3 ms·

Maybe those extra cores can be used to do a better job of remembering, learning, and anticipating what users will do. This could pre-load or unload application

Maybe those extra cores can be used to do a better job of remembering, learning, and anticipating what users will do. This could pre-load or unload applications or components based on historical usage, rearrange toolbars to have the most commonly used commands, and in general make the kinds of improvements to computing in general that the squiggly underlines did for spell checking last decade. Right now computers are largely deterministic and users have to learn how the computer works. That's why users hate computers. Some of that pain could be taken away. I think this will benefit OSes, thick clients, and installable programs more than the web.

jgrahamc 19y ago
Magic toolbar rearrangement is a world of pain. That's like having my SO notice that I always look for my keys before I go out the door so she moves them to the table near the front door, when I habitually put them in the vide poche near by desk.
- pchristensen 19y ago
  I'm not saying that's what I would want, but have you ever watched a non-techie use the computer? Just looked over their shoulder and watched them? It's horrifying! I can only watch my wife for about 2 minutes before I start belting out things like "You don't need to double click links on the web!" or "If you double click on an app, you have to give it a couple seconds to load or else you're making the problem worse!" What a smart OS would do was watch you for a while and notice what you do, and then make a decision based on the statistics: let's say 85% of the time, your keys are in the vide poche and you find them immediately, and the other 15% of the time they're somewhere else and it takes you 5 minutes to find them. Then it would warp them to the right place (the place your actions showed them was right) with a note and an option to "always do this". I shudder to think of MSFT's implementation of this (Clippy), but if a smart company along the lines of Humanized did it, and used statistics instead of some clever algorithm (didn't we just read about Google doing that?), it could be a godsend for average users.
- pchristensen 19y ago
  Toolbar rearrangement was a bad example. Try this: I wish like nothing other that Windows Mobile 5 would realize that when I press Text Messages with no new messages, go straight to "Compose Message" and rotate the screen to landscape, or if there are new messages, go to the oldest new message. I've done that for 98% of the times I've opened Text Messages, and I'd imagine most usage of most apps by most users fits into a few similar buckets. Don't underestimate the value of saving every user 5 seconds each time they use your app.

jgrahamc 19y ago

Magic toolbar rearrangement is a world of pain. That's like having my SO notice that I always look for my keys before I go out the door so she moves them to the table near the front door, when I habitually put them in the vide poche near by desk.

pchristensen 19y ago
I'm not saying that's what I would want, but have you ever watched a non-techie use the computer? Just looked over their shoulder and watched them? It's horrifying! I can only watch my wife for about 2 minutes before I start belting out things like "You don't need to double click links on the web!" or "If you double click on an app, you have to give it a couple seconds to load or else you're making the problem worse!" What a smart OS would do was watch you for a while and notice what you do, and then make a decision based on the statistics: let's say 85% of the time, your keys are in the vide poche and you find them immediately, and the other 15% of the time they're somewhere else and it takes you 5 minutes to find them. Then it would warp them to the right place (the place your actions showed them was right) with a note and an option to "always do this". I shudder to think of MSFT's implementation of this (Clippy), but if a smart company along the lines of Humanized did it, and used statistics instead of some clever algorithm (didn't we just read about Google doing that?), it could be a godsend for average users.
pchristensen 19y ago
Toolbar rearrangement was a bad example. Try this: I wish like nothing other that Windows Mobile 5 would realize that when I press Text Messages with no new messages, go straight to "Compose Message" and rotate the screen to landscape, or if there are new messages, go to the oldest new message. I've done that for 98% of the times I've opened Text Messages, and I'd imagine most usage of most apps by most users fits into a few similar buckets. Don't underestimate the value of saving every user 5 seconds each time they use your app.