QUOTE = Any computer-savvy eye can determine, at a glance, the usefulness and quality of an interface. Whoa!!! I have to respectfully disagree. My first reaction to emacs’ interface was *barf. It is still gag, but I am now well aware of the remarkable effectiveness of it’s UI. Remember folks that computer interface ergonomics is not just ‘pretty layout’ but a hard and fast discipline. An ugly layout of buttons can sometimes be quantitatively more effective than a minimal and pretty ‘Apple-like’ UI. Of course, if you are not sure, stick to the Apple UI guidelines, they have quite a bit of research behind them.* –General/JeremyJurksztowicz
Computer ergonomics is hardly what anyone should call a “hard and fast discipline”. But it IS an arena where someone can pretend to some “expertise” and deliver gassy sermons that purport to demonstrate what a kick-ass, get-down expert he is. Jeremy, you have a growing reputation here about feeding local flame wars here with ostentatious rhetoric like that seen above. But it boils down to saying basically nothing: “Sometimes one thing works better, sometimes another thing does.” If you have hard-and-fast, bring it. – General/BoozeDog
And let the flame-wars begin anew! :-) In all seriousness, a good layout (in my experience) is synonymous with an effective UI. Sure, any UI is “powerful” when it has lots of functionality and you’re able to learn it all like the back of your hand. However, you’re comparing non-GUI to GUI here when you bring up emacs. Technically, anything that displays something is “graphic” in nature, but in reality, emacs is not a graphical app. It’s important to acknowledge this difference. Further, since when did “clean” and “simple” become ineffective? In all my experience and reading of the experiences and expert opinions of others, I’ve never seen anything but the exact opposite of this - that clean and simple are the most effective. The more nitty-gritty functions being tucked neatly away while the primary elements are available but out of the way is the goal of every modern GUI. Just my $0.02.
and I’d give you at least fi’ty cent for it. Well said. – General/BoozeDog
I would but that dang lockness monster just asked me for tree-fitty.
Diddy?
A significant proportion of this community probably wouldn’t recognize the American pop culture references … ;-)
Wow, I have a reputation, I tend to touch nerves wherever I go! I tend to support unpopular view points, and thus do get into flame-wars unusually often (C++ memory mangement is easy, visual basic has some advantages over cocoa, bush jr. is a great president… wink) but I resent that you called my measured response to a contentious statement ‘ostentatious rhetoric’. I thought I gave a pretty good overview of why I disagreed, but I failed english class in high-school, so…
Someone asked for an example… Logic Audio. I bought it after using Ableton Live, which has by all accounts a MUCH CLEANER interface. For the first few months I regretted paying 600 clams for a button-o-rama whack-a-mole interface. But now I cannot consider going back. Logic Audio has a MORE EFFICIENT interface for experts, and a far less efficient interface for beginers.
Well, anyways, take a look at ‘The Humane Interface’ by the late great Jef Raskin and you will see there are quantitative rules for measuring the effectiveness of a UI (‘About Face’ is also really good. It is written by the designer of visual basic (I think…) but he rips microsoft a new one for its UI undesign). And I did not say that a clean and simple UI is ineffective, just that UI design is NOT ALWAYS intuitive, sometimes it is counter-intuitive. Well, I will not claim that I am a UI expert, I am only echoing the sentiments of two highly qualified and reputable authors who’s books I have read. Then again the Warren Commision was ‘reputable’, so who knows. –General/JeremyJurksztowicz
Maybe this thread should be moved to UI page. It really doesn’t have anything to do with General/ActiveDeveloper. DONE
Worse, yet, General/ActiveDeveloper doesn’t have anything to do with anything but marketing. The whole freaking mess should have been deleted ages ago, but here at General/CocoaDev every voice deserves to be heard. Live with it. Jeremy: *I tend to support unpopular view points, and thus do get into flame-wars *. No one is really asking you to shut up; just make sure you are not confusing cause and effect here. I’m grateful for all contributions at General/CocoaDev; there are not many places on the planet to converse with intelligent people.
No one who is not intelligent can be expected to have mastered Cocoa. <— That hurt my brain for a second.
“only intelligent people can master cocoa” sounded somewhat elitist to me. My rewording does not make my sentiment any the less elitist.
or less true?