[development] About options... :)

[Syscrusher]

On Tuesday 13 December 2005 14:04, Khalid B wrote:
> On 12/13/05, Uwe Hermann <uwe at hermann-uwe.de> wrote:
> > On Tue, Dec 13, 2005 at 03:13:28PM +0100, Piotr Krukowiecki wrote:
> > >
> > > Linus opinion (and mine btw ;)):
> > >
> > > http://lists.osdl.org/pipermail/desktop_architects/2005-December/000390.html
> > > http://lists.osdl.org/pipermail/desktop_architects/2005-December/000395.html

Wow. Linus used the F word. But he's right on target. My favorite lines:

"When user interfaces means that something CANNOT BE DONE, it's not about 
'usable design' any more. At that point, it's about UNusable design."

My UI philosophy is "make the advanced stuff options, and put it on its
own tab (or in Drupal's NEW, EXTREMELY SPIFFY collapsible fieldsets {grin}),
and make sure the defaults make sense for the most common situations." But
don't handicap advanced users just to cater to novices.

My wife is a very good illustration of the fallacy of the "nontechnical equals
stupid" theory of UI design. She is a librarian, not a computer geek. Very smart
lady, has a Masters' degree, studied abroad, very well-read...and absolutely no
interest whatsoever in learning the innards of programming. But she uses Drupal,
administers Drupal, and loves Drupal ... and that includes the "advanced"
features. She uses -- and loves -- Linux, but only because the marketplace took
away her beloved OS/2. I wonder how the "nontech equals dumb" crowd would
categorize her.

Off my soapbox now. Thanks for sharing, Dries. Good concepts to keep in mind.

Scott

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