your made in China Wal-Mart products. The reds are out to get us through retail outlets! Buy American! Support Freedom!
A university in the city where a catastrophic failure in civil engineering resulted in the deaths of more than a thousand people and destruction of billions of dollars of property - that university is cancelling its civil engineering program?
Makes sence to me -- Apparently their civil engineering program isn't that effective...
There are some fine lines between art and porn...stuff like: http://konzababy.tripod.com/photography.htm (?Not?Safe?For?work?) Click the tiny image to enlarge. -- Is this art or porn? (I say art 100%)
See this interview (Not Safe For Work) on domai.com for an interesting dialog about nudes/art/porn. -- Is Domai Porn? Difficult to say (I lean more toward yes, but I have reservations)
I agree -- give me a dialog box over that weird-o right sidebar any day. It's not intuitive at all, and can be confusing to inexperienced users. The first time I encountered that interface blunder I went searching for an option to revert to using the old dialog box system -- but I never found it. I guess it's abiword for me again...
Slashdot Mirror
This article was a serious waste of time. The author didn't offer any new or innovative ideas providing only a seriously myopic framework.
There are many issues in human-computer interfaces that the author left untouched. The first, and most obvious, is a change in paradigm from personl to (what has been coined as) ultra-personal computing. Who is to say that we'll spend as much time (or any time at all) sitting in front of a desktop or laptop computer? I'm not the only (or first) person to consider the idea that the personal computer will evolve into a function of a cellphone or similar technology (think: your phone as your computer) [Dropping it into a dock (or what-have-you) to gain access to a larger display, kybd, mouse, etc.? Tiny projected displays/input devices?] If computing does take such a turn, what kind of interfaces would we be looking at? How would we perform common tasks such as spreadsheet/word processing? Would we use different kinds of applications to achieve the same ends? Would we access and information in different ways?
Another issue is accessability. At present it is difficult for blind users to access computers. All the existing solutions are clumsy and don't interface well with our vision-centric computing environments. A 3d interface would make this much worse! I've always thought that the data and the presentation should be separated. Consider a website with the data in one area and a visual presentation defined in another. It would be simple to add a non-visual presentation definition in the same object -- allowing blind users [or users with tiny displays (cellphone users?)?] to access the same information in a more effective way. This was promised by the web, but thats all changed now. Websites 'designed for 800x600' etc. started to appear (killing a major feature of html -- it's ability to be rendered on disparate displays). Now ajax, 'dynamic web content', and other technologies further decay the users ability to access information on devices other than desktop style computers using a GUI. Decoupling the information from its presentation could change all of that without killing the benefits these new technologies bring us. (? Think different kinds of documents: static, form, application ?)
The author also seems to focus on a single aspect of computing: content retrieval. The auther implies that the user interface is nothing more than the method by which information is located by the user and says very little about how information should be presented other than some content should be 2d instead of 3d. When I use a computer, there are certain things I want to be able to do. I want to locate data, create or modify data, and interact with data. The author doesn't seem to what to do anything other than organize his data to make it easy to locate.
My appologies if I rambled a bit. Computer interfaces are a very complex topic that I don't feel the auther did justice to. I'm also annoyed that the author seems to be pushing his own 3d interface product instead of tackling a real computing issue. (That and his reference to the four color problem, which he doesn't seem to know the name of.)
My first harddisk was 40mb. The manual that came with it was for the 20mb model -- there was a single loose-leaf insert that gave the specs for the 40mb model. I ran a BBS (yes, it had LORD) on a 286 with a 1200 baud modem (which I thought was elite awesome). I remember in the early 90s when I added a second 512mb HD to my machine to get an amazing 1gb of disk space.
... those days sucked. [I picked up an IBM Aptiva (66mhz) a few months before a friend of mine got his new machine (75mhz). I was sad.]
Those were not the days
The good old days (for me) were the mid 80s. I had a C64 (with a Floppy Drive!) that replaced a coleco Adam (horray!). You could write a game on that thing which was just as good as the commercial stuff in just a few weeks during your spare time. Computer magazines almost always had code that did something cool. There were even 'which-way' style books (the 'micro adventure' series) that had computer programs for you to enter and run (brought you into the action).
Those were the days.
For an excellent (and certainly more through) account of the advent of the personal computer you should check out Fire in the Valley by Paul Freiberger and Michael Swaine. It's one of those rare non-fiction works that truly engages you in the story. It even includes a copy of the letter Bill Gates wrote about software piracy (c. 1976).
What would stop you from using seperate windows? In FireFox, I get a new window by default -- not a new tab. When I right-click on a link the first option I get is to "Open Link in New Window" *followed* by "Open Link in New Tab". If you've used a browser that supports tabs before you'd know this. My contention is that you've never used a browser that supports tabs and are simply afrade of change.
We are at war with Open XML. We have always been at war with Open XML and allied with OpenDocument... Winston Smith knows this...
How is Apple "blocking competitors' products"? I don't need an iPod to use iTunes. There are services other than iTunes I can use to buy digital music. There are pleanty of digital music players that are not made by Apple. Apple is in no way restricting end-user chioce! I don't know where you got that idea.
LAMP -> Linux, Apache, MySQL, [PHP|PERL]
Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (Abelson & Sussman) is avaliable to read online for free!
Some treasures on my shelf:
D. Knuth, The Art of Computer Programming (Volumes 1-3)
D. Berlinski, A Tour of the Calculus
D. Berlinski, The Advent of the Algorithm
G. Polya, How to Solve It
P. Beckmann, A History of Pi
G. Lakoff & R. Nunez, Where Mathematics Comes From
Aho & Ullman, Principles of Compiler Design (1st Ed.)
Aho & Sethi & Ullman, Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools
P. Freiberger & M. Swaine, Fire in the Valley: The Making of The Personal Computer
H. Sheldon, Boyd's Introduction to the Study of Disease
C. Petzold, Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software
Anyone of these would have made a good gift for me -- and I'm sure other geeks would appreciate these as well. That is, if they don't own them already.
On a related note: The conference proceedings from the ACM SIGCSE add quite a bit to my library every year. The membership is very affordable and makes an excellent gift (provided, of course, that the geek in question is not already a member of the ACM). I'm not sure about the other SIGs, but you certainly get your dues worth out of SIGCSE.
My appologies -- though I can't be certain that Cliff coined the phrase. I first read this quote in the Reader Digest (though I forget what issue). Subsequent searches for the origional author returned only anonymous sources. Also, I figured that this little joke was so well known that it wouldn't be assumed to be an origional work -- I did not intend to pass this particular bit of wisdom off as my own creation.
Ugh, I'm really tired of these posts. If you want to see preaty naked women there are many more direct ways than watching second rate movies with female protagonists hoping to see a nipple slip past the censors.
1) Rent a Porn
2) Go to a Strip club
3) Go to a Bar (a trendy one)
I'll guarantee that you see naked women and/or half-naked women -- on occasion you'll even see women that look as good or better than Charlize Theron.
Oh! and you might even get a chance to actually *talk* to a woman! How cool would that make you huh?
fucking dorks...
[All jokes about Coke and Columbia aside] This is just the kind of thing that happens when companies outsource good American (e.g. U.S.) jobs. Demand that your next bottle of pop (soda, whatever) is bottled in the Good Ol' U.S. of A. by a red-blooded American.
Buying American products means good jobs for the folks here at home. Don't support Communism with your made in China Wal-Mart products. The reds are out to get us through retail outlets! Buy American! Support Freedom!
115 ways to earn money with your computer.
Does not include: Gold Farming or Fishing
Remember that old saying -- [Give a man a fish: he eats for a day. Teach a man to phish: he eats for a lifetime.]
A Freudian Slip is when you say one thing, but mean your mother...
Ignore the AC. I clicked the link and it is safe. Not only is it save, it has exactly what the grandparent said it has.
ack! Don't mod the parent +1 Informative -- That would be wrong -- Mod him -1 Mind Virus.
i sorder
It's Seasonal Affective Disorder. NOT Attitude. Affective!
http://www.sada.org.uk/
http://www.outsidein.co.uk/sadinfo.htm
http://www.mentalhealth.com/book/p40-sad.html
http://www.nosad.org/
http://www.ncpamd.com/seasonal.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasonal_affective_d
That should be RDFA -- You've seriously devalued that acronym! Be careful, a mistake like that could cost you billions...
It's moving South relative to it's earlier position. I wouldn't worry unless it somehow managed to move east.
Makes sence to me -- Apparently their civil engineering program isn't that effective...
They can filter all the porn they want -- as soon as they can define it: http://www.spectacle.org/296/opt.html (Safe For Work)
... porn?
(Or, even better, tell me why it's immoral.)
More seriously:
There are some fine lines between art and porn...stuff like: http://konzababy.tripod.com/photography.htm
(?Not?Safe?For?work?) Click the tiny image to enlarge. -- Is this art or porn? (I say art 100%)
Even closer still are things like http://www.domai.com (Not Safe For Work)
See this interview (Not Safe For Work) on domai.com for an interesting dialog about nudes/art/porn. -- Is Domai Porn? Difficult to say (I lean more toward yes, but I have reservations)
Any thoughts? What makes porn
Hmmm...probably not a very good assessment. I think the *user* fails the Turing Test if they click on the link...
You have no chance to survive make your time!
The parent was making a joke about pornography.
I agree -- give me a dialog box over that weird-o right sidebar any day. It's not intuitive at all, and can be confusing to inexperienced users. The first time I encountered that interface blunder I went searching for an option to revert to using the old dialog box system -- but I never found it. I guess it's abiword for me again...
To whomever modded my post "flamebait" and "overrated": please die.