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I think this article points out some very valid problems (I relate a lot with Slack's loading, OSX spaces taking too long to switch between, etc), but the concl

I think this article points out some very valid problems (I relate a lot with Slack's loading, OSX spaces taking too long to switch between, etc), but the conclusions may be a little misguided. To address specific examples first: 1. Slack is slow to start, and, as others have pointed out, uses animations to remind the user that it's working and not just frozen. The fix here is to improve the application's performance, but there will never be 0 network lag. 2. Animations are good here so that you remain spatially aware of a "space" relative to other spaces. I agree that the animations are too long, and I myself have shortened their duration. My biggest disagreement is with this quote: "We should stop babying our users and try to raise beginners and the less technical to the bar of modern day power users rather than produce software that’s designed for the lowest common denominator." I think the best software is intuitive to use for novices, yet leaves room for people to improve. I'm learning how to use OSX's Logic right now, and I've been really happy with the amount of guidance it gives me. There are options to expose advanced controls, and there are a fleet of really convenient shortcuts, but I have no problem getting around.

mbreese 8y ago
I think another example of this would be using something like Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. Switching between tools can be accomplished by clicking an icon, a drop down, or some other GUI element. However, once you get to a certain level of skill, it becomes faster to just use the keyboard shortcuts. For a novice, it's more forgiving. But for the expert, it's possible to be very efficient. It's also possible to go too far the other way too. Not to date myself too much, but an old example of too much "expert" levels was back in the DOS days with Word Perfect. Keyboard shortcuts were the only way to do things (like formatting). So you either learned the magic codes (with three extra/meta operations per code) or you kept a cheat sheet on the keyboard itself. That was a learning curve to get to 'power-user' status.
- ObsoleteNerd 8y ago
  I still use cheat sheets, but I design my own into wallpapers that fit my desktop perfectly, than have them rotating randomly every hour. Keeps my refreshed on shortcuts in my popularly used programs, and adding a new one to the rotation is a great way to learn all the shortcuts for a new program. It's not like I ever leave my desktop visible for a pretty wallpaper to matter. My nice ones are on my lock screen.
  - samlehman617 8y ago
    Would you mind sharing some?

mbreese 8y ago

I think another example of this would be using something like Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. Switching between tools can be accomplished by clicking an icon, a drop down, or some other GUI element. However, once you get to a certain level of skill, it becomes faster to just use the keyboard shortcuts. For a novice, it's more forgiving. But for the expert, it's possible to be very efficient. It's also possible to go too far the other way too. Not to date myself too much, but an old example of too much "expert" levels was back in the DOS days with Word Perfect. Keyboard shortcuts were the only way to do things (like formatting). So you either learned the magic codes (with three extra/meta operations per code) or you kept a cheat sheet on the keyboard itself. That was a learning curve to get to 'power-user' status.

ObsoleteNerd 8y ago
I still use cheat sheets, but I design my own into wallpapers that fit my desktop perfectly, than have them rotating randomly every hour. Keeps my refreshed on shortcuts in my popularly used programs, and adding a new one to the rotation is a great way to learn all the shortcuts for a new program. It's not like I ever leave my desktop visible for a pretty wallpaper to matter. My nice ones are on my lock screen.
- samlehman617 8y ago
  Would you mind sharing some?