Re: [Usability] Re: on gconf-edit

[Reinout van Schouwen <reinouts gnome org>]

On Tue, 19 Oct 2004, Maciej Katafiasz wrote:

> is necessary, after all you can intoxicate yourself even with vitamin C
> if overdosed ;). Things working "as if by magic" are nice, voodoo is
> not. And voodoo happens when all your fairy magic insulates user from
> practical knowledge, instead of making it easy to assimilate[1]. I'd say

Nerds used to joke about how people are unable to set the time on their 
VCR, so that it would keep blinking 00:00. Modern VCRs just fetch the 
current time from the teletext signal. Is this voodoo (from the users 
POV)? Certainly. But the point is, it *just works* and that's what 
counts. When the user isn't intimidated with all the technical fluff of 
a device, but instead feels that he masters it, perhaps he'll be 
encouraged to learn more about it? Wouldn't that be better than forcing 
him to deal with all these scary small buttons that might as well cause 
the apparatus to explode?

> You click Download - *poof*, file is downloaded "somewhere" -- now it's
> up to you to figure where exactly, or give up searching. In my case that

By default, Epiphany will launch whatever application is specified as 
the default handler for the mime type of the downloaded file. If one 
isn't specified, indeed the file "disappears" into the Downloads folder 
(or whatever other folder you specified in the Epiphany preferences). 
I've filed bug #155833 to make this a bit more obvious and open the 
download folder upon completing the download.

> > > Yes. Particularly I miss scroll-on-middle-button, it's totally
>
> That's exactly why I prefer Galeon :). And I very much don't consider it
> "power user" feature, just as I don't think mouse-wheel is show-off
> gimmick nowadays ;)

This is bug #110693.

> eye coordination. Magic URLs are great since they can be 100% automated
> -- and as we all know, thinking is bad for your efficiency :). Since I

If you use *lots* of smart bookmarks, I agree keywords would come in 
handy. Perhaps an extension for this would be nice. Epiphany by default 
tries to cater to the common case, however.

> transition, when lack of enough practical knowledge seriously hinders
> smooth operation. Correct solution is to gently introduce user to more
> more intrinsic details of things' workings, not to shield her from them

Is simply telling her that she can press Tab to get to the next 
textfield, an intrinsic detail of how the program works? I disagree, the 
secretary just hasn't been trained well to use GUIs effectively.

regards,

--
Reinout van Schouwen			student of Artifical Intelligence
email: reinout cs vu nl			mobile phone: +31-6-44360778