However, I'd be interested to see what Sir Clive can come up with. He did bring an awful lot of either innovative, inventive or first/early-to-market things about. However that was quite a while ago...
I don't mind if CLI is left in a platform, however, my feelings are that if I can't do whatever I want to do in a GUI tool/util/app then it's not finished.
If you use a WIMP platform you can - if it's written properly - divine that clicking and moving the mouse around gives you various bits of information or settings; it gives an obvious feedback.
You can extend that to saying if you click on the correct places you can find the settings and functions that you might want: given the caveat that you know what functionality you want, and I mean in a gross level of detail such as "I want to write a new letter" or "I want to change my display resolution". So by experimentation and generally without referral to some lengthy tome or incomprehensible MAN pages, you can get there as long as you don't panic. (An important consideration amongst new computer users, replaced by not giving into frustration amongst more experiences computer users)
When you find yourself stuck though, unable to do some simple but critical task (configuring network settings, display settings, for instance) except to go into a CLI and try and work your way around the mire, then it's needing work.
Linux isn't fun, until the GUI is done. To paraphrase someone or other...
There is no bigger disincentive to actually try and use Linux than to go online and ask for help and get that ridiculous response... or the partner response:
Well go and code up a fix yourself or quit complaining!
Accessibility shouldn't be considered an incovnenience - it's just good practice.
Might want to follow them at your own site then yeah? See, this is amusing. Preach about following accessibility but even the "not hard to comply" ALT tags, you don't have on your site.:P
Why would you expect an accessibility requirement to improve the graphical appeal of a website?
And therein lies my whole problem with this. Accessibility compliant pages are damn ugly. Almost uniformly.
And so what we end up doing is take a visual medium and break it for those with different needs.
We add a ramp to stairs or make special parking places closer to entrances for disabled people and that doesn't break the stairs or the parking lot. Providing speaking book or braille versions of books doesn't break the textual books. Yet we want to break webpages. Why?
If we want to make sites accessible, then make dual sites. A limited site that has the information in a reader-readable way and the full featured site. A compulsory castration of the visual medium itself is just awful in my opinion.
Ever heard of braille?
Braille isn't a visual medium, the visual artifact is a side effect of it's mechanism of transferral of information.
That was exactly my point. Read the exchange again:
I'm wondering what written text is, if not visual...
Ever heard of braille?
It feels like we're going in a recursive loop here...
All can transfer the same information, yes of course. All three rely on different mediums and senses. The internet is akin to reading a book, but without the paper. It is visual. It can be extended but at it's core it is visual. This isn't difficult.
For instance, McDonald's are legally obliged to provide bathrooms that are specially equipped for people with mobility problems, at least in the UK. However private homes aren't required to provide them. It seems reasonable to draw the line at the same place on the web - so individuals would not be required to follow WCAG (or similar), yet service providers would.
So... what kind of companies? All companies? Or just companies above a certain size? And if all companies, you realise that screws small operations into the ground interms of their web presence costs. And if just above a certain size, what size? How do you determine it? And as soon as you've come up with an arbitrarily defined point where it has to be done, what have you done but put a big pile of eeny meeny miny mo rules that mean nothing except that someone felt they should be in place.
Actually, normal HTML is perfectly accessible to most people, including people with visual difficulties. It's when you start ignoring the specifications or adding extras like Javascript, CSS and Flash that you have the potential to screw up.
What spec are you talking about there? Last I knew Javascript(ECMAScript) and CSS were part of many specs.
Ever heard of braille?
Braille isn't a visual medium, the visual artifact is a side effect of it's mechanism of transferral of information.
The Web is not a visual medium. Yes, it contains a lot of visual content, but there's also plenty of text content that can be presented just fine in a non-visual manner.
Right. This is like saying "A car is not a means of transportation. Yes I can use it for transport, but I can also use it to house my pot plants." Well of course I can do that, but that is stretching the useage to a new area and beyond it's designed for purpose.
And just note that I didn't say accessibility standards were a bad thing. I said makeing them compulsory is.
The Web still consists mostly of text content, and there's nothing visual about that.
I'm wondering what written text is, if not visual...
Some countries (UK, Australia two that I know) have some legislation in place whereby some sites *have* to be designed to meet accessibility guidelines for vision impaired folks.
This really annoyes me. The web is a visual medium. It should not be compulsory to cater for those that can't benefit from a visual medium, in a visual medium.
We don't have legislation to ensure that every book that is released has a braille version and a speaking book version do we? No. Why take on the web this way?
Yes I've been hit by this myself, and it's hugely frustrating being on the end of it as a site developer having the spectre of the law raised above you...
A few months back (4-6 months ago not sure) I downloaded Netscape 4.5 I believe to try and work on website compatibility with it.
I've since lost the files and reinstalled Windows and needed to go get the files again for a new site compatibility problem. Well... just you go and find it now. They used to have a "Download Older Versions of Netscape" link or two. Now? Well if they are still there, they are well hidden. In fact, one link which has a link to a "Free Download" of 4.7 takes you straight to 7.1 download page.
This is beyond no longer developing Netscape. Removing old versions from the site? Excuse me?
Actually, that's a good point. It doesn't seem google actually PRODUCES any sort of content on their own.
Actually, that's a pointless point. Of course google doesn't produce anything; they are a meta data service. Search engines and collators for websites, for news for images and who knows what else.
The issue is whether or not they should be able to collate data that is in some way secured. And on that I'm offering no opinion mainly because I can see all sides of this and hats are all too grey to be able to distinguish for me.
If you think that is idiocy then you've not been keeping up with current US govt practice, policy and law have you?
While that example might not happen, in a country where librarians are expected to report reading habits it is not out of the bounds of reality to see it getting to that stage. Not likely but not entirely improbable or impossible.
Actually it embarrasses me a bit too. I look at how my cursive writing is now if I attempt to do it and it honestly looks like a child's handwriting. Truly awful. When I was at school I always had trouble with cursive (any other left handers out there who found it difficult to deal with?) and my writing was terrible and after a while I gave up and just used to print everything. Even worse I printed (and still do print) everything as different sized capitals.
And then I got to use a Sinclair ZX81 (marketted as a Timex in the US I believe). Eight years old and my handwriting was a writeoff. It didn't hit me then but when I got the BBC Micro and a dot matrix a while later it did: no more handwriting pain for me!
I'm now in my 30s and my handwriting still makes me squirm when I have to do it. It still looks like an 8 year olds and I'm sorry to break it to some people here, but there are times in the real world when you just need to be able to write using a pen or pencil and trying to disguise crappy handwriting doesn't really cut it.
The point I'm getting to in a very roundabout way here is, I don't think people should be quite as glib as many are being here about good riddance to cursive or the 'get with the 21st century' type comments. Cursive is where we came from and to an extent where we still are. If you're without your desktop, laptop or PDA, what are you going to rely on? That shouldn't be forgotten so lightly or willingly.
Having been using a VIA EDEN 800 board (c3-800mhz) as an IIS webserver/db server for a growing website/forum for 4 months now I've certainly got no problems recommending it as a low cost platform.
Board, stick of ram and a hard disc and you're set. If it's reliable (which it is) you can't beat that for a nice small low-cost system.
This is coming from someone who has also had problems with VIA chipset boards in the past... it's more a case of tabasco in one eye but a soothing eyewash in the other.
I'm an Operaphile. Straight up front I'll say that but from my very very brief look at Firebird (.6) I'm impressed. One of the things I can't live without in Opera are the mouse gestures. I know that there has been a - imo - rather crappy implementation of the idea available for Mozilla for a while but it seems that it's finally getting there.
I tried previous releases of Phoenix and while I thought it promising it always has seemed very rough around the edges understandably but this seems to be getting close. Allied with Thunderbird this could be a good mix...
This whole discussion reminds me of the early stories of the fear of driving fast. That the human body couldn't withstand such stresses and would explode...
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think it was funny to begin with. ;)
However, I'd be interested to see what Sir Clive can come up with. He did bring an awful lot of either innovative, inventive or first/early-to-market things about. However that was quite a while ago...
This bugs the crap out of me.
The amount of times I've asked for a solution in windows, explicitly saying it needs to be in windows and having the response:
"Use MySQL on Linux. It's ultrareliable. Why would you need Microsoft or Windows? Why use ASP? Use PHP on Linux. Why use Microsoft? Use Linux."
That kind of mindless kneejerk response is truly counter to the image of Linux.
I don't mind if CLI is left in a platform, however, my feelings are that if I can't do whatever I want to do in a GUI tool/util/app then it's not finished.
If you use a WIMP platform you can - if it's written properly - divine that clicking and moving the mouse around gives you various bits of information or settings; it gives an obvious feedback.
You can extend that to saying if you click on the correct places you can find the settings and functions that you might want: given the caveat that you know what functionality you want, and I mean in a gross level of detail such as "I want to write a new letter" or "I want to change my display resolution". So by experimentation and generally without referral to some lengthy tome or incomprehensible MAN pages, you can get there as long as you don't panic. (An important consideration amongst new computer users, replaced by not giving into frustration amongst more experiences computer users)
When you find yourself stuck though, unable to do some simple but critical task (configuring network settings, display settings, for instance) except to go into a CLI and try and work your way around the mire, then it's needing work.
Linux isn't fun, until the GUI is done. To paraphrase someone or other...
Here here!
There is no bigger disincentive to actually try and use Linux than to go online and ask for help and get that ridiculous response... or the partner response:
Well go and code up a fix yourself or quit complaining!
grit teeth...
And so what we end up doing is take a visual medium and break it for those with different needs.
We add a ramp to stairs or make special parking places closer to entrances for disabled people and that doesn't break the stairs or the parking lot. Providing speaking book or braille versions of books doesn't break the textual books. Yet we want to break webpages. Why?
If we want to make sites accessible, then make dual sites. A limited site that has the information in a reader-readable way and the full featured site. A compulsory castration of the visual medium itself is just awful in my opinion.
Speaking book. Auditory.
Braille. Tactile.
Text. Visual.
All can transfer the same information, yes of course. All three rely on different mediums and senses. The internet is akin to reading a book, but without the paper. It is visual. It can be extended but at it's core it is visual. This isn't difficult.
Legislation should not be arbitrary.
Braille isn't a visual medium, the visual artifact is a side effect of it's mechanism of transferral of information.
Do you also think it should be compulsory for all books to have braille and speaking book versions?
If so, who is going to pay for all that? You?
And just note that I didn't say accessibility standards were a bad thing. I said makeing them compulsory is.
I'm wondering what written text is, if not visual...
Some countries (UK, Australia two that I know) have some legislation in place whereby some sites *have* to be designed to meet accessibility guidelines for vision impaired folks.
This really annoyes me. The web is a visual medium. It should not be compulsory to cater for those that can't benefit from a visual medium, in a visual medium.
We don't have legislation to ensure that every book that is released has a braille version and a speaking book version do we? No. Why take on the web this way?
Yes I've been hit by this myself, and it's hugely frustrating being on the end of it as a site developer having the spectre of the law raised above you...
A few months back (4-6 months ago not sure) I downloaded Netscape 4.5 I believe to try and work on website compatibility with it.
I've since lost the files and reinstalled Windows and needed to go get the files again for a new site compatibility problem. Well... just you go and find it now. They used to have a "Download Older Versions of Netscape" link or two. Now? Well if they are still there, they are well hidden. In fact, one link which has a link to a "Free Download" of 4.7 takes you straight to 7.1 download page.
This is beyond no longer developing Netscape. Removing old versions from the site? Excuse me?
A person is entitled to choose which organisation they give their money to so don't be such a sourpuss. :P
If you want to get into poor/starving/dying people argument then have a go at government rather.
I still listen to the soundtrack CD from Interstate 76. Oops?
Oh yeah.... a racing game with the SS engine. What a lovely thought...
Actually, that's a pointless point. Of course google doesn't produce anything; they are a meta data service. Search engines and collators for websites, for news for images and who knows what else.
The issue is whether or not they should be able to collate data that is in some way secured. And on that I'm offering no opinion mainly because I can see all sides of this and hats are all too grey to be able to distinguish for me.
If you think that is idiocy then you've not been keeping up with current US govt practice, policy and law have you?
While that example might not happen, in a country where librarians are expected to report reading habits it is not out of the bounds of reality to see it getting to that stage. Not likely but not entirely improbable or impossible.
Really? Where do I find out about this. If this is true (I'm sceptical...) then I guess it's lucky I stick mostly with BBC News for my news online...
You can count me as one of the people that ignore the NYT unless I can get a cached page. I get enough spam as it is...
Actually it embarrasses me a bit too. I look at how my cursive writing is now if I attempt to do it and it honestly looks like a child's handwriting. Truly awful. When I was at school I always had trouble with cursive (any other left handers out there who found it difficult to deal with?) and my writing was terrible and after a while I gave up and just used to print everything. Even worse I printed (and still do print) everything as different sized capitals.
And then I got to use a Sinclair ZX81 (marketted as a Timex in the US I believe). Eight years old and my handwriting was a writeoff. It didn't hit me then but when I got the BBC Micro and a dot matrix a while later it did: no more handwriting pain for me!
I'm now in my 30s and my handwriting still makes me squirm when I have to do it. It still looks like an 8 year olds and I'm sorry to break it to some people here, but there are times in the real world when you just need to be able to write using a pen or pencil and trying to disguise crappy handwriting doesn't really cut it.
The point I'm getting to in a very roundabout way here is, I don't think people should be quite as glib as many are being here about good riddance to cursive or the 'get with the 21st century' type comments. Cursive is where we came from and to an extent where we still are. If you're without your desktop, laptop or PDA, what are you going to rely on? That shouldn't be forgotten so lightly or willingly.
Having been using a VIA EDEN 800 board (c3-800mhz) as an IIS webserver/db server for a growing website/forum for 4 months now I've certainly got no problems recommending it as a low cost platform.
Board, stick of ram and a hard disc and you're set. If it's reliable (which it is) you can't beat that for a nice small low-cost system.
This is coming from someone who has also had problems with VIA chipset boards in the past... it's more a case of tabasco in one eye but a soothing eyewash in the other.
I'm an Operaphile. Straight up front I'll say that but from my very very brief look at Firebird (.6) I'm impressed. One of the things I can't live without in Opera are the mouse gestures. I know that there has been a - imo - rather crappy implementation of the idea available for Mozilla for a while but it seems that it's finally getting there.
I tried previous releases of Phoenix and while I thought it promising it always has seemed very rough around the edges understandably but this seems to be getting close. Allied with Thunderbird this could be a good mix...
Worth trying for a while at least.
This whole discussion reminds me of the early stories of the fear of driving fast. That the human body couldn't withstand such stresses and would explode...