Archive | Technology RSS feed for this section

It’s the Little Things…

18 Apr

In software design and usability, it’s the little things that make a difference.  (For example, see this post on two secrets of Mac design.)  Sometimes the little things aren’t good, however, as I discovered with GMail today.

I was processing through my contacts and deleting those I don’t want.  I spent a while selecting all 123 contacts to delete and hit the delete key, only to receive this message:

When writing this function of the GMail interface, the developers should have considered that people would probably want to batch delete their contacts.  I specifically selected all of them to save time, rather than going through in little groups like I evidently should have.

It might seem picky, but this is the sort of thing that differentiates good software from great software.

BBC Redesign

31 Mar

BBC appears to have sent the redesign of their website public last night.  When I checked the news page this morning, it looked like this:

 BBC News

My initial impressions are favorable.  They’ve retained the main red color, while still making it a bit less forceful.  Everything is basically in the same locations, but I can tell that there is more whitespace in the design.  Remember, in web design “whitespace is your friend”.

Not having spent much time on the rest of  bbc.co.uk, I can’t really comment on it, though it does look like the redesign spans the whole site.  I wish I had a screenshot of any part before the redesign.  (Though if you just want to look at one, there are plenty on Flickr.)

He Nailed It

15 Mar

We use Linux because it’s fun.  I’ve tried telling people this before; they don’t seem to understand.

Warcraft II Multiplayer LAN Setup

16 Feb

You’ve almost found what you’re looking fore. This post has moved to JamesFrank.info.

Monopoly? I think not.

20 Jan

After seeing an article about the new MacBook Air on Daring Fireball’s linked list, I decided to have a peek at it. Gruber summed up the gist of the article well:

Mike Barton at PC World doesn’t like the MacBook Air, which, apparently, somehow proves that Apple should license Mac OS X so that he can run it on a $600 ThinkPad. I’m sure Apple will get right on that.

Barton’s argument hinges on the idea that Apple has a “monopoly”:

Apple’s monopoly power over the Mac OS is holding back better software.

That’s just nonsensical. If we go to the Oxford English Dictionary (the definitive dictionary), it defines a monopoly as:

The exclusive possession or control of the trade in a commodity, product, or service; the condition of having no competitor in one’s trade or business.

Only if you define “product” as Mac OS X alone does saying Apple has a monopoly even remotely work.  In reality, though, the product here is not OS X but an operating system in general.  I would hardly say that Apple doesn’t have any competition with Microsoft lurking around the corner, not to mention the variety of up and coming Linux distributions.

Calling Apple’s hold on OS X a monopoly is like saying a movie studio has a “monopoly” on a movie they produce or that Hersheys has a monopoly on York Peppermint Patties.  Of course you have a monopoly on the specific product you produce.

I’m alright if Barton doesn’t like Apple hardware.  I’m even OK if he thinks Apple should license OS X  to run on other hardware.  Just don’t use buzzwords to mislabel Apple and portray it as something it’s not just because you don’t like its new product.

Why? Some odd errors.

12 Jan

Recently I came across an amusing error while trying to install some software on Windows XP. I had seen it before, and it struck me again how funny it is:

A system call that should never have failed has failed.

Windows Error

MSDN says it is a generic error, but it seems to me that nothing should ever fail and everything should be expected to fail. As my mom remarked to my dad when I was frustrated with my computer:

You see, what Jim doesn’t understand is that computers aren’t supposed to work and you should be happy when they do.

This error, however, pales in comparison with my favorite one:

Error loading EXPLORER.EXE. You must reinstall Windows.

I remember seeing that back on Windows 98. I turned off the computer, turned it back on, and it all worked. Oddly, Microsoft’s help page for this error doesn’t actually tell you to reinstall Windows. But my question is more along the lines of, “Why would you ever program that into the operating system?”

The Constant Quest for Features

9 Dec

The other day I was reminded that not everyone values features and version increases the way I do.  I was speaking with Tuppence about her IM client:

Me: though i need to update your GAIM
Tuppence: why?
Tuppence: why the desire for change?
Me: hmm… good point
Tuppence: Why can’t people be satisfied with old things that work just fine?

When I said “hmm… good point” it was dawning on me that not everyone values the newest version of a program as much as I do.  In fact, there’s a very large portion of the computer using world that is happy if the program is simple, stable, and does what they need it to.  It doesn’t need to change.

Then there are those of us who want to get a Thinkpad and  run Gentoo Linux on it for our next computer.  That should be proof enough that tinkering with new (or old) features is  enjoyable to us.

But, if you’re a developer, remember the rest of the world.  Remember all those people who don’t get a kick out of searching through preference panels for new options, trying out features they’ll never really use, or downloading alpha software.  Design for them too, and don’t be too disappointed if they don’t always buy your next version.

Preview Can Crop!

24 Nov

Last night I discovered one of my favorite new OS X Leopard features: Preview can now crop images!  On a whim I went to the Tools menu to see if they had added it, and there it was.  Somehow I missed this in the massive feature list (emphasis mine):

Edit your images in Preview. Crop, rotate, resize, and save images in a range of image formats. Selection tools make it a snap to cut and paste images from Preview directly into other applications.

Now instead of going to some other image program, I can do the simple crop right from Preview.  Which is good, because my Gimp hasn’t worked since moving to Leopard and I’m too lazy to fix it.

ig = iGoogle

23 Oct

For quite a while now (read: several years) I have wondered why Google’s personalized home page had the address www.google.com/ig.  Of course, I should have noticed long before today that the “ig” stood for “iGoogle,” Google’s name for the personalized home page.

What is interesting, however, is that the url was www.google.com/ig well before the home page was called “iGoogle.”  It used to be called something along the lines of “Google Personal.”  Which is why, at that time, it was very confusing that the url ended in “ig.”

With the advent of “iGoogle” it all becomes clear, but I wonder why Google took so long to change the name to match the URL.  Any ideas?  The only one I can think of is that Google wanted to ensure that Apple wouldn’t get mad at it for using an “i-” name.

Judging UI Design by the Number of Clicks

29 Sep

The dining hall here at college uses student ID cards as a form of payment.  When a student enters the cafeteria, the attendant swipes their card through a machine as if it was a credit card.  But the attendant has to do more than just swipe the card, they also have to tap two buttons on the screen of the computer.  I’m not sure exactly what the buttons do, but presumably something along the lines of “New Purchase,” “Student.”

This would not seem like a problem at first glance, but when you realize that 90% of the people eating in the dining hall are students, it becomes apparent that those two taps add a lot of work.  For every student that goes through, the attendant has to do three more actions then should be necessary.

Of course, most attendants get good at overcoming the problem.  Some leave one hand on the screen to hit the buttons, while swiping cards with the other hand.  Others tap the buttons with the card before swiping it.  But the point remains that the system is not well designed for its use.  To be efficient, the computer should automatically go to a new student purchase, which can be overridden by the cashier when someone else wishes to enter the cafeteria. (more…)

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.