FreeBSD and SSD drives

[Bruce Cran]

On Sun, 13 Feb 2011 08:58:05 -0500
Jerry <freebsd.user at seibercom.net> wrote:

> New, as in four years old? That is one of the worst straw man
> arguments I have heard in a while. In any case, In 2008
> OpenOffice.org started the project Renaissance to improve the user
> interface of OpenOffice. So far the prototypes of the project are
> frequently seen as similar to the ribbon interface.
> 
> Obviously, the use and customization of any software is a personal
> experience. However, if the use of the "ribbon" is beyond your
> abilities, and I am assuming that you are aware that the "ribbon" can
> be hidden, modified and that there are many "add-ons" available that
> can be used to manage it, then so be it. I would rather work with an
> application with a minor annoyance, and I do not find the "ribbon" to
> be one, then to use a less robust application. Again, it is up to the
> end user to ascertain their requirements and find the tool that is
> best fitted to that job.
> 
> In any case, I am quite confident that your condemnation of the
> "ribbon" is totally based on your reading of Slashdot and other
> similar documents and not from any personal experience.

Obviously I'm not talking about myself having problems with it since
I've used all sorts of different UIs over the years and can learn new
interfaces quickly. You seem to be forgetting that most people don't
upgrade very frequently: I wouldn't be surprised if lots were still
running Office 2000.  I worked in an R&D environment and even there
people were steadfastly ignoring Vista and even 64-bit Windows even 3
years after it was released - I had to keep running 32-bit XP.

The problem is that less technically-literate people have problems with
_certain_ operations which were simple in the past - printing for
example now takes several clicks during which the screen changes each
time. For people who get confused when icons move on the screen the
context-sensitive nature of it can be rather difficult to learn.

With large screens and people who don't have the baggage of expecting
things to work a certain way I do think Ribbon is better: for example I
recently started using Access 2010 and found it rather easy to find how
to do things like exporting to SQL Server 2008, which would previously
have been buried. Also, the way traditional sub-menus work in Windows
is really awful for people who don't have accurate mouse skills - move
the mouse outside the menu and it disappears. The Ribbon solves this
problem.

-- 
Bruce Cran