Troll, but I'll bite. Not really.. it's more acknowledging that the parent post was probably only really posted to induce argument, but they feel it worth talking about anyway.
Troll, but I'll bite. One important part of any interface is consistancy. When you break consistancy, you break the model of how things work that the user has created in their heads. For example, when you see an underlined letter on a menu, you know that you can press ALT and that letter to select it. When you see a scrollbar, you know you can use it to navigate a document. When you see underlined text on a webpage, you know you can click it. When you start breaking these things, the user is no longer sure if what they learned works in all situations.
Might I suggest you avoid the underline tag at all costs? Many users associate underlines with hypertext links.. so they will click it and nothing will happen.
How hard would it have been for you to just ignore the story? It's not like they can satisfy 100% of readers 100% of the time. I personally found it to be interesting. Also, you don't really speak for all of Slashdot.
Uh.. I think he means vulnerability to viruses and trojan horses that can modify system files to do nasty things. An MD5 hash database of known good Windows files would be useful for this.
No, we have plenty more to trim out and we're slowly getting to it. Our current targets are 5mb for Windows and between 7 and 8mb for Linux, but these are just guesses. It's entirely possible that we'll beat those (case in point: we had previously targetted 6mb for Windows).
Yeah, Windows most certainly has its share of completely bizarre interfaces (I think WinMX wins the award from me.). I was going to give you a link to the Interface Hall of Shame, which is an interesting collection of them (mostly Windows), but it appears to be down..
Uh, no shit. Hence why I carefully avoided mentioning toolkits, desktop environments and the like. What I suggested was a single UI specification, not windowing environment. Also, realize what a programmer and a power user wants out of a computer is not what a typical user needs. You are not a typical computer user. Nor am I. We'd probably both make lousy interface designers. For my needs, Linux on the desktop is already where it needs to be, but for the common user, I don't feel that is the case. Drink some coffee, and try reading my previous post again.
"Given that we now have this fast, secure, desktop-ready, free OS, why doesn't everyone switch?"
Hate to argue the third point, but until Linux has a single, consistant, easily understandable set of user interface guidelines that most people follow, I don't think we are there yet. One of the main rules of UI design is consistancy, but a user's experiences will differ vastly from one program to the next, often not allowing them to take what they've learned in one program and apply it to another. (for example, toolbars get located in different places, menu layouts work differently, widgets don't behave the same way, buttons on standard dialog boxes are placed differently, some support context menus, some don't, etc etc.) I'm not saying it's any better or worse on the Windows side, but in my eyes, that really is a major hurdle we need to work on as a community before we proclaim Linux a "desktop-ready" OS.
It's less about Eiffel, and more about the attitude of a one-size-fits-all tool, or why use something high level when you can do it lower level. C, Java, Perl, Fortran, C++, VB, Assembly, ObjC, etc all have their place, and can fill different (overlapping needs). But it's silly to claim one language will be the best solution for all possible situations. Sure, you can do pretty much everything in C.. but it might be more time consuming, expensive, harder, or it might be faster, cheaper, easier.. depending on what you're trying to do. There are a lot of right tools for a job.. but there is no one right tool for every job, which is what the AC was claiming.
Any computer program can be expressed in C... why bother with crap...
Yeah, right.. while we're going down that slope at all, any computer program can be expressed as machine code, so why bother with assembly, C, VB, or any of that? Why bother with Photoshop when you can just do stuff pixel by pixel? I think you get the point..
I've always wondered.. all these ACs that go around insulting people's posts.. is it just one loser with too much free time, or a bunch of losers working in tandem?
I think Mastercard has the copyright on that arrangement of words ending with "Priceless" - You just busted their copyright, widely recognized trademark and harmed their good name. Oh oh!
Interestingly enough, they don't really mind that kind of usage, and actually encourage it. I was watching an interview on TV with a MasterCard spokesman.. and he stated that parodies of MasterCard commercials on shows and by people they had no problem with.. but where they draw the line is when people start to use it for their own gains (in this case, they were upset that a political candidate was using a parody of the MasterCard bit in their commercials).
Slashdot Mirror
Killer Linux app to show off:
VMWare
Try THAT under Windows!
Troll, but I'll bite. Not really.. it's more acknowledging that the parent post was probably only really posted to induce argument, but they feel it worth talking about anyway.
Have you ever even touched an iBook with OS X? Hardly doorstop material.
Uh.. the link to goatse was actually on topic and funny, if you had bothered visiting both links he provided.
Troll, but I'll bite. One important part of any interface is consistancy. When you break consistancy, you break the model of how things work that the user has created in their heads. For example, when you see an underlined letter on a menu, you know that you can press ALT and that letter to select it. When you see a scrollbar, you know you can use it to navigate a document. When you see underlined text on a webpage, you know you can click it. When you start breaking these things, the user is no longer sure if what they learned works in all situations.
Might I suggest you avoid the underline tag at all costs? Many users associate underlines with hypertext links.. so they will click it and nothing will happen.
Uhm, when they are the ones DEVELOPING the future PC games, I'd say they have some insight to where things are going.
How hard would it have been for you to just ignore the story? It's not like they can satisfy 100% of readers 100% of the time. I personally found it to be interesting. Also, you don't really speak for all of Slashdot.
Uh.. I think he means vulnerability to viruses and trojan horses that can modify system files to do nasty things. An MD5 hash database of known good Windows files would be useful for this.
Uh.. ever hear of an honest question? Maybe you should look at fmaxwell's post for the proper way to respond.
What industry standards has AOL refused to follow? Just curious.
Uh, from the readme:
:)
No, we have plenty more to trim out and we're slowly getting to it. Our current targets are 5mb for Windows and between 7 and 8mb for Linux, but these are just guesses. It's entirely possible that we'll beat those (case in point: we had previously targetted 6mb for Windows).
There is a reason they are called readmes...
Yeah, Windows most certainly has its share of completely bizarre interfaces (I think WinMX wins the award from me.). I was going to give you a link to the Interface Hall of Shame, which is an interesting collection of them (mostly Windows), but it appears to be down..
Uh, no shit. Hence why I carefully avoided mentioning toolkits, desktop environments and the like. What I suggested was a single UI specification, not windowing environment. Also, realize what a programmer and a power user wants out of a computer is not what a typical user needs. You are not a typical computer user. Nor am I. We'd probably both make lousy interface designers. For my needs, Linux on the desktop is already where it needs to be, but for the common user, I don't feel that is the case. Drink some coffee, and try reading my previous post again.
I guess the parent parent post forgot to close his tag..
LINUX DESKTOP'S FATAL FLAW: X
I dunno.. I thought porn on Linux desktop's was one of it's strong suites..
From the article..
"Given that we now have this fast, secure, desktop-ready, free OS, why doesn't everyone switch?"
Hate to argue the third point, but until Linux has a single, consistant, easily understandable set of user interface guidelines that most people follow, I don't think we are there yet. One of the main rules of UI design is consistancy, but a user's experiences will differ vastly from one program to the next, often not allowing them to take what they've learned in one program and apply it to another. (for example, toolbars get located in different places, menu layouts work differently, widgets don't behave the same way, buttons on standard dialog boxes are placed differently, some support context menus, some don't, etc etc.) I'm not saying it's any better or worse on the Windows side, but in my eyes, that really is a major hurdle we need to work on as a community before we proclaim Linux a "desktop-ready" OS.
Yes.
Well said.. that deserves a +1.
It's less about Eiffel, and more about the attitude of a one-size-fits-all tool, or why use something high level when you can do it lower level. C, Java, Perl, Fortran, C++, VB, Assembly, ObjC, etc all have their place, and can fill different (overlapping needs). But it's silly to claim one language will be the best solution for all possible situations. Sure, you can do pretty much everything in C.. but it might be more time consuming, expensive, harder, or it might be faster, cheaper, easier.. depending on what you're trying to do. There are a lot of right tools for a job.. but there is no one right tool for every job, which is what the AC was claiming.
Ah, that makes a little more sense. :)
Any computer program can be expressed in C... why bother with crap...
Yeah, right.. while we're going down that slope at all, any computer program can be expressed as machine code, so why bother with assembly, C, VB, or any of that? Why bother with Photoshop when you can just do stuff pixel by pixel? I think you get the point..
I've always wondered.. all these ACs that go around insulting people's posts.. is it just one loser with too much free time, or a bunch of losers working in tandem?
I think Mastercard has the copyright on that arrangement of words ending with "Priceless" - You just busted their copyright, widely recognized trademark and harmed their good name. Oh oh!
Interestingly enough, they don't really mind that kind of usage, and actually encourage it. I was watching an interview on TV with a MasterCard spokesman.. and he stated that parodies of MasterCard commercials on shows and by people they had no problem with.. but where they draw the line is when people start to use it for their own gains (in this case, they were upset that a political candidate was using a parody of the MasterCard bit in their commercials).
Sorry, could you say again? I kept getting this static that sounded like "BLAH BLAH I'M AN ANONYMOUS COWARD IGNORE ME"..