open tasks, jobs, unmaintained stuff, etc.

[Aaron J. Seigo]

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On March 5, 2004 12:46, Boudewijn Rempt wrote:
> No -- it's about what you think that's commons sense, masked by posturing
> about what you think a majority users should like, but which you don't have
> any hard data for.

when i don't know for sure, i say so. read the usability archives for many 
such examples of me doing just that. i do collect data, but yes, my data 
could be wrong and i don't have lists of everything i've collected in nearly 
so coherent an order as i do the web browser toolbar data i've been 
collecting recently, but i do have data and i do pay attention. unlike most 
of the other people in KDE who do little more than bellyache about things. 

now...

when i say "most people" i don't mean "you don't". you may use something and 
STILL most other people may not! just because your household happens to 
change some specific feature does not all of a sudden make it a common thing. 
many of the things i do to my machines fall into that same category. i'm not 
playing favourites, but i do try and maintain my sense of reality. you say i 
should pay attention to real data, but then also ask me use your house as an 
representative sample!

when i say "it shouldn't be in the main interface because it's buggy" i'm not 
speaking to how many people use it because that's irrelevant. transparency as 
we can currently do it is pathetic. we worked _hard_ getting bugs out of it 
(at least three people that i know of, only one of whom was me), but there 
are still issues that remain. because it's a hack, due to limitations in what 
X can currently do. when it isn't a stupid, broken hack then i have no 
problems with it being there again. i'm not talking about popularity, i'm 
talking about quality and being ready for prime time.

please, pay attention to the words i use rather than argue as if i said 
something different. thank-you.

and as i noted elsewhere, unless you've played with kconfedit you really are 
in a poor place to comment on it.

> Anyway, messing with configuration options has 
> nothing to do with usability.

yes it does; it's one part of the overall usability picture as it is how 
people engage the flexiblity of the system, something they innevitably wish 
to do.

if you don't understand how that pertains to usability, you shouldn't be 
discussing usability at all. seriously.

you are right that some people inccorectly fixate on it as if it were the last 
thing on earth, but that's no better than completely ignoring it as if it was 
immaterial.

> Real usability is not surprising people: about consistent keyboard

these are all parts of it, yes. not the complete picture, but important parts 
of it. irrelevant to our discussion here, but parts of it. ;-)

> toobar buttons like 'find' and 'zoom' right next to each other. And not
> alienating your existing user base by dis-empowering them.

please read my email again and discover how i note this will empower people. 
in KDE 3.2 you can disable the menu separators in the kmenu. do you know how? 
no? with kconfedit you will. that's empowerment, no?

- -- 
Aaron J. Seigo
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