GUI Bloopers author Jeff Johnson refers to this type of interface (or blooper, as he calls it) as a "TTY GUI". I think that description adequately fits the bill.
By the way, Tim. You are one of the smartest people who posts Slashdot. And I don't give props too often.
Sims, from a UI standpoint, is very well designed. The buttons are nice and big, which means they're fast to access via Fitts law. The buttons appear in a pie-shaped fashion around the mouse pointer, which further increases access time (you don't have to go down a list of buttons button by button. The pie shape means that each button is adjacent to the mouse pointer).
A lot of idiots throw high-technology at usability problems. Especially all those people touting web based interfaces (and of course, we've never, ever seen a confusing, difficult-to-navigate web page, have we? None of those exist;) ) Usability problems are not technology problems, they are people problems. The silicon based computer is not speaking the same protocol as the carbon-based one. The solution is not to add RAM and CPU cycles to the silicon computer, but get the silicon computer to speak the same protocol the carbon-based computer speaks.
I can get a mobile version same thing by tying my Agenda VR around the neck of a pit bull.His rate is actually quite competitive with that of a well-trained security specialist.
There actually is a guy named David Gelernter who came up with something like this. Because of his computer science background, was a unabomber victim. While he was recovering, he came up with a system called "LifeStreams" that would record data throughout a person's life as if their entire life was some sort of filestream that is constantly added to.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/5.02/fflifest re ams_pr.html
While the icon metaphor is limited, part of the problems people are having with it are not so much related to the design itself, but the fact that so many programmers do so many cognitively unsound things that shouldn't be done in any interface design on any platform. And this is what is really causing many users to suffer through today's desktop interfaces. For example, some programmer might implement a button layout where it is not clear how one widget relates to another. One button on one side of the screen may have some relationship to a list that is in some obscure location somewhere else on the screen (as opposed placing the button right next to the list it acts on). Or one program might have both the menu selections "Customize" and "Options", which is ridiculously confusing for the user because both words refer to the same exact type of thing (configuring something in a program) but perform different actions. I'm not pulling that particular example out of my butt--I'm taking it directly from Microsoft. Before we eliminate the icons, we need to eliminate many programmers' lack of understanding about how to create usable interfaces. If we don't do this and simply go from icons to something else, they'll just end up making the next great interface as equally miserable as the current one.
The mouse has been proven in usability labs to be faster than keyboard shortcuts. A true GUI power user has no probably with this scientifically proven fact and uses the mouse and a GUI designed to take full advantage of it. A clueless newbie (which a lot of *nix people tend to be the second things get graphical) would engage in the far more cognitively expensive and slower task of mentally sorting through what arbitrary sequence of keys do what. If the *nix people would, in the words of Yoda, unlearn what they have learned for the past 30 years, linux would make far more progress on the desktop.
If the hollywood studios use the dvd's in their linux rendering boxes to view their latest CG work, will they have start writing themselves threatening e-mails?
Marathon Tempus Irae is without question the most original, most creative, most engaging FPS scenario ever created. The artwork was phenominal, especially considering that the marathon engine is only 2.5D. One haven't lived until they've blown away Pfhor in an exsquisitely decorated 16th century italian chapel to the tune of chanting monks.
It's a lot easier that way. If you know the right bars to look in, you can shop around and get a pretty good deal right now. Of course, if your SO comes with a lifelong service contract, this is a WAY toi expensive upgrade path.
We already know where this one will go. When that senior executive finds out what PVR's are and what they can really do, you can bet that he's going to scream bloody murder and threaten TiVO with lawyers unless they put in a piece of hardware that makes you watch the ads. Wouldn't it be cool if instead of reacting with lawsuit (which we all know the networks will inevitably do) they responded to PVR's by making ads fun to watch?
Slashdot Mirror
I just know that one day some sick bastard will bring his ti-book to an x-ray technician who'll be started to find a gerbil shoved up his PCMCIA slot.
GUI Bloopers author Jeff Johnson refers to this type of interface (or blooper, as he calls it) as a "TTY GUI". I think that description adequately fits the bill.
By the way, Tim. You are one of the smartest people who posts Slashdot. And I don't give props too often.
Sims, from a UI standpoint, is very well designed. The buttons are nice and big, which means they're fast to access via Fitts law. The buttons appear in a pie-shaped fashion around the mouse pointer, which further increases access time (you don't have to go down a list of buttons button by button. The pie shape means that each button is adjacent to the mouse pointer).
;) ) Usability problems are not technology problems, they are people problems. The silicon based computer is not speaking the same protocol as the carbon-based one. The solution is not to add RAM and CPU cycles to the silicon computer, but get the silicon computer to speak the same protocol the carbon-based computer speaks.
A lot of idiots throw high-technology at usability problems. Especially all those people touting web based interfaces (and of course, we've never, ever seen a confusing, difficult-to-navigate web page, have we? None of those exist
I can get a mobile version same thing by tying my Agenda VR around the neck of a pit bull.His rate is actually quite competitive with that of a well-trained security specialist.
(with apologies to the Blue Oyster Cult)
With the best of intentions and Netscape's old code
They produce a browser that tends to explode
Rendering pages in pure XML
XUL's really great, but performance is hell
Standards compliant every way they can be
But slow as a bear when compared to IE
Oh, no. We wish these bugs would go
Go go Mozilla, yeah
Oh, no. The rendering's so slow
Go go Mozilla, yeah
History explains as a matter of course
How mega codebases deter open source
Mozilla!
Out with the swords and spells and in with the falling anvils and pianos. They should make a fortune off of Acme product placement.
Since sex ed classes are too controversial, they'll just let the kids trade cyberporn to learn about the human body.
whoops. I meant to say
/SCHWING
SCHWING Check out that hot babe
Check out that hot babe
Wasn't Ron Jeremy in that?
If one ball hangs lower than the other, how will that affect reentry?
There actually is a guy named David Gelernter who came up with something like this. Because of his computer science background, was a unabomber victim. While he was recovering, he came up with a system called "LifeStreams" that would record data throughout a person's life as if their entire life was some sort of filestream that is constantly added to.
t re ams_pr.html
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/5.02/fflifes
While the icon metaphor is limited, part of the problems people are having with it are not so much related to the design itself, but the fact that so many programmers do so many cognitively unsound things that shouldn't be done in any interface design on any platform. And this is what is really causing many users to suffer through today's desktop interfaces. For example, some programmer might implement a button layout where it is not clear how one widget relates to another. One button on one side of the screen may have some relationship to a list that is in some obscure location somewhere else on the screen (as opposed placing the button right next to the list it acts on). Or one program might have both the menu selections "Customize" and "Options", which is ridiculously confusing for the user because both words refer to the same exact type of thing (configuring something in a program) but perform different actions. I'm not pulling that particular example out of my butt--I'm taking it directly from Microsoft. Before we eliminate the icons, we need to eliminate many programmers' lack of understanding about how to create usable interfaces. If we don't do this and simply go from icons to something else, they'll just end up making the next great interface as equally miserable as the current one.
The mouse has been proven in usability labs to be faster than keyboard shortcuts. A true GUI power user has no probably with this scientifically proven fact and uses the mouse and a GUI designed to take full advantage of it. A clueless newbie (which a lot of *nix people tend to be the second things get graphical) would engage in the far more cognitively expensive and slower task of mentally sorting through what arbitrary sequence of keys do what. If the *nix people would, in the words of Yoda, unlearn what they have learned for the past 30 years, linux would make far more progress on the desktop.
Real geeks use punchcards!
"The same thing we try to do every night, Pinky...try to take over glibc!"
Future scientists will conclude that Matt Groening was right: dark matter is basically cute alien shit.
Personally, I've never found windows' constant delays to be very appealing.
If the hollywood studios use the dvd's in their linux rendering boxes to view their latest CG work, will they have start writing themselves threatening e-mails?
Marathon Tempus Irae is without question the most original, most creative, most engaging FPS scenario ever created. The artwork was phenominal, especially considering that the marathon engine is only 2.5D. One haven't lived until they've blown away Pfhor in an exsquisitely decorated 16th century italian chapel to the tune of chanting monks.
Is it just me, or does Curl seem very Lisp influenced?
Dolly the Jedi Slayer
It's a lot easier that way. If you know the right bars to look in, you can shop around and get a pretty good deal right now. Of course, if your SO comes with a lifelong service contract, this is a WAY toi expensive upgrade path.
You could wear running socks running SOCKS
If I could manipulate entire universes, I'd find chess kind of boring.
We already know where this one will go. When that senior executive finds out what PVR's are and what they can really do, you can bet that he's going to scream bloody murder and threaten TiVO with lawyers unless they put in a piece of hardware that makes you watch the ads. Wouldn't it be cool if instead of reacting with lawsuit (which we all know the networks will inevitably do) they responded to PVR's by making ads fun to watch?