the first thing i always do when installing xp is to turn off all visual styles and set the desktop to classic mode (esspecially in control panel i cant stand the menu system) then i turn off error reporting and such
now then with this so called holding of hands im sure that the microsoft devs dont want to have their hands held using an OS so im sure that they will give us the option of turning that off to (or at the very least some one will find the correct registry entry in order to turn them off) so that is not so much a worry for me
i beleive that vista is going to be a good thing it will just take a little getting used to. i for one like IE7 and if that is a sign of things to come then great.
regarding the general use of computers i use the comparison of cooking (to make another analogy) whilst some people find this the easiest thing in the world many people dont know how long to boil an egg. it is a fair comparison across all skills sport, diy, drawing and even social communication. Whilst i beleive that building a computer is easy, and i sometimes feel guilty for charging people, i just think of all the chefs that charge for the meals they cook. I bet some of them laugh at some of the cook books that hold our hands through making a cake.
Where would we be if every one was good at everything
Originally Posted by CyberSol Great article. I think some of us went through the same "it's to easy, don't hold my hand , I want POWER!!!" mentality when we upgraded from 98/2000 to XP...
OTOH, some of us, have already grow up that phase... I'm attracted to Vista, and in part it's due to that "patronizing" people are talking about.
I'm already past the point when tinkering to solve a problem was fun. Now I don't want to have problems to begin with. I don't want to spend my valuable free time defragmenting the drive, caring and nursing the installation, worrying about patches and bad drivers...I want things done, games running and things working. Yeah, experimenting with new hardware is fun. Getting to know why a game crashes is not.
Of course, I still prefer to have some customizing options...like turning off UAC controls or being able to choose my preferred visual style, but I have better things to do than defragmenting the HDD, or tinkering with msconfig to remove unneeded starting process...and my PC resources would be better used when gaming than being stuck with firewalls, anti-virus, anti-spywares, google desktop search, dvd players and the like.
If Vista is more like OS/X, in the sense of not asking me to be aware of what goes under the skin (is there something more inane that having to maintain a structured and clean folder tree just to be able to locate applications easily? go Vista Search!!!), I'm all for it and it'll make my life easier and my computing time more enjoyable.
Thing is computers should be easy to use, and shouldn't be the exclusive right of a few techies. I draw on paper, I don't need to know how the paper was made, I don't need to know how to make a pencil from a tree. A computer is a tool, and one we rely on more and more in the modern world. This reliance has created the need to make the use of computers an easier experience as they are used more and more in the work place. When you think about it, the car analogy is really inaccurate; as if I were to purchase a car, even twenty years ago, there would only be the remotest possibility that after driving it for 3 minutes, the thing would actually fall to pieces by the side of the road and require me to dismantle the whole engine, rebuilding it, adding upgraded parts and seeking out a new fuel. Consumers have put up with Microsoft's half made, ropey, held together with string, over priced products for years, and this in itself has created 'uber geeks,' who enjoy the techie side of computers and hardware. The mainstream consumer does not want to be burdened with this just to send an email to Aunty Dorris, watch a film etc, and why should they. Remember Microsoft ME operating system? At the time my friend spent £1000 on a machine, it never worked properly, crashed continuously. How did Microsoft get away with this?
I personally am a graphics artist and above anything else, I require reliability, I cannot afford down time, and a day to reinstall Windows and all my software. With this in mind, I am going to get a hair dressers computer on Friday, a nice silver one with two cores and ram upgrade...lol
OK, I seldom look at stuff on digg but from the few times I have I'd have to say that a FEW of the posters actually have more than two brain cells - as for the rest - I think I have posters on my wall with greater wisdom and a more diverse vocabulary.
Beautiful. And so true. I don't know what to say because i am still willing to learn new things. I don't want to be offensive, but just out of curiosity why do some people like DOS and the old stuff still. It confuses me.
Oh my god, that is why I stay with bit right there. People who have no sense of humor and are totally ignorant. These people are the type that disgrace the internet geeks such as us.
That there alone has prevented me from ever going to digg again, how could they say that about this site?
[/angry rant]
I agree with the article wholeheartedly, but the title continuously reminds me of the Bond movie "Goldeneye." from IMDB:
[Ourumov's car has just entered a crowded marketplace]
General Ourumov: Use the bumper! That's what it's for!
Originally Posted by customh I don't want to be offensive, but just out of curiosity why do some people like DOS and the old stuff still. It confuses me.
For me it's a combination of nostalgia, and the fact that using DOS required more skill (which in turn, made you look good).
Saying that though, I always remember setting up EMS memory being a major pain in the ass - I'm glad we don't have that nonsense anymore..."right, only 640kb, and I need 560kb set up as EMS - should I disable the mouse driver, just to free up a little more? Hmmm, can I get away with running HIMEM.SYS? Damn it! I forgot about the SET BLASTER environment variable!".
The amount of boot disks I had was rediculous - well, at least is was before I discovered boot menu's.
Originally Posted by customh Beautiful. And so true. I don't know what to say because i am still willing to learn new things. I don't want to be offensive, but just out of curiosity why do some people like DOS and the old stuff still. It confuses me.
Yep, riggs nailed it: nostalgia, the sense of learning, the feeling of POWER!!! <insert evil laugh here> The challenge made you feel Great when you succeeded - but, do I use the command line from XP (there is actually some good stuff in there now)? - heck no! (If I had been able to keep using 4DOS things might be different though :( )
Heh, i still prefer oldschool any day... No vista before i absolutely have to... I love tinkering with my 1986 Alfa Romeo 75 (Milano) and enjoy driving it much more than a 2006 VW Golf for example..
I can actually open up the hood of my old car and repair stuff with a screwdriver and a wrench, without plugging in a diagnostic machine... This requires skill none the less as does computing, and the fact that the majority of car/pc owners dont care how it works as long as it works, Vista will be good for Joe Average just as the Golf is for Mr. Smith, who, given a selection of tools would ruin the car he drove in 5 minutes..
This and the fact that the diagnostic machine for the new golf costs more than i would spend on repairs on the old 75 in a year, I think I'll keep my old car without ABS, ASR, DSP and all the gimmicks there is out there... Only thing i like about this old car is lots of BHP, the option of LSD (figure that one guys ) :) and a set of alloy wheels
It's quite possible, and easy to turn off "Idiot Mode" in vista.
The first, harshest, biggest step of this mode though is User Account Control (UAC) essentially, it checks EVERYTHING with you - if you try running ANYTHING or changing ANYTHING (the color of your Aero Glass included, thank you very much) if stop and pops up a little window locking you out of the OS until you tell Windows yay or nay.
Now; therein lies the problem. Sure, malicious apps can run willy-nilly, installing themselves, spawning demonic process children, clogging up the drives - but where does this go to? While this may be fine for the "middleweight" user, it doesn't suit us, nor Joe Public. For us geeks, being asked about EVERY SINGLE THING after we just chose to do it is extremely frustrationg - and that's understated, you can bet.
But what about Joe Public then, the chumps with kids, wives, granparents, who never even bothered to read what the big red bubble said on that firewall you put on, and just disabled the anti-virus so that they could go along, chuffing their way across limewire. Leave a PC in the hands of these children (take it as literal and metaphorical, thank you) will have it buggered up to six ways past tuesday so fast that you won't even be able to comprehend what they've done.
So yeah, in reality, it seems that more and more, people think technology is just some indestructable toy....
Originally Posted by Tulatin ...So yeah, in reality, it seems that more and more, people think technology is just some indestructable toy....
And somehow it's never their fault when it stops working. Actual quote from a co-worker who's job relies heavily on using a computer (read in an exasperated whine): "I don't know! I just clicked yes on the pop-up so it would go away - I didn't know it would install anything!!!" :( :( :(
As I'm an excellent parallel parker, I slid in without a hitch and gently bounced off the bumper of the car behind to make sure I had the maximum amount of room to straighten up in. One of my friends said "Whoops!!" and laughed like I'd done something wrong, to which I replied "Ah, that's what bumpers are for eh?"
or at least that's what bumpers were for. These days, bumpers are for little more than show on most cars (who's bright idea was it to switch to body coloured plastic that will chip and scratch if you look at it funny?) and offer about as much protection as Windows without a firewall.
A lot of this could have applied to MacOS many years ago - I had to use it at work from 1995 for a few years and found it very nannying at the time.
AS for what is progress in OS, I had a period in 2003-4 where I was working with NT4, W2k and XP machines - The bank was in a transition and I'm a developer. I always preferred the later OS just because the richer OS gives you more ways to do the same thing and I can choose the method I like. As long as Windows stays with the principal that each edition adds more ways to do the same thing we'll all be happy taking what we need from a new OS.
Comments 26 to 47 of 47
now then with this so called holding of hands im sure that the microsoft devs dont want to have their hands held using an OS so im sure that they will give us the option of turning that off to (or at the very least some one will find the correct registry entry in order to turn them off) so that is not so much a worry for me
i beleive that vista is going to be a good thing it will just take a little getting used to. i for one like IE7 and if that is a sign of things to come then great.
regarding the general use of computers i use the comparison of cooking (to make another analogy) whilst some people find this the easiest thing in the world many people dont know how long to boil an egg. it is a fair comparison across all skills sport, diy, drawing and even social communication. Whilst i beleive that building a computer is easy, and i sometimes feel guilty for charging people, i just think of all the chefs that charge for the meals they cook. I bet some of them laugh at some of the cook books that hold our hands through making a cake.
Where would we be if every one was good at everything
OTOH, some of us, have already grow up that phase... I'm attracted to Vista, and in part it's due to that "patronizing" people are talking about.
I'm already past the point when tinkering to solve a problem was fun. Now I don't want to have problems to begin with. I don't want to spend my valuable free time defragmenting the drive, caring and nursing the installation, worrying about patches and bad drivers...I want things done, games running and things working. Yeah, experimenting with new hardware is fun. Getting to know why a game crashes is not.
Of course, I still prefer to have some customizing options...like turning off UAC controls or being able to choose my preferred visual style, but I have better things to do than defragmenting the HDD, or tinkering with msconfig to remove unneeded starting process...and my PC resources would be better used when gaming than being stuck with firewalls, anti-virus, anti-spywares, google desktop search, dvd players and the like.
If Vista is more like OS/X, in the sense of not asking me to be aware of what goes under the skin (is there something more inane that having to maintain a structured and clean folder tree just to be able to locate applications easily? go Vista Search!!!), I'm all for it and it'll make my life easier and my computing time more enjoyable.
I personally am a graphics artist and above anything else, I require reliability, I cannot afford down time, and a day to reinstall Windows and all my software. With this in mind, I am going to get a hair dressers computer on Friday, a nice silver one with two cores and ram upgrade...lol
http://www.digg.com/software/Windows_Vista_Dumbing_Down_for_Joe_User
You, though, have to remember there are many technically educated people on Digg and some who are no where near that.
Sad to say I actually agree with most of the technically advanced ones on Digg.
*shrug* I stopped reading the comments in digg about a month after the site came out.. reminded me of Usenet just with more tools and less vocabulary.
Ignored.
Laughed at the VB script
That there alone has prevented me from ever going to digg again, how could they say that about this site?
[/angry rant]
from IMDB:
[Ourumov's car has just entered a crowded marketplace]
General Ourumov: Use the bumper! That's what it's for!
Saying that though, I always remember setting up EMS memory being a major pain in the ass - I'm glad we don't have that nonsense anymore..."right, only 640kb, and I need 560kb set up as EMS - should I disable the mouse driver, just to free up a little more? Hmmm, can I get away with running HIMEM.SYS? Damn it! I forgot about the SET BLASTER environment variable!".
The amount of boot disks I had was rediculous - well, at least is was before I discovered boot menu's.
I can actually open up the hood of my old car and repair stuff with a screwdriver and a wrench, without plugging in a diagnostic machine... This requires skill none the less as does computing, and the fact that the majority of car/pc owners dont care how it works as long as it works, Vista will be good for Joe Average just as the Golf is for Mr. Smith, who, given a selection of tools would ruin the car he drove in 5 minutes..
This and the fact that the diagnostic machine for the new golf costs more than i would spend on repairs on the old 75 in a year, I think I'll keep my old car without ABS, ASR, DSP and all the gimmicks there is out there... Only thing i like about this old car is lots of BHP, the option of LSD (figure that one guys ) :) and a set of alloy wheels
I agree though, will be easyer for the average person, inclueding my family (exclueding my brother)
The first, harshest, biggest step of this mode though is User Account Control (UAC) essentially, it checks EVERYTHING with you - if you try running ANYTHING or changing ANYTHING (the color of your Aero Glass included, thank you very much) if stop and pops up a little window locking you out of the OS until you tell Windows yay or nay.
Now; therein lies the problem. Sure, malicious apps can run willy-nilly, installing themselves, spawning demonic process children, clogging up the drives - but where does this go to? While this may be fine for the "middleweight" user, it doesn't suit us, nor Joe Public. For us geeks, being asked about EVERY SINGLE THING after we just chose to do it is extremely frustrationg - and that's understated, you can bet.
But what about Joe Public then, the chumps with kids, wives, granparents, who never even bothered to read what the big red bubble said on that firewall you put on, and just disabled the anti-virus so that they could go along, chuffing their way across limewire. Leave a PC in the hands of these children (take it as literal and metaphorical, thank you) will have it buggered up to six ways past tuesday so fast that you won't even be able to comprehend what they've done.
So yeah, in reality, it seems that more and more, people think technology is just some indestructable toy....
AS for what is progress in OS, I had a period in 2003-4 where I was working with NT4, W2k and XP machines - The bank was in a transition and I'm a developer. I always preferred the later OS just because the richer OS gives you more ways to do the same thing and I can choose the method I like. As long as Windows stays with the principal that each edition adds more ways to do the same thing we'll all be happy taking what we need from a new OS.