5 ms·

Non-technical end users won't want to be trying to enter Terminal commands they don't know or understand, and they shouldn't have to.

vbezhenar 4y ago
How is it different from running shell scripts they don't understand (or entire applications for that matter)?
- einherjae 4y ago
  It’s scarier, less ergonomic, and smells hacker-y. There is a significant difference between “just click on this”, and “open the DOS prompt and write these magical runes”
  - vbezhenar 4y ago
    It was observed that people get attached to Ikea furniture because they assembled it and it contains tiny bit of their labour. May be it could work with software? Like you've executed some scary command to enable this software to work, now you attached to it.
    - 0ct4via 4y ago
      That's not a fair comparison though -- if you screwdriver slips or you put the wrong screw in the hole, your sofa doesn't stop working -- but you could do real damage to your OS. IKEA furniture assembly involves very simple tasks and tools, and a guide that's purely pictorial -- and even then, there are an array of services where people will do that assembly for you, even offerings from IKEA themselves. Software neither has the same physical presence, nor the same relative lack of risk. The average person can appreciate something "made with their own hands," but lacks the specialist knowledge to appreciate a script or code deployment. Given how scared and how easily-scammed people can be by having someone open Event Viewer in Windows and claim this means their computer has viruses, opening some script and demanding verbatim typing of commands is more likely to lead to anxiety or unsureness than anything, and certainly not attachment. You're thinking as if the average person is the average HN reader -- they're not. At all.
  - Someone 4y ago
    You mean that both are scary/require you to trust the person telling you to do it, but only the shell script also looks scary?
    - einherjae 4y ago
      The shell script is abstracted, and can hide a lot of the ugliness to the average user, whereas “type this into your terminal” goes full arcane black magic to the average user. But any opening of a terminal means we’re not in Kansas any more, and can’t be relied upon for any average user flow.
samoit 4y ago
Then, these users maybe should be using ios and not macos
- 0ct4via 4y ago
  How do you work that one out? The average user shouldn't need to delve into the command line -- whether it's macOS, Windows, Ubuntu (for example), whatever -- that's the whole point of a GUI. System Software (later Mac OS, for Mac OS 7.6 through Mac OS 9) didn't have a command line interface available. That did Apple pretty well from 1984 to 2001. Mac OS X (and later OS X, then macOS) obviously have the Terminal app, but it is neither a requirement nor in common usage for the average desktop user. Maybe don't be so classist and reductive? Not everyone hangs out on HN and uses terminal emulators regularly...
  - bookofjoe 4y ago
    I've been hanging out on and enjoying HN daily for many years and I STILL have NO IDEA what a Terminal app or command line is — nor will I ever try to find out.
    - 0ct4via 4y ago
      That's perfectly ok -- it's saddening when there are demeaning comments like above -- it's elitist and exclusionary. You keep doing what you're doing -- I'm pleased to have encountered the world's most popular blogging anesthesiologist!
      - bookofjoe 4y ago
        38 years of passing gas was enough.

vbezhenar 4y ago

How is it different from running shell scripts they don't understand (or entire applications for that matter)?

einherjae 4y ago
It’s scarier, less ergonomic, and smells hacker-y. There is a significant difference between “just click on this”, and “open the DOS prompt and write these magical runes”
- vbezhenar 4y ago
  It was observed that people get attached to Ikea furniture because they assembled it and it contains tiny bit of their labour. May be it could work with software? Like you've executed some scary command to enable this software to work, now you attached to it.
  - 0ct4via 4y ago
    That's not a fair comparison though -- if you screwdriver slips or you put the wrong screw in the hole, your sofa doesn't stop working -- but you could do real damage to your OS. IKEA furniture assembly involves very simple tasks and tools, and a guide that's purely pictorial -- and even then, there are an array of services where people will do that assembly for you, even offerings from IKEA themselves. Software neither has the same physical presence, nor the same relative lack of risk. The average person can appreciate something "made with their own hands," but lacks the specialist knowledge to appreciate a script or code deployment. Given how scared and how easily-scammed people can be by having someone open Event Viewer in Windows and claim this means their computer has viruses, opening some script and demanding verbatim typing of commands is more likely to lead to anxiety or unsureness than anything, and certainly not attachment. You're thinking as if the average person is the average HN reader -- they're not. At all.
- Someone 4y ago
  You mean that both are scary/require you to trust the person telling you to do it, but only the shell script also looks scary?
  - einherjae 4y ago
    The shell script is abstracted, and can hide a lot of the ugliness to the average user, whereas “type this into your terminal” goes full arcane black magic to the average user. But any opening of a terminal means we’re not in Kansas any more, and can’t be relied upon for any average user flow.

samoit 4y ago

Then, these users maybe should be using ios and not macos

0ct4via 4y ago
How do you work that one out? The average user shouldn't need to delve into the command line -- whether it's macOS, Windows, Ubuntu (for example), whatever -- that's the whole point of a GUI. System Software (later Mac OS, for Mac OS 7.6 through Mac OS 9) didn't have a command line interface available. That did Apple pretty well from 1984 to 2001. Mac OS X (and later OS X, then macOS) obviously have the Terminal app, but it is neither a requirement nor in common usage for the average desktop user. Maybe don't be so classist and reductive? Not everyone hangs out on HN and uses terminal emulators regularly...
- bookofjoe 4y ago
  I've been hanging out on and enjoying HN daily for many years and I STILL have NO IDEA what a Terminal app or command line is — nor will I ever try to find out.
  - 0ct4via 4y ago
    That's perfectly ok -- it's saddening when there are demeaning comments like above -- it's elitist and exclusionary. You keep doing what you're doing -- I'm pleased to have encountered the world's most popular blogging anesthesiologist!
    - bookofjoe 4y ago
      38 years of passing gas was enough.