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From: gilbert@hci.hw.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.windows.misc
Subject: Re: A/UX window systems, Mac tool...( Hum Interface)
Message-ID: <200@glenlivet.hci.hw.ac.uk>
Date: 29 Mar 88 12:10:04 GMT
References: <4129@hoptoad.uucp> <283@rhesus.primate.wisc.edu> <1710@ssc-vax.UUCP> <7523@apple.Apple.Com> <1719@ssc-vax.UUCP> <241@eos.UUCP> <884@daisy.UUCP> <3172@phri.UUCP> <1514@devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> <7654@apple.Apple.Com>
Reply-To: gilbert@hci.hw.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton)
Organization: Scottish HCI Centre
Lines: 36
Keywords: It works.

In article <1514@devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> des@jplpro.JPL.NASA.GOV (David Smyth) writes:
>
>top-of-screen menu bar is "modal" and modality is really evil and
>confusing.  One of Xerox's design tenets for good human interfaces
>is "No modes!" and a good tenet it is.

Larry Tesler should have kept his tee-shirt to himself!!!!!!!!!!
Modelessness falls apart under a moment of examination.

A problem with HCI is the search for `no-brainer' guidelines which are
short, simple and easy-to-learn, .... but impossible to use.

Any usable system is going to be moded, as the bandwidth of the input
channel is invariably inadequate for the specification of many
discrete pieces of input information.  Read journals like IJMMS for
more thoughtful approaches to modality.

The Mac will ALWAYS be moded as long as applications are written in
PASCAL or C without signals/threads.  This is why talking of modeless
design is silly if the implementation abstractions enforce modedness.

As for the evil and confusingness of modes, this is meaningless.
It is impossible to define modedness well enough to allow experimental
comparisons of moded and non-moded systems.  The sentence is cute, but
untestable ... one of Xerox's design tenets was "Evaluate alternatives"
and a better tenet.  Now when someone implements a truly modeless
complex application, then we'll be able to make sensible comments
by EVALUATING the true effects of increasing modedness on human performance
when interacting with computers.

P.S. Everyone at Xerox had their own pet tenets! :-) 
P.P.S. ... and so does everyone here.
-- 
Gilbert Cockton, Scottish HCI Centre, Heriot-Watt University, Chambers St.,
Edinburgh, EH1 1HX.  JANET:  gilbert@uk.ac.hw.hci   
ARPA: gilbert%hci.hw.ac.uk@cs.ucl.ac.uk UUCP: ..{backbone}!mcvax!ukc!hci!gilbert