Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: $Revision: 1.6.2.16 $; site inmet.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!cca!inmet!bhyde
From: bhyde@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.micro.mac
Subject: Re: Finder Suggestions
Message-ID: <26700029@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 28-Aug-85 14:46:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: inmet.26700029
Posted: Wed Aug 28 14:46:00 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 31-Aug-85 21:41:10 EDT
References: <2281@sdcrdcf.UUCP>
Lines: 22
Nf-ID: #R:sdcrdcf:-228100:inmet:26700029:000:1267
Nf-From: inmet!bhyde    Aug 28 14:46:00 1985


The single thing that scares naive users the most is complexity.
The Mac is able to appear simple while having a lot of complexity
by packing a lot of stuff into a small space.  Thus MacWrite has
the usual fifty or so commands that any formatter needs but it seems
to have many fewer.  MacWrite is also a good example of how complexity
scares off a naive user, most naive users never figure out for themselves
how to create a header/footer, hide rulers, etc because the menu those
things appear in is so cluttered.

So one might suggest that there should be a mess of other icons on the
finder's desk top.  I think not.  Naive users think the trash can is
cute, and that's good, but if you put a lot of tools on the desk then 
they are going to slip right out the front door of the store before the
salesman has gotten the chance to scare them away in his own unique manner.

Any body who reads usenet is probably what the micro-people call a "power
user."  Microsoft's applications for the Mac are geared much more toward
the power user, particularly microsoft graph.  But it is interesting to
me how much microsoft's spread sheet breaks new ground in being accessable
to naive users (or atleast those naive users that want a spread sheet).
    ben hyde, cambridge.