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

[Christopher A. Williams]

On Mon, 2005-11-14 at 10:51 -0600, Les Mikesell wrote:
> 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.

...And one more thing: Here's the original rant from the guy doing the
usability assessment about why he's so frustrated with people on these
lists. I left it out before because I figured it would start a
flame-fest. While it's an old argument, it's telling in light of this
thread. I hate that I may have to go back to him and tell him he was
right...

** Begin Linux Rant**

Then again, since it’s geared at Linux users, it does help reinforce the
notion that Linux is unnecessarily complex and difficult, and should
help keep the number of non-disgusted Linux users to a minimum. It
appears to me that the goal of the Linux crowd is to scare off people
who don’t enjoy overly complicated, arcane, and utterly unnecessary
technicalities. In that sense, the site is a resounding success, as it
turns a bunch of menial maintenance tasks (updating drivers, something
that you barely ever have to do anymore on Windows and MacOs) into a
two-day ordeal of research, jargon, and wild goose chases.


Most humans don’t enjoy vacuuming, especially when they have to build
their vacuum from scratch, after scouring the globe for well-hidden
vacuum parts, and learning about electrical engineering. But of course,
the Linux crowd is extremely proud that they are able to, in just a few
months, after a few shocks and a few calls to the firehouse, build a
vacuum cleaner that, with constant care and maintenance, works almost as
well as the $34.99 Hoover everybody else buys at Wall-Mart. “But”, they
say, “can you control the power input level in your Hoover?”

And our answer is, of course: “Who cares?”

** End Linux Rant**



-- 
======================
"Only two things are infinite,
the universe and human stupidity,
and I'm not sure about the former."

-- Albert Einstein