Wow. A lot to read so I'm start a new thread sort of.
Everyone makes valid points for the most part. What we need to find, is which ones apply to us. Who are we recreating this late-great desktop environment (DE) for? I suggest, for now, its for the loyal kde3 users. For true and current gnu-linux users. I am not, in any sense, discounting those who will come, but they will come because of what we build now. So let's make it a good one (DE). Its illogical to design something for someone isn't currently using it. It is logical to design something for those who are. So I suggest we focus on them.
David C. Rankin wrote "I agree with just "Documents". If you don't know who's documents are on your box, you have more issues to worry about :p" - Well David (if it was you who wrote this) I can see you and I are existentialists. I can't agree more. We cannot cater to those who cannot/will not learn or simple use their mind. Think about it this way, can you create a DE for someone who doesn't want to use your DE? David was also labouring to find something better than Office, that's a hard one. Productivity, DTP, this one is going to be a killer. However putting graphics under media, I disagree with because, whilst they overlap to a degree, media or multimedia has traditionally been the domain of Audio Video.
John A. Sullivan III wrote "People have businesses to run and could care less about educating themselves (rightfully)." - I've never met a successful business person who didn't what to know how it all works, considering its how money is made. I have business client, all of which have wanted to see what's under the hood. Once again, We cannot cater to those who cannot/will not learn or simple use their mind. Its simply impossible to crater to those who do not think. Think about it, how can you build something for someone that doesn't care? A person like this, is never happy.
Oliver Kullmann wrote "I think the KDE 3 -> KDE 4 disaster has much to do with a kind of take-over by ms-centric thinking. Sure, hard to quantify, but with KDE 3 I always had the feeling it moves in principle into the right direction, while with KDE 4 this basic trust is completely lost (on a daily basic --- I have to use it under various circumstances)." - I agree. Currently kde4 seems to be in competition with MS, who oddly enough has stolen things from kde (check out their open/save dialog which now has a kde like side bar). Competition is a waste of time, let's just focus on doing a good job.
John A. Sullivan III "I would like to politely disagree while admitting that many others on the list may be better qualified than I to address this issue. However, my impression of why KDE4 has been such a problem has not been the MS imitation but their prioritization of developer interests over user interests" - Its true, they are in compentition with MS, and its true, they are serving their interests over those of the users. I have dealt directly with KDE4 devels over the last year until I just couldn't anymore.
David C. Rankin - Your suggests are right on track and have given me much to think about.
Poor, overworked Tim wrote "Well, I do want to convey to the user that the Documents folder is unique to his or her profile, unlike the other shortcuts which point to shared system resources that are identical across all profiles. Personally I like "My Documents", but other alternatives could be "Personal Documents", "Personal Files" or similar. - Isn't it possible to create a script that would read the user's login name and create a direct such as "Tim's User File" which would contain everything in its own net subdirectories (Documents, Spreedsheets, Homework (for those still in skool), Photos etc). My people just a directory called User-Files, or rename it later on.
I also, whole-heartedly, agree with Lisi in that if a language is to be used, such as English, then it should be used correctly. The same should go for computer terms.
Felix Miata wrote "Try a librarian hat and think about cataloging, file drawers and shelving. Does that help?" - yes it does help and its what I've been trying to do.
I apoligize for the length of the email but I thougt it wise to start a new one, than add to the already lengthy one.
I've always believed order comes from chaos, so I think we are making progress.
Kate
Great wrap up. Good work.
Best regards, Tiago
On Tue, Jan 25, 2011 at 12:29 AM, Katheryne Draven borgqueen4@gmail.comwrote:
Wow. A lot to read so I'm start a new thread sort of.
Everyone makes valid points for the most part. What we need to find, is which ones apply to us. Who are we recreating this late-great desktop environment (DE) for? I suggest, for now, its for the loyal kde3 users. For true and current gnu-linux users. I am not, in any sense, discounting those who will come, but they will come because of what we build now. So let's make it a good one (DE). Its illogical to design something for someone isn't currently using it. It is logical to design something for those who are. So I suggest we focus on them.
David C. Rankin wrote "I agree with just "Documents". If you don't know who's documents are on your box, you have more issues to worry about :p" - Well David (if it was you who wrote this) I can see you and I are existentialists. I can't agree more. We cannot cater to those who cannot/will not learn or simple use their mind. Think about it this way, can you create a DE for someone who doesn't want to use your DE? David was also labouring to find something better than Office, that's a hard one. Productivity, DTP, this one is going to be a killer. However putting graphics under media, I disagree with because, whilst they overlap to a degree, media or multimedia has traditionally been the domain of Audio Video.
John A. Sullivan III wrote "People have businesses to run and could care less about educating themselves (rightfully)." - I've never met a successful business person who didn't what to know how it all works, considering its how money is made. I have business client, all of which have wanted to see what's under the hood. Once again, We cannot cater to those who cannot/will not learn or simple use their mind. Its simply impossible to crater to those who do not think. Think about it, how can you build something for someone that doesn't care? A person like this, is never happy.
Oliver Kullmann wrote "I think the KDE 3 -> KDE 4 disaster has much to do with a kind of take-over by ms-centric thinking. Sure, hard to quantify, but with KDE 3 I always had the feeling it moves in principle into the right direction, while with KDE 4 this basic trust is completely lost (on a daily basic --- I have to use it under various circumstances)." - I agree. Currently kde4 seems to be in competition with MS, who oddly enough has stolen things from kde (check out their open/save dialog which now has a kde like side bar). Competition is a waste of time, let's just focus on doing a good job.
John A. Sullivan III "I would like to politely disagree while admitting that many others on the list may be better qualified than I to address this issue. However, my impression of why KDE4 has been such a problem has not been the MS imitation but their prioritization of developer interests over user interests" - Its true, they are in compentition with MS, and its true, they are serving their interests over those of the users. I have dealt directly with KDE4 devels over the last year until I just couldn't anymore.
David C. Rankin - Your suggests are right on track and have given me much to think about.
Poor, overworked Tim wrote "Well, I do want to convey to the user that the Documents folder is unique to his or her profile, unlike the other shortcuts which point to shared system resources that are identical across all profiles. Personally I like "My Documents", but other alternatives could be "Personal Documents", "Personal Files" or similar. - Isn't it possible to create a script that would read the user's login name and create a direct such as "Tim's User File" which would contain everything in its own net subdirectories (Documents, Spreedsheets, Homework (for those still in skool), Photos etc). My people just a directory called User-Files, or rename it later on.
I also, whole-heartedly, agree with Lisi in that if a language is to be used, such as English, then it should be used correctly. The same should go for computer terms.
Felix Miata wrote "Try a librarian hat and think about cataloging, file drawers and shelving. Does that help?" - yes it does help and its what I've been trying to do.
I apoligize for the length of the email but I thougt it wise to start a new one, than add to the already lengthy one.
I've always believed order comes from chaos, so I think we are making progress.
Kate
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On Mon, 2011-01-24 at 19:29 -0500, Katheryne Draven wrote: <snip>
Poor, overworked Tim wrote "Well, I do want to convey to the user that the Documents folder is unique to his or her profile, unlike the other shortcuts which point to shared system resources that are identical across all profiles. Personally I like "My Documents", but other alternatives could be "Personal Documents", "Personal Files" or similar. - Isn't it possible to create a script that would read the user's login name and create a direct such as "Tim's User File" which would contain everything in its own net subdirectories (Documents, Spreedsheets, Homework (for those still in skool), Photos etc). My people just a directory called User-Files, or rename it later on.
<snip>
Someone earlier pointed out the problem with spaces and I wholeheartedly agree. I think that's an excellent idea. Whatever we do, can we avoid spaces in the directory names. I suppose that's really not a KMenu item but drifted into the thread via the reference to My Computer.
John A. Sullivan III wrote "People have businesses to run and could care less about educating themselves (rightfully)." - I've never met a successful business person who didn't what to know how it all works, considering its how money is made. I have business client, all of which have wanted to see what's under the hood. Once again, We cannot cater to those who cannot/will not learn or simple use their mind. Its simply impossible to crater to those who do not think. Think about it, how can you build something for someone that doesn't care? A person like this, is never happy.
<snip> I'll gladly yield on this as I may be reflecting our own experiences. We are moving entire small business over and we find the owner / decision maker is interested, engaged, and sold. Then there are the 10, 20, 100, 200 other users who could care less and are only interested in getting their jobs done. When their productivity starts to sag or just because it is different and they like to complain, we start getting lots of push back about it being different. Honestly, from looking at how well this conversation is going, I have a sneaking suspicion that the end result will be very usable and not much of a transition. I do think it is a dangerous assumption to think end users will be engaged - the project sponsor may be but then come the next 200 rank and file.
Many thanks to all for such thoughtful and peaceful input - John
On 1/24/11, John A. Sullivan III jsullivan@opensourcedevel.com wrote:
On Mon, 2011-01-24 at 19:29 -0500, Katheryne Draven wrote:
<snip> > Poor, overworked Tim wrote "Well, I do want to convey to the user that > the Documents folder is unique to his or her profile, unlike the other > shortcuts which point to shared system resources that are identical > across all profiles. Personally I > like "My Documents", but other alternatives could be "Personal > Documents", "Personal Files" or similar. - Isn't it possible to create > a script that would read the user's login name and create a direct > such as "Tim's User File" which would contain everything in its own > net subdirectories (Documents, Spreedsheets, Homework (for those still > in skool), Photos etc). My people just a directory called User-Files, > or rename it later on. > <snip>
Someone earlier pointed out the problem with spaces and I wholeheartedly agree. I think that's an excellent idea. Whatever we do, can we avoid spaces in the directory names. I suppose that's really not a KMenu item but drifted into the thread via the reference to My Computer.
John A. Sullivan III wrote "People have businesses to run and could care less about educating themselves (rightfully)." - I've never met a successful business person who didn't what to know how it all works, considering its how money is made. I have business client, all of which have wanted to see what's under the hood. Once again, We cannot cater to those who cannot/will not learn or simple use their mind. Its simply impossible to crater to those who do not think. Think about it, how can you build something for someone that doesn't care? A person like this, is never happy.
<snip> I'll gladly yield on this as I may be reflecting our own experiences. We are moving entire small business over and we find the owner / decision maker is interested, engaged, and sold. Then there are the 10, 20, 100, 200 other users who could care less and are only interested in getting their jobs done. When their productivity starts to sag or just because it is different and they like to complain, we start getting lots of push back about it being different. Honestly, from looking at how well this conversation is going, I have a sneaking suspicion that the end result will be very usable and not much of a transition. I do think it is a dangerous assumption to think end users will be engaged - the project sponsor may be but then come the next 200 rank and file.
Many thanks to all for such thoughtful and peaceful input - John
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Tiago thank you.
John
Now I see what you're saying regarding business. I thought you were talking about the owners, where, it seems, you were talking about the employees who only see it as a paycheck.
If that's what you're saying then yes, you're right. I've experienced employees who didn't care either way what was going on so long as they were paid. In once case, the owner, a kind person, was so put off by their lack of interest, he decided to outsource. To add injury to insult, the end work wasn't any better.
However, I would still rather build something for someone who could appreciate it.
Thank you both,
Kate
-
John A. Sullivan III -
Katheryne Draven -
Tiago Marques