Idea: easier transition for newcomers from other DEs/OSes

Martin Sourada martin.sourada at seznam.cz
Fri Aug 24 21:18:10 UTC 2007


On Fri, 2007-08-24 at 21:28 +0200, Christopher Brown wrote:
> On 24/08/07, Adam Jackson <ajackson at redhat.com> wrote:
>         On Fri, 2007-08-24 at 19:15 +0200, Martin Sourada wrote:
>         > Hi,
>         >
>         > It's all about picking default settings new users wish.
>         Imagine a user
>         > who is coming from Windows to Fedora, but he has no clue how
>         linux 
>         > works. It would greatly help him if the linux behaved to
>         some extent
>         > similar to Windows - meaning applications look (themes),
>         window's
>         > buttons layout (in this case same), menu layout, keyboard
>         shortcuts etc. 
>         > The same for users coming from Mac OS and for users used to
>         Gnome and
>         > switching to KDE and opposite way. The idea is that user
>         selects what he
>         > wants his desktop resemble, and then the usage of the
>         desktop would be 
>         > more intuitive to him.
>         
>         Bzzt, logical fallacy.  Read about the uncanny valley, then
>         apply that
>         lesson to your argument.  Point for point emulation is not
>         just
>         technically infeasible, it's also a really really bad idea. 
> 
> I agree. As an aside, I found the uncanny valley article on wikipedia
> fascinating.
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_Valley
> 
> if you're interested. However much you skin over GNOME or KDE to make
> them look like inferior OS's with greater market penetration, it
> really is pretty pointless. This creates restrictions on UI design and
> people waste time developing like-for-like applications simply in
> order to mimic The Control Panel or My Network Places.
> System>Administration or Places>Network is faster and simpler and
> after is easily picked up. I have yet to introduce anyone to GNOME and
> they have failed to grasp the new layout - quite the reverse - the
> simplicity is often seen as a key benefit. 
> 
> Cheers
> Chris
> -- 
> http://www.chruz.com 
> -- 

Ok, I had a sneaky feeling that it is against the philosophy, but wanted
to mention it nevertheless. I wasn't talking about emulation (even
though it might look so), I was talking about making the process of
transitioning to other system easier. I use gnome, I like almost
everything about it, but I am not the target audience here. Let's say it
this way, comparing KDE and GNOME. You are happy GNOME user but want to
try KDE, for whatever reason, so you'd actually like it to behave like
you are used to (to certain extent). Like having two panels, three
menus, similar looking widget set, same keyboard shortcuts. Nothing
more, the applications would still be KDE, the kontrol center still be
from KDE, etc. 

More generally I am talking about a utility that could ease the job of
doing this. You can set pretty much in today's gnome or kde to be it
more friendly to users used to something different, but it'll still be
KDE and GNOME. I'd like those users to have easy utility, to ease their
start - i.e. to set for them the basic things, so that they will both
learn new behaviour, but also use some of the already learnt.

It would be maybe even more appreciated by dual booters...

And I was talking about CHOICE. If user wants why not help him. If he
wants to try GNOME with all its defaults, let him do that as well.

But anyway, you seem to be against that, so I will not pursue it
further. It is probably a bad idea (and after reading the wikipedia
article about the uncanny valley it seems even worse than that)...

Martin
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