[PREV - ALLEN_WRENCH_SYNDROME]    [TOP]

YOU_AND_I_DIFFER

                                             February 17, 2013
                                             August   03, 2013


                                                 THE_COMPUTER_PHILOSOPHERS
   Another trip back to the
   cathedrals and bazaars.

   JWZ defends why he uses Safari
   rather than Firefox (the product of
   a software project he helped start)...    http://www.jwz.org/blog/2012/04/why-i-use-safari-instead-of-firefox/

    "I think history has proven that                 I could spend a long time
    UI is different than software."                  trying to resolve the
                                                     apparent contradictions
    The central idea here is that                    in that piece, not to
    the management techniques                        mention psychoanalyzing
    (or lack-thereof) of open                        the oddly defensive tone
    source software do not work                      underlying it all, but
    for developing (and maintaining)                 I'm trying to resist.
    the user-interface.

        There are various ways you
        can make a case for that:

        o  many programmer-designed applications
           have really strange, clunky interfaces,
           and the programmers involved famously
           remain blind to this, and resist all
           criticism.

        o  most of the more popular open source
           applications are slavish imitations          Consider the case of
           of already existing commercial releases.     gimp: it originally
                                                        had a very unusual
                                                        (and in my opinion,
    Presumably then, the idea                           very interesting)
    is: consistency requires                            UI revolving entirely
    central authority.                                  around right-click
                                                        menus and keyboard
        Mussolini made the trains                       shortcuts that could
        run on time, Jobs made all                      be easily redefined
        the menus work the same.                        on-the-fly.
           
        (And Apple's symbol                               As the project
        was once a rainbow...)                            progressed, they
                                                          dropped that in
                                                          favor of the
                                                          conventional menu
                                                          bar across the top.

   If the idea is that there's
   One True UI, one ideal way
   that all will embrace once
   shown the way-- there are       NOTHING_IS_PURE
   reasons to doubt that...
                                               DEEPKEYS
   My own experience has been that I am
   clearly not one of "the rest of us".
   Apple has always had it's enthusiasts,
   but despite various tries on my part,
   I have never become one of them.


        I'm entirely in sympathy with jwz's
        complaint about the difficulty with           CUSTOM_FIRE
        shutting off new features you don't
        want in Firefox...

        But isn't it interesting that there
        are people like myself who really
        and truly do like tabbed browsing,
        even though jwz hates it?

        That alone would appear to establish
        that it's not possible to come up with
        the one true UI, the one way of
        Getting It Done that fits everyone.

            So then, there's a need for some
            range of choice...

            And after that, it comes down to
            questions of granularity: how
            many different commpeting
            projects are optimum, how many
            subdivisions within the projects
            are workable, etc.






--------
[NEXT - ROUND_PENTAGON]