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List:       kde-look
Subject:    Re: DialogBoxes (was: Cookie window popup)
From:       Sean Pecor <sean () digitalspinner ! com>
Date:       2000-09-10 14:01:48
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On Sun, 10 Sep 2000, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
> In my opinion, the only reason many users work in full-screen mode is
> because MS Office apps default to full-screen mode, and they don't know
> how to get out of it. So they think that's the only way the programs
> work.

That could be. But most novice and the majority of the intermediate 
computer users I've monitored in focus groups do not even have a basic 
understanding of task switching or "multiple windows". They don't understand 
that you can run more than one program and task switch. They don't understand 
that two windows beside each other can be different programs. They don't use 
the task bar even though it sits there taunting them constantly. 

To understand and work with multiple programs and tasks, one has to grasp the 
concept that all tasks are really just one task. Most people just never get 
there. If they had, this mentality would have pervaded every consumer device 
in existence. But it hasn't. Picture-in-picture TVs never entered the 
mainstream for this reason; people may click-click-click all day but at any 
given time they're watching only one thing (while being continually 
_distracted_ by advertising overlays). Universal remote controls sell like 
crack-cocaine because people prefer one remote control with forty buttons 
instead of three with twenty buttons each (each arguably more intuitive than 
the big universal remote but I digress). 

I admit I don't use full screen widows 100% of the time. I'll get out of them 
when I'm forced to do so (drag-drop limitations, etc.). But full screen 
windows enhance the particular way that I like to work, and as a bonus I 
don't spend time monkeying around with window placements frantically like 
I've watched others do. 

Sean.

-- 
Digital Spinner, Inc.
802.948.2020
sean@digitalspinner.com

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