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List:       kde-look
Subject:    Oh dear...
From:       Derek <fountai () hursley ! ibm ! com>
Date:       1999-07-12 9:07:31
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I think I can see why this mailing list died now. It's an exposure of
one of the problems of open source development: When everyone has an
opinion, nothing gets done.

The contributions on here over the last few days have been basically
opinion pieces. For instance, while everyone has an opinion on whether
single or double clicking is a good idea, few people seem to have an
appreciation of the HCI issues involved. Lots of people will argue
whether context menus on the right mouse button are a standard or not,
but few seem to contemplate the thought patterns of people who don't
know the standards (ie new users). People are prepared to claim that new
users will earn, but aren't making any efforts to ensure that the man
who is used to, say cutting machinery, can learn to use KDE easily.

Contrary to what some people have said, HCI is not about what is easy to
use for the individual. There is plenty of evidence which points to
things which makes life easier for everyone. Some, like the
accessibility of the corners of the screen, have been discussed. Others
have been touched on, but shouted down by people who, for the most part,
don't know what they are talking about.

It appears that, once again, the HCI of KDE is back in the hands of the
software developers. We are on the verge of missing a great opportunity
here. The way computers currently work makes them difficult to use. This
applies to KDE, Windows and all the others. The press say that Linux is
still harder to use than Windows  As 2.0 is going to be a quantum leap,
we have the chance to fix this, and leap ahead of the competition.

Does anyone have any ideas about how we can start to discuss the issues
sensibly without loads of people just screaming "YOU MIGHT LIKE THAT BUT
*I* DON'T!" whenever am idea is put forward?

Here's one:

Whenever anyone posts an idea, start the post with 'We could make it
configurable that...'. Thus, everyone would know that the option being
put forward isn't something that people will *have* to use. Those who
wouldn't want it know that they could switch it off and so needn't get
involved in the discussion. Perhaps then we could get around to
discussing the merits of the ideas and their implentations.

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