I was thinking about ways to do mass usability testing, and had the
following idea, it may or may not be crazy. heck this may not even be
the right forum.

Create a "demo" disk. 

it shouldn't be to hard to create a bootable Cd rom that boots linux
and  kde. first off I rejected the idea based off the number of
insanely strange hardware combo's but I've found some potential work
arounds.

1: video hardware can be bypassed by useing Xfree86-framebuffer, and
and the kernel framebuffer for Vesa 2.0 now I know not all cards
support vesa 2.0 but I think the VAST majority do. 

2: Mice. as of X4.1.0 the Xconfig file supports mulitiple mouse
deffinitions, we could simply include one for ps/2 and another for
serial. 

3: Monitor modes, again shouldnt' be a problem if the card supports
vesa modes. 

I was thinking tie a relavent kernel (2.4.[67]) with a customize
boot-logo patch applied would abstract the user away from the kernel
completely (a good thing for unbiased testing IMO)

Ok so I'm sure your wondering what this has to do with usability
testing? simple. You put KDE / Gnome / or Both on the disk, along with
a questionarie. users play with it, and submit the questionaire via
e-mail.

of course we would have to write some sort of rollover failsafe script
to launch different kinds of network drivers etc. but I think it would
work. 

questions? comments? snide remarks?

-Kevin

=====
May the Penguin be with you!
    (o_      Kevin Poorman
    //\      Netalix@Yahoo.com
    V_/_     AOLIM: Netalix, Shyslpwlkr or TheUnchosen1

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