15 Jan
2012
15 Jan
'12
9:06 p.m.
ok. I cannot give you usability studies, because they
don't
exist. But you can
try it yourself. Just use it! Just try this setting for a
day or two. Give it
to a non-experienced user.
I have tried Smart placement. I don't like the placement scheme. :)
I have been using computers since 1977. I'm not a newbie. :) Old fashioned? Sometimes.
Older than most users today? For sure. Cranky? Sometimes. But newbie? Not even close. :)
Having been around computers for so long, and usually being the local "go to"
computer person where ever I go, I have learned a thing or two about usability. I
won't claim to be a subject matter expert, but I have observed more than most people
using computers today. I know that for each option provided, in any interface, for any
tool, some people will like one option and some will like another. That is the way humans
are wired. Some people like Smart placement. Some people like Centered. Some like the
other options. That does not make one option "right" or "wrong." Only
different. Good software design provides options. Good developers provide options and let
the users decide.
Most of my usability observations have taken place where the other users are not computer
savvy. These people are intelligent and wonderful but are not close to being classic
computer "geeks." I have observed that among software developers their
observations about usability more often than not are limited to fellow geeks and not every
day users.
I can say with confidence that quite often what is "cool" to a "geek"
is not cool to every day users. I have observed this often.
Computer savvy users --- geeks in common parlance, are wired differently than every day
computer users. Much like "motorheads" are wired differently than every day
users of automobiles.
That you offer no usability studies related to this specific topic means we are limited to
opinions. I can live with that.
Of course it has to do with technical aspects of the
window
manager. You can
only choose a default if you understand it. If you
understand every detail of
it. If you know and understand the underlying code and the
history behind it.
The original poll question has nothing to do with the technical aspects of each placement
option. The poll question is about usability, of which you provide no related studies.
As I mentioned in the bugzilla, I can see from the code (I can read C++ but am not a C++
hacker --- I'm teaching myself as we speak) that a lot of sweat equity went into the
thought and design of Smart placement. Having hacked lots of code myself, I appreciate the
effort behind the work.
With that said, for you to tell me I can choose a default only if I understand the
technical aspects is condescending. I need only to use the options to decide what I like
or don't like.
I never argued that Smart placement should be removed. More than once I emphasized that
this discussion is not about the merits of each option, but only about which option should
be the default for the initial installation. Users can change the option after the initial
installation, but what should the default be? As you offer no usability studies about the
topic, then as I said, we all are limited to opinions only. Fair enough. Just don't
"talk down" to people about their choices.
If you just had looked into the code, if you had
tracked
down why it is the
default, you would not even have come up with the
proposal.
Condescending opinion.
Just to give you an idea. The placement policy
centered was
not always called
centered. It was committed as "StupidlyCentered". It did
not even had a GUI
option, because it is so stupid. It is from 2002 and has
not changed at all,
the code is still the same (except an internal
adjustment).
I never have been impressed with these types of developers' attitudes.
I don't care that the Centered option has remain unchanged since 2002. I have tools,
appliances, and furniture in my house that are --- I'm guessing here --- older than
you. My pickup truck is 23 years old and runs like a top. Does that make any of those
objects "stupid"?
A hammer is a tool that is simple in design and has remained unchanged since its
invention. Is the hammer stupid because the design is simple?
To name a window placement option "StupidlyCentered" is an indication of a
condescending "we know better than you" attitude.
An example of this "we know better" attitude is the work I did a while ago to
restore some options to the Konqueror web link context menu. Despite user requests years
ago not to change the menu, the menu options never were restored because the developer
"knew what was best." I restored those options.
Another example of this condescending attitude are some usability options I restored to
Kate. The original options were called "useless crap" by the developer and
removed. Those comments remain in the original patch commit. I restored that "useless
crap."
My point with these examples is for you to claim you know what is best for me or other
users is like holding water with a sieve. You have no standing to decide what is best for
me or anybody other user.
Seriously? Do you want to use that as the default?
Yes I do. You haven't figured that out yet?
Tim and I started this discussion in the bugzilla. As much as I want Centered, er,
StupidlyCentered, I am not so arrogant to think others want that option as the default. I
wrote a patch to change the default. So I have sweat equity involved in this discussion.
Perhaps a little pride too because I am not a full fledged C++ coder.
I might get out-voted and Smart will remain the default option for new installations.
Therefore in the bugzilla I proposed an alternate method to change the global default for
new installations without patching code. That is one of the attractive elements I like
about the Trinity project. We don't see things here as "my way or the
highway" or "either or." We don't pretend to "know better."
We see all options as being viable and we try to work with everybody.
The usability study for placement policy smart might
be
that it was used in
KWM and based on code from an even older window manager.
Maybe 15 years of
experience in good window placement are an argument, maybe
not.
Okay. Opinion, not facts.
You can spend your time on discussing each config
option of
KDE which have not
changed in the last 12 years. All is fine with that. But I
can only recommend
you to concentrate on what is important. The KDE devs are
not all stupid and
for most of the defaults there are good reasons.
I never intimated that the KDE developers were stupid. I always thought they were
incredibly smart and talented. Yet as I mentioned previously, what a geek thinks is usable
often contradicts what every day users think is usable.
And even if you come up with a new default I can only
suggest that you go
afterwards to the maintainers of the specific KDE
application and ask why they
had the default and not the one you use. There might be
very good reasons to
not use your default. Remember: you did not develop the
applications, you
don't know the limitations!
There might be some usability reasons, but as you have not provided any related studies, I
am left to think the underlying reason is ego and what some geeks thought was cool.
Darrell