Some of the objectives mentioned here can be helped by putting Scratch (http://scratch.mit.edu/) in the hands of the students.
There is a version for Ubuntu (hence Debian) available
Yeah! If they keep at it, I can see a massive backlash on the horizon. "Enough is enough with these so called rights! From now on, we use information freely like God intended and that's that!"
Since they are not technical people, it's a waste of time to try to explain what's in the Blackbox at hand.
Focus instead on the consequences of the choices offered. As in "If you go with choice number 1, it'll cost the company 2 millions dollars and there is a high risk of delay. Choice number two, on the other hand, means good integration with our infrastructure, cost less and offers better chances of success." They can understand these choices.
I've not read all the previous comments but, in case it was not mentioned, here's the link to http://www.sciencedaily.com/ which I consult occasionally to find good reading material on science.
There is a companion site, Arts & Letters Daily, at http://aldaily.com/ which cover the world of ideas, humanities and literature which is also very nourishing, for those who sometimes come up for air from the deeps of tech.
I just thought of an appropriate analogy for what I mean.
Librarians classify their books according to some carefully developed system (Dewey or Library of Congress, generally). This is the interoperable standard against which all participants operate. For instance, nowadays, book publishers provide the appropriate Dewey and Lib of Congress "metatag" to help the librarians do their job. Because the publisher does his small bit, countless librarians benefit. The tag is carefully chosen by the most competent agent and the resulting classification is less prone to errors than if each librarian had to do it for him/herself as in the past. Information sharing at it's best!
Replace Dewey with an appropriate series of tags for a given file type and allow the file format to embedd the tags and voilà, instant sorted collections of files.
Yes. Precisely. As with MP3, I envision that each file type would be associated with a given set of tags appropriate to its nature which would satisfy the majority of obvious classification needs. Each user would then be free to use or not a "Type Manager", in the sense developped in this thread, to navigate his collection of files of this particular type. A big help, in my opinion when one accumulates hundreds of files that must now be classified manually.
The concept needs careful thinking, of course, but it's an idea worth considering, don't you think?
Still, a big part of the work is already done. As with MP3, we would have tag editors that wouls allow us to touch up things a bit. I'm a dreamer, I know.
MP3's ID tags provide a way for iTunes and all to generate a path-like and intuitive classification of files (/artist/album/piece/etc.) that everybody can share. I, for one would welcome a world where my downloaded files of all types would be automatically sorted because millions of people would have taken the few minutes needed to metatag them correctly at creation time. Why limit this to MP3?
General users are not, and never will become, computer geeks. They need to control their computer through GUIs. This means that the GUI must present the following inescapable, unavoidable characteristics:
- Clarity (When people say they want simplicity, they usually mean clarity);
- Exhaustivity (Everything that must be done must be available through the GUI. No dropping into.config files for the end user);
- Consistency (To minimize learning curve or, in other words, reuse what the user has learned);
The role of clarity and consistency is to provide quick and painless learning.
By exhaustivity, I mean that users must have a (clear and consistent) way to do the following:
- install Linux;
- upgrade Linux;
- install and uninstall applications;
- replace hardware parts and their associated drivers;
- personalize their own Linux;
- manage security;
- and everything else I may have missed.
We need an organisation structured like the IETF or the W3C whose purpose would be to evolve a complete specification of a clear and consistent user experience giving the user total control of his machine. Programmers and distributions would be free to branch out, but over time, the availability of a good user experience proposition (and high level libraries to easily implement its various facets) would win over developers as well as users, and a commun culture will develop.
Right now, the geeks are happy with Linux, but the genral user is totally, utterly confused.
Slashdot Mirror
Give him MIT's Scratch! Definitely. http://scratch.mit.edu/
Some of the objectives mentioned here can be helped by putting Scratch (http://scratch.mit.edu/) in the hands of the students. There is a version for Ubuntu (hence Debian) available
Yeah! If they keep at it, I can see a massive backlash on the horizon. "Enough is enough with these so called rights! From now on, we use information freely like God intended and that's that!"
Since they are not technical people, it's a waste of time to try to explain what's in the Blackbox at hand. Focus instead on the consequences of the choices offered. As in "If you go with choice number 1, it'll cost the company 2 millions dollars and there is a high risk of delay. Choice number two, on the other hand, means good integration with our infrastructure, cost less and offers better chances of success." They can understand these choices.
I've not read all the previous comments but, in case it was not mentioned, here's the link to http://www.sciencedaily.com/
which I consult occasionally to find good reading material on science.
There is a companion site, Arts & Letters Daily, at http://aldaily.com/ which cover the world of ideas, humanities and literature which is also very nourishing, for those who sometimes come up for air from the deeps of tech.
Enjoy.
Perceptions are important.
I suggest we start substituting the expression "Intellectual Monopoly" every time They use "Intellectual Property".
Not only does this sound better to a pro-liberty public but, more significantly, it restores the original meaning of the copyright notion.
It can also act as a much needed slogan that express most concisely what we mean.
I just thought of an appropriate analogy for what I mean. Librarians classify their books according to some carefully developed system (Dewey or Library of Congress, generally). This is the interoperable standard against which all participants operate. For instance, nowadays, book publishers provide the appropriate Dewey and Lib of Congress "metatag" to help the librarians do their job. Because the publisher does his small bit, countless librarians benefit. The tag is carefully chosen by the most competent agent and the resulting classification is less prone to errors than if each librarian had to do it for him/herself as in the past. Information sharing at it's best! Replace Dewey with an appropriate series of tags for a given file type and allow the file format to embedd the tags and voilà, instant sorted collections of files.
Yes. Precisely. As with MP3, I envision that each file type would be associated with a given set of tags appropriate to its nature which would satisfy the majority of obvious classification needs. Each user would then be free to use or not a "Type Manager", in the sense developped in this thread, to navigate his collection of files of this particular type. A big help, in my opinion when one accumulates hundreds of files that must now be classified manually. The concept needs careful thinking, of course, but it's an idea worth considering, don't you think?
Still, a big part of the work is already done. As with MP3, we would have tag editors that wouls allow us to touch up things a bit. I'm a dreamer, I know.
MP3's ID tags provide a way for iTunes and all to generate a path-like and intuitive classification of files (/artist/album/piece/etc.) that everybody can share. I, for one would welcome a world where my downloaded files of all types would be automatically sorted because millions of people would have taken the few minutes needed to metatag them correctly at creation time. Why limit this to MP3?
General users are not, and never will become, computer geeks. They need to control their computer through GUIs. This means that the GUI must present the following inescapable, unavoidable characteristics: - Clarity (When people say they want simplicity, they usually mean clarity); - Exhaustivity (Everything that must be done must be available through the GUI. No dropping into .config files for the end user);
- Consistency (To minimize learning curve or, in other words, reuse what the user has learned);
The role of clarity and consistency is to provide quick and painless learning.
By exhaustivity, I mean that users must have a (clear and consistent) way to do the following:
- install Linux;
- upgrade Linux;
- install and uninstall applications;
- replace hardware parts and their associated drivers;
- personalize their own Linux;
- manage security;
- and everything else I may have missed.
We need an organisation structured like the IETF or the W3C whose purpose would be to evolve a complete specification of a clear and consistent user experience giving the user total control of his machine. Programmers and distributions would be free to branch out, but over time, the availability of a good user experience proposition (and high level libraries to easily implement its various facets) would win over developers as well as users, and a commun culture will develop.
Right now, the geeks are happy with Linux, but the genral user is totally, utterly confused.