HY is it that so many user interfaces simply fail to work? It’s because users are permitted to take shortcuts and ignore the instructions. This is in fact the message which is delivered by Jeff Veen, whose opinion was inspired by another’s.

Veen concludes: “They’re not stupid. They’re not lazy. Don’t treat them that way.” Users are efficient. They want to get the job done with the least effort. It just doesn’t bode well as far as the intent of the developer is concerned.

New Yanoff for Palm – an example of
poor UI design

have just reached page one of Digg’s top users! This puts me at an excellent position in two separate Web sites: MATLAB Central and Digg, with 20^th and 30^th position, respectively.

With MATLAB I have been for 2 years, but with Digg this was achieved within just 2 months, which seems rather amazing to me. Two months to get there translates to more than one story at the front page, per day, on average. The pace on weekdays stands at approximately 3-4 front page (promoted) items per day, which makes my first rave seem almost insignificant and utterly irrelevant.

Season of the playful penguins from Oyonale

Some days ago I found advice and general information for Linux beginners. It seems rather decent, so I’ll quote a slight bit as a teaster.

1. Read, read, read and study what’s available out there before choosing a distribution to install. Unlike Windows there is more than one choice. A good place to start is distrowatch, a sort of “news of what’s new in Linux” site. You’ll find a paragraph of discussion of many older releases as well as new ones.

OME people might argue that I am “some Linux fanboy”, or at least have me characterised in this way. In reality, I care for far more than just an operating system. I care for technology, communication, and openness as a whole.

Among the things that I try to encourage and/or promote:

• Open Source development models and software. This includes the operating system (which in this case, in the Open Source arena, Linux is The operation system).
• (Preferably open) Protocols. For chips, processor, including their underlying designs.
• Standards and formats. I don’t care for people who send me a Word file or a WMV files, which are proprietary. Sadly, people send them innocently, not realising what they do. They can’t wholly take the blame for ignorance, on which software monopolies capitalise.
• I loathe the idea of encrypting one’s data without consent or genuine purpose, e.g. digital right management (DRM). If I wish to engage in a private conversation with someone, we can mutually choose to encrypt it. Applying this ‘crippling stage’ to other people’s personal media and information without their knowledge is just another black area.
• Neutrality and end of discrimination. Against platforms, regions, etc. The idea of Net neutrality is like that of a fast lane for those who pay more, e.g. First Class in airlines. This augments the barrier between the rich and the poor and creates another technological (or digital) divide, which bridging projects like the One Laptop Per Child are stubbornly trying to annihilate.

The bad reputation that the press is giving the term “hacker” is getting. Too. Much. To bear. From this morning’s news.

Supporters of Gary McKinnon have condemned the decision to let the former hacker be extradited to the US.

[...]

“The US Government is scapegoating Gary McKinnon to cover up their ownshortcomings as systems administrators,” he told the BBC News website. “Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?”

For the record, the system administrators did not change the default password, so McKinnon had a look at some files and changed the desktop’s wallpaper. This is based on something that I read in a fairly reliable source last year. It seems as though the current American regime is becoming irrational and suppressive.

The following screenshot, which I grabbed just moments ago, speaks for itself. Many thanks to T.J. from the search engine newsgroup for pointing that one out.

Google proposes Yahoo Search (it shiows up right below Yahoo
Mail) as a candidate for ‘therapy products’

Rarely can you find such ironic screenshots.

HEN was the last time you revised your résumé? Here comes a personal rant. Explicitly putting in skills such as “Word” and “Photoshop”, rather than “office/authoring/WYSIWYG tools” and “graphical design/editing applications” (respectively), is just plain silly. Competence in industry is about skills that are independent of just one commercial application. Times are changing and preferred software changes in accordance. Businesses evolve. Adaptability and familiarity with diversity is where true merits lie. Common function names and icons can help the user quickly familiarise and re-orientate, so generic skills are what truly counts. Think memorisation of menus versus understanding. The paradigm and terminology, as well as menu layouts, will typically remain uniform, owing to the nature of the task at hand.

In conclusion, I would suggest omitting brand names from any curriculum vitæ. Programming languages might be the exception, yet it’s the paradigms that count (e.g. object oriented, scripting, declarative). In programming languages, it’s largely syntax that varies, much as in menus in various applications and common utilities. Avoid being assigned to a vendor, whether it is commercial or not. Failing to do so is pretty much like saying that you can drive a Corsa rather than saying that you are in possession of a drivers’s licence.

An example of a poor user interface
in The GIMP (version 1.2.3)