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Well, I think you have to learn a particular system and then generalize. NewChat(tm)'s best bet is to have the new interface mimic and borrow the metaphors of

Well, I think you have to learn a particular system and then generalize. NewChat(tm)'s best bet is to have the new interface mimic and borrow the metaphors of the older interface. In a sense, what makes an interface "good" is that it uses what is already known.

balabaster 10y ago
These are called interface standards and should follow the standards defined by the eco-system in which the application resides. This is why we adhere to them to ensure that the userbase has as much of a baseline familiarity as can be assumed. As for the original question regarding the distribution of user's "computer skills"... if you can figure out how designers think about how you should use systems, then it's much less about having "computer skills" than having the capacity to figure out the psychology of the application designer - if you can type and use a mouse and can either Google or read a book describing the paradigms of an application or eco-system and figure out what they mean, you've got all the computer skills you need. As programmers, I think we tend to forget what exactly it is we do... we don't just program, we figure shit out at the most technical levels. Other people are quite adequate at this too - we have lawyers, doctors, surgeons, mechanics and any number of other professions that solve way more complex problems than we do - we're not islands of all the world's intelligence. If people appear to lack "computer skills" it's because the paradigms we use to define our user interfaces and solve the problems we are attempting to solve are shit - and I say this as a pretty well seasoned computer programmer who spends most of my life trying to figure out how to get other people's shit user interfaces to get my own shit done. So... that's really what I've got to say about that. People will figure out what they have time and inclination to figure out. If they don't have the time or inclination to figure it out, then it's your problem: Your software isn't solving big enough pain points for the learning curve involved. This means that either this user is not your target audience, or you don't understand your target audience well enough. Either way, it's not on the end user, it's on you as the software designer.
talmand 10y ago
>> NewChat(tm)'s best bet is to have the new interface mimic and borrow the metaphors of the older interface. Lawsuit.

balabaster 10y ago

These are called interface standards and should follow the standards defined by the eco-system in which the application resides. This is why we adhere to them to ensure that the userbase has as much of a baseline familiarity as can be assumed. As for the original question regarding the distribution of user's "computer skills"... if you can figure out how designers think about how you should use systems, then it's much less about having "computer skills" than having the capacity to figure out the psychology of the application designer - if you can type and use a mouse and can either Google or read a book describing the paradigms of an application or eco-system and figure out what they mean, you've got all the computer skills you need. As programmers, I think we tend to forget what exactly it is we do... we don't just program, we figure shit out at the most technical levels. Other people are quite adequate at this too - we have lawyers, doctors, surgeons, mechanics and any number of other professions that solve way more complex problems than we do - we're not islands of all the world's intelligence. If people appear to lack "computer skills" it's because the paradigms we use to define our user interfaces and solve the problems we are attempting to solve are shit - and I say this as a pretty well seasoned computer programmer who spends most of my life trying to figure out how to get other people's shit user interfaces to get my own shit done. So... that's really what I've got to say about that. People will figure out what they have time and inclination to figure out. If they don't have the time or inclination to figure it out, then it's your problem: Your software isn't solving big enough pain points for the learning curve involved. This means that either this user is not your target audience, or you don't understand your target audience well enough. Either way, it's not on the end user, it's on you as the software designer.

talmand 10y ago

>> NewChat(tm)'s best bet is to have the new interface mimic and borrow the metaphors of the older interface. Lawsuit.