Livna Usability Assessment (Was: Re: cursed nvidia fedora my lack of knowledgeness)

[Les Mikesell]

On Mon, 2005-11-14 at 00:28, Christopher A. Williams wrote:
> > 
> > There's nothing unique about the use of the site. You shouldn't
> > be at livna unless you already know that the program you want
> > to install isn't in the core or extras repositories.  When you
> > know about those repositories, you'll know all you need to
> > know about livna except the config info. 
> 
> ...So, we shouldn't allow non-technical users the ability to do things
> with Fedora like play Windows Media formats because they're not
> technical enough to understand it. Nice...

No, I mean we shouldn't confuse them into thinking that livna is
different even if they are too dumb to know better.  They should
start by using fedora extras and then when livna works exactly
the same way they won't have anything new to learn.  Livna is
different only by policy, not by anything technical.

> > > Not necessarily true. Everyone will have Yum, but what about other tools
> > > like Yum Extender?
> > 
> > Not necessary - and again not unique to livna. Just get the config
> > done and type something like:
> > yum install xine vlc mplayer xmms-mp3
> 
> ...Which makes my point again. You show more interest in being technical
> with the CLI and it's capabilities to do rather complex operations than
> helping make the software useful for the average, non-technical user.

The most useful thing you can do for a non-technical user is to
demonstrate that the best way to control a computer is by typing
commands that aren't limited to the choices someone already made
for them.  And that you don't even have to type them, you can cut
and paste from someone's instructions or run a bunch of them from
a prepared script.  This is true even, or especially if you want
to do something the author of the base software didn't anticipate.

> The user has to know that they need xine, vlc, mplayer and xmms-mp3 to
> be able to handle the most basic multimedia formats available on other
> platforms.

Remind me again what they are doing at livna...

>  If they know *exactly* what they need and understand yum,
> then this is a relatively easy command. But first, they need to know
> they need these packages. If you didn't know the package names, you
> couldn't get this done even if you were a yum guru.

The best way to learn about the programs is to install them. So the
yum command is the first step.  The price is right here, we don't
need to sell anyone.
 
> > >  And even if everyone s Yum, do they know what it
> > > does what to do with it before coming to this site? If they did,why is a
> > > wiki being discussed as an addition?
> > 
> > They do need a place for feedback about unexpected problems and
> > workarounds - the things someone maintaining the site can't predict.
> 
> Yes this is a need, among others.

Given a wiki, you don't need to know the others ahead of time. If you
see a need you can address it without anyone else's agreement.  In other
words you could add those simple instructions that you think someone
needs yourself.

> > > My mother is a Fedora Core user as well. She uses Fedora because I
> > > showed her how to do some things with it and she likes the speed,
> > > stability and flexibility Fedora give even an average user. She couldn't
> > > make heads or tails of the Livna site either. It was no help to her at
> > > all - I had to step her through finding and setting up the repo using
> > > the RPM. She waited patiently for a couple of days before I could get to
> > > her to help.
> > 
> > Did she understand how to use the core and extras repositories?  Those
> > should come first.  Learn about the place with thousands of programs
> > before the one with dozens.
> 
> ...So, again, my mother should learn all about the thousands of other
> programs, with all of the CLI utilities before she earns the right to
> watch things that come in Windows Media format or, heaven forbid, listen
> to an MP3 file.

Yes, she should understand that thousands of programs are available
for the asking, and that a few aren't for policy, not technical reasons.
That understanding comes pretty easy compared to wading though the
EULA that comes with Windows Media player.

> Oh, and since Extras is already pre-configured with FC4,
> we all must make sure we know that it is, understand it, and after lots
> of practice and pain, we get to finally play those news videos from CNN.

You are missing a lot of stuff if you don't understand what is available
in extras.

> The same ones we could always play out of the box with the Redmonian
> software with none of the fuss.

Yet in core/extras you'll find lots of stuff that would cost thousands
to add to windows.

> And we wonder why Linux isn't accepted at a greater level. Hmmm....

I don't wonder that.  It's because there is no salesman that will buy
your lunch while explaining the virtues of their wares. 

> You really don't see the fallacy with what you say.

No, I find typing 'yum install ...' much easier than going shopping and
dealing with sales people.

> The answer to your first question, by the way, is yes, she had a basic
> understanding, thanks to me teaching her.

Then I suspect she could have handled typing in or cutting/pasting
that rpm command listed on the livna site to get started.

> > > > There's nothing different about using the tool with this
> > > > repository than the other ones they already use.
> > > 
> > > This may be the case, but the average non-technical user may not realize
> > > it.
> > 
> > That's the problem you need to solve, not the situation of someone
> > who stumbles across the livna web site without having or knowing
> > how to use fedora.
> 
> ...And again you miss the whole point. I know enough about Fedora to
> understand it easily as well as you do. I can enter cryptic commands
> with the best of them.

The point is to make the commands non-cryptic.  You don't do that
by avoiding them.

>  Yet this site isn't useful even for me as an
> information portal.

What information do you expect to find there other than what you
need to configure yum?  It's just the wrong place to look for anything
else.

> > The config info has to live somewhere.  
> 
> Then make it blatantly easy for people coming to the site to use it.

What's easier than running the rpm command listed there?

> It happened with Extras and it *could* happen with Livna as well. But if
> that does happen, we better be prepared to make things as easy as
> possible for people just starting with Fedora. Otherwise, they'll go
> back to using what they were before and leave Fedora behind.

If you are only interested in running programs that are not, by policy,
included in Fedora then perhaps it's not the best choice for you. If
you are interested in the wide variety of things in extras, then you'll
understand that livna isn't technically different.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
    lesmikesell at gmail.com