3 ms·

I agree with catering to your target audience in theory; however, at that scale, you're going to have people screw up anyway, no matter how many explanations, w

by ronsor 1y ago

I agree with catering to your target audience in theory; however, at that scale, you're going to have people screw up anyway, no matter how many explanations, warnings, or prompts you add. I've shipped software which could be installed by clicking "Yes" twice, and somehow a non-negligible amount of people are still puzzled by the setup process. It's tiring.

varispeed 1y ago
> and somehow a non-negligible amount of people are still puzzled by the setup process. It's tiring. Probably the process wasn't researched enough. You can do focus groups with customers or even hire members of the public for a discovery session and see how accessible process is and then refine. Technical teams are often severely biased and what they think should be easy and natural might be quite the opposite to other people who are not deeply involved with the domain.
- ronsor 1y ago
  The vast majority of users have had no problem. The installer consists of a "Yes (to accepting the license agreement)", waiting on a progress bar, and a "Yes (to starting the program)." It is like almost every installation wizard ever seen on a computer, except simpler and no bundled adware. When I've asked the ~5-10% of people who are confused, they've done at least one of the following: * Admit they clicked at random, and somehow closed the installer. * Gave up immediately and exited. * Complained there was no video tutorial for a sixty-second process. This kind of stuff has me at a loss for words, and overall, it makes me more jaded when producing software for the "average" end-user. There's only so much magic I can put in, and I already do a lot of work to make sure most stuff I make is as user-friendly as possible. Plenty of people don't actually read explanations, even a few words; you can't really help them at that point.
  - varispeed 1y ago
    > Admit they clicked at random, and somehow closed the installer. > Gave up immediately and exited. Seems like someone with ADHD. > Complained there was no video tutorial for a sixty-second process. Could be someone with Dyspraxia. These behaviours might be puzzling to neurotypical people, but they exist and are reality for many users. It's also not connected to that person intelligence in any way. Their brains just operate differently.
    - ronsor 1y ago
      > Seems like someone with ADHD. Perhaps it does, but it begs the question of "how did they operate the computer at all?" These same people seem to have no trouble accomplishing other tasks they want to do on the computer--tasks which require more focus. > Could be someone with Dyspraxia. Fair. In any case, as only one person developing a program for free in my spare time, I don't have the time or ability to cater for every scenario.
      - varispeed 1y ago
        > These same people seem to have no trouble accomplishing other tasks they want to do on the computer--tasks which require more focus. That's common. ADHD has this kind of paradoxes. People can hyperfocus on tasks that align with interests or feel stimulating and become completely overwhelmed by other tasks, even seemingly simple. > I don't have the time or ability to cater for every scenario. That's fair, but still it's at least worth being mindful about accessibility issues some people face. For big corporations this is inexcusable.
  - SoftTalker 1y ago
    Some people are just incompetent. Easiest thing is to write them off as customers: they will be an outsize source of pain. If they can’t manage an installer that simple, how will they ever use the software?
foxglacier 1y ago
For some reason desktop installers are weirdly complicated. Why are there two yes buttons instead of one or none? Maybe you have to accept the OS's warning dialog but perhaps installers should just work without any interaction. You can always uninstall if you ran it by mistake.

by ronsor 1y ago

varispeed 1y ago

> and somehow a non-negligible amount of people are still puzzled by the setup process. It's tiring. Probably the process wasn't researched enough. You can do focus groups with customers or even hire members of the public for a discovery session and see how accessible process is and then refine. Technical teams are often severely biased and what they think should be easy and natural might be quite the opposite to other people who are not deeply involved with the domain.

ronsor 1y ago
The vast majority of users have had no problem. The installer consists of a "Yes (to accepting the license agreement)", waiting on a progress bar, and a "Yes (to starting the program)." It is like almost every installation wizard ever seen on a computer, except simpler and no bundled adware. When I've asked the ~5-10% of people who are confused, they've done at least one of the following: * Admit they clicked at random, and somehow closed the installer. * Gave up immediately and exited. * Complained there was no video tutorial for a sixty-second process. This kind of stuff has me at a loss for words, and overall, it makes me more jaded when producing software for the "average" end-user. There's only so much magic I can put in, and I already do a lot of work to make sure most stuff I make is as user-friendly as possible. Plenty of people don't actually read explanations, even a few words; you can't really help them at that point.
- varispeed 1y ago
  > Admit they clicked at random, and somehow closed the installer. > Gave up immediately and exited. Seems like someone with ADHD. > Complained there was no video tutorial for a sixty-second process. Could be someone with Dyspraxia. These behaviours might be puzzling to neurotypical people, but they exist and are reality for many users. It's also not connected to that person intelligence in any way. Their brains just operate differently.
  - ronsor 1y ago
    > Seems like someone with ADHD. Perhaps it does, but it begs the question of "how did they operate the computer at all?" These same people seem to have no trouble accomplishing other tasks they want to do on the computer--tasks which require more focus. > Could be someone with Dyspraxia. Fair. In any case, as only one person developing a program for free in my spare time, I don't have the time or ability to cater for every scenario.
    - varispeed 1y ago
      > These same people seem to have no trouble accomplishing other tasks they want to do on the computer--tasks which require more focus. That's common. ADHD has this kind of paradoxes. People can hyperfocus on tasks that align with interests or feel stimulating and become completely overwhelmed by other tasks, even seemingly simple. > I don't have the time or ability to cater for every scenario. That's fair, but still it's at least worth being mindful about accessibility issues some people face. For big corporations this is inexcusable.
- SoftTalker 1y ago
  Some people are just incompetent. Easiest thing is to write them off as customers: they will be an outsize source of pain. If they can’t manage an installer that simple, how will they ever use the software?

foxglacier 1y ago

For some reason desktop installers are weirdly complicated. Why are there two yes buttons instead of one or none? Maybe you have to accept the OS's warning dialog but perhaps installers should just work without any interaction. You can always uninstall if you ran it by mistake.