5 ms·

There are a number of people in this thread posting things like "the average user should be educated" and "why break things for us technically savvy people just

by edanm 13y ago

There are a number of people in this thread posting things like "the average user should be educated" and "why break things for us technically savvy people just to please people who can't be bothered to read a whole url". I really con't stand this behavior. Not everybody, not even most people, want to understand "how to web works", "how urls work" or anything else along those lines. Insisting that people are somehow wrong to not want to understand this is just ridiculous - as ridiculous as if I had said "we're not going to let anyone drive a car unless they know how to tune an engine" or some such. I for one am very happy that the creators of automobiles have bothered to make the process so simple, even a moron at automobiles like me can drive in car and have it work 99.9% of the time, and the rest of the time - it's clear I need to take it to an expert. We as the software developers, product designers and UX experts of the world should stop trying to tell the world what it should and shouldn't care about, but rather, use that as input to decide how to build our software so actual people can use it. Do I love this Chrome experiment? I don't know. But I know that I'm willing to trade a few seconds of discomfort of my own, which can probably be stopped by tweaking one configuration setting, in order to save the majority of the population who aren't tech savvy from the problems of phishing and just generally giving them a better user experience.

jsoffer 13y ago
> Not everybody, not even most people, want to understand "how to web works", "how urls work" or anything else along those lines. I still want to support those that do, and prevent them from having unnecessary burdens on their way. Understanding how things work is hard enough already by itself.
enraged_camel 13y ago
>>I for one am very happy that the creators of automobiles have bothered to make the process so simple, even a moron at automobiles like me can drive in car and have it work 99.9% of the time, and the rest of the time - it's clear I need to take it to an expert. On the other hand, you are required to get a driver's license before you are allowed to drive, because if you don't know the rules, you can harm yourself and other people. Perhaps that's the direction we need to go: an Internet User's License that teaches people the basics so that they don't harm themselves and other people. They don't need to know how the Internet works to use it, but they should be expected to know how to keep themselves and others safe.
altcognito 13y ago
Nobody is asking people to understand the HTTP protocol. This is understanding how information is addressed in the 21st century. The more apt comparison might be physical mail addresses. People should understand (and it is taught in schools!) the basic format and the structure of it. We don't ask them to understand (in the states) the layout of zip codes, but we do expect them to understand that the first line refers to street address. Similarly, we can do the same education for information today. We can explain the design behind the structure, the beauty and simplicity in URL design. (not always, I get that) Or, we can just continue on the path we're headed and tell users: "just type this into the search bar (Google), and a website comes back, along with some ads (probably)".
- edanm 13y ago
  While I would love for the simple idea of the URL scheme to be something everyone understands, I highly doubt it's every going to happen. I'm sad about this, but I live in the real world with real people, and I've seen the kind of stuff they do and don't learn, whether by ability or by inclination.
  - altcognito 13y ago
    What's sad is that we've had URL schemes for 20 years and they aren't taught in school. Also sad is many people think we teaching algebra and calculus secondary education is a given but basic concepts like domain names in a URL are "too complicated" for the real world.
    - edanm 13y ago
      I get where you're coming from, and I'm not sure whether I agree or not. Personally, I think modern education is wrong-headed time most of the time, but I'm not sure I'd switch to teaching URL schemes if I was overlord of the universe. I'd much more likely insist on teaching the basics of economics, finance, logic, rationality, human psychology, etc. URLs would still be far down my list.
      - 13y ago
pdkl95 13y ago
> Not everybody, not even most people, want to understand "how to web works", "how urls work" or anything else along those lines. There are also a surprising number of people that don't want to be literate. In the modern world, we have generally regarded such views as wrong. Basic literacy is such an important skill to have, we have even created various mandates to provide the necessary education to all children. Technology has simply added a handful of additional details. Nobody is suggesting that every has to learn all the subtleties of URLs or read RFC 1738. Much like tuning the engine in a car, these are technical details safely left to experts. Anybody who wishes to participate in this new, technology-filled world (i.e. ~"everybody") will need to make a few minor additions to their skill-set[1]. One of these is to know what a URL is, in concept, and be able to differentiate between the host-part and the path-part. Being able to parse the path/query-string is not necessary. The necessary skill is being able to recognize that "example.com/foo/bar/baz" is more specific than "example.com", or being able to guess that "example.com/2014/04/18/the-great-quux" is probably a specific article posted last month. This skill is important to have to participate in the modern world, not just to use a "web browser". You see URLs everywhere. Many print ads now have a URL in them, for example. This is the new literacy, de facto. [1] Other skills might include understanding that text shaped similar to "foo@example.com" is probably an email address, how to use a mouse, and what terms such as "password" or "login" mean.
- smsm42 13y ago
  It's not literacy, it's more like knowing car's engine error codes. Arcane knowledge which is very useful if you're mechanic but would be mostly useless trivia for anybody else. Guessing "example.com/2014/04/18/the-great-quux" is a date-based URL is a nice parlor trick but most sites don't even have this URL scheme or any URL scheme at all. Next to none of the phishing-relevant sites does. No print ad would have URL of any complexity - if it would have anything beyond domain name it'd be a single keyword.
  - StuffMaster 13y ago
    I would liken more to like the readouts of the car. Say we hide the fuel gauge behind a menu and replace it with a "need gas" symbol. A clueless user might say "I don't want to learn how the fuel gauge or recirculating air button work. I just want to know if I need gas right now." But knowing how to plan your trips/stops is important, as is knowing where your air is coming from.

by edanm 13y ago

jsoffer 13y ago

> Not everybody, not even most people, want to understand "how to web works", "how urls work" or anything else along those lines. I still want to support those that do, and prevent them from having unnecessary burdens on their way. Understanding how things work is hard enough already by itself.

enraged_camel 13y ago

>>I for one am very happy that the creators of automobiles have bothered to make the process so simple, even a moron at automobiles like me can drive in car and have it work 99.9% of the time, and the rest of the time - it's clear I need to take it to an expert. On the other hand, you are required to get a driver's license before you are allowed to drive, because if you don't know the rules, you can harm yourself and other people. Perhaps that's the direction we need to go: an Internet User's License that teaches people the basics so that they don't harm themselves and other people. They don't need to know how the Internet works to use it, but they should be expected to know how to keep themselves and others safe.

altcognito 13y ago

Nobody is asking people to understand the HTTP protocol. This is understanding how information is addressed in the 21st century. The more apt comparison might be physical mail addresses. People should understand (and it is taught in schools!) the basic format and the structure of it. We don't ask them to understand (in the states) the layout of zip codes, but we do expect them to understand that the first line refers to street address. Similarly, we can do the same education for information today. We can explain the design behind the structure, the beauty and simplicity in URL design. (not always, I get that) Or, we can just continue on the path we're headed and tell users: "just type this into the search bar (Google), and a website comes back, along with some ads (probably)".

edanm 13y ago
While I would love for the simple idea of the URL scheme to be something everyone understands, I highly doubt it's every going to happen. I'm sad about this, but I live in the real world with real people, and I've seen the kind of stuff they do and don't learn, whether by ability or by inclination.
- altcognito 13y ago
  What's sad is that we've had URL schemes for 20 years and they aren't taught in school. Also sad is many people think we teaching algebra and calculus secondary education is a given but basic concepts like domain names in a URL are "too complicated" for the real world.
  - edanm 13y ago
    I get where you're coming from, and I'm not sure whether I agree or not. Personally, I think modern education is wrong-headed time most of the time, but I'm not sure I'd switch to teaching URL schemes if I was overlord of the universe. I'd much more likely insist on teaching the basics of economics, finance, logic, rationality, human psychology, etc. URLs would still be far down my list.
    - 13y ago

pdkl95 13y ago

> Not everybody, not even most people, want to understand "how to web works", "how urls work" or anything else along those lines. There are also a surprising number of people that don't want to be literate. In the modern world, we have generally regarded such views as wrong. Basic literacy is such an important skill to have, we have even created various mandates to provide the necessary education to all children. Technology has simply added a handful of additional details. Nobody is suggesting that every has to learn all the subtleties of URLs or read RFC 1738. Much like tuning the engine in a car, these are technical details safely left to experts. Anybody who wishes to participate in this new, technology-filled world (i.e. ~"everybody") will need to make a few minor additions to their skill-set[1]. One of these is to know what a URL is, in concept, and be able to differentiate between the host-part and the path-part. Being able to parse the path/query-string is not necessary. The necessary skill is being able to recognize that "example.com/foo/bar/baz" is more specific than "example.com", or being able to guess that "example.com/2014/04/18/the-great-quux" is probably a specific article posted last month. This skill is important to have to participate in the modern world, not just to use a "web browser". You see URLs everywhere. Many print ads now have a URL in them, for example. This is the new literacy, de facto. [1] Other skills might include understanding that text shaped similar to "foo@example.com" is probably an email address, how to use a mouse, and what terms such as "password" or "login" mean.

smsm42 13y ago
It's not literacy, it's more like knowing car's engine error codes. Arcane knowledge which is very useful if you're mechanic but would be mostly useless trivia for anybody else. Guessing "example.com/2014/04/18/the-great-quux" is a date-based URL is a nice parlor trick but most sites don't even have this URL scheme or any URL scheme at all. Next to none of the phishing-relevant sites does. No print ad would have URL of any complexity - if it would have anything beyond domain name it'd be a single keyword.
- StuffMaster 13y ago
  I would liken more to like the readouts of the car. Say we hide the fuel gauge behind a menu and replace it with a "need gas" symbol. A clueless user might say "I don't want to learn how the fuel gauge or recirculating air button work. I just want to know if I need gas right now." But knowing how to plan your trips/stops is important, as is knowing where your air is coming from.