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How to Design Software Good

haiku-os.org

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Re: How to Design Software Good

#41

Post by [deleted] »

fao_ wrote: post #38
JadeNB wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We blame the user, but it's our fault for laying hidden traps. You can implement social media without tricking users, but we choose not to. Aside from the fact that it's a minefield of dark patterns, how did social media get into this discussion?

> Aside from the fact that it's a minefield of dark patterns, how did social media get into this discussion? "Aside from [the thing that makes it relevant to this discussion], how is [x] relevant to this discussion?".

[deleted]

Re: How to Design Software Good

#42

Post by PavlovsCat »

qwerty456127 wrote: post #21

> depend only on the formats installed by default in the system. Funny fact I've actually "invented" this philosophy (drivers for every file format being installed, managed and exposed to applications and scripts by an OS) when I was a child. I was amazed to see somebody has actually went implementing this idea (as far as I understand it works approximately this way in Haiku) > As an aside, MP3 is a format which requ…

> Funny fact I've actually "invented" this philosophy (drivers for every file format being installed, managed and exposed to applications and scripts by an OS) when I was a child.

The Amiga got something like that with Workbench 2.0, actually:

http://wiki.amigaos.net/wiki/Datatypes_Library

This is also very cool:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AREXX

> ARexx can easily communicate with third-party software that implements an "ARexx port". Any Amiga application or script can define a set of commands and functions for ARexx to address, thus making the capabilities of the software available to the scripts written in ARexx.

> ARexx can direct commands and functions to several applications from the same script, thus offering the opportunity to mix and match functions from the different programs. For example, an ARexx script could extract data from a database, insert the data into a spreadsheet to perform calculations on it, then insert tables and charts based on the results into a word processor document.

Re: How to Design Software Good

#43

Post by jrockway »

JadeNB wrote: post #35
jrockway wrote: post #15

I am not sure I agree with all of this. I worry that the article encourages you to dumb-down software so that your users feel completely helpless. That is the opposite of what you should do. Your users should feel enabled and encouraged to explore and experiment. Sometimes they may encounter jargon, but if it ultimately helps them gain a better understanding if they choose to research it more, I think it's helpful. T…

> We blame the user, but it's our fault for laying hidden traps. You can implement social media without tricking users, but we choose not to. Aside from the fact that it's a minefield of dark patterns, how did social media get into this discussion?

Just as an example where the results of using software surprise users and upset them. I was specifically referring to when Google integrated G+ and YouTube; I mentioned it in passing a couple of sentences before.

Re: How to Design Software Good

#44

Post by bkmartin »

fao_ wrote: post #40
emmelaich wrote: post #13

> Good Software Does Not Expose Its Implementation Excellent goal but way harder than people think. I would say it is not possible in the fullest.

I kind of feel that you just read the title here. It's not talking about the 'fullest': An example of this would be if a music composition program has an easily-reached maximum song size because the code monkey who wrote it used a 16-bit variable instead of a 32-bit one. *While there are sometimes limitations that cannot be overcome*, the actual code written and the architecture used when it was written should have a…

The most common example I see is the password requirement that it must be between 8 and 16 characters... The 16 character limit is the main issue there... You know it has to do with the wya the data is stored.

Re: How to Design Software Good

#45

Post by AceJohnny2 »

emmelaich wrote: post #13

> Good Software Does Not Expose Its Implementation Excellent goal but way harder than people think. I would say it is not possible in the fullest.

Indeed. Also referred to as "Leaky Abstractions"

Spolsky talked about it 16 years ago:

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/11/11/the-law-of-leaky-a...

Re: How to Design Software Good

#46

Post by [deleted] »

waddlesplash wrote: post #33
oralty wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Haiku is an OS that basically no one uses for any purpose. > By your logic, since macOS has ~1/10 the install base of Windows, Does not follow. MacOS use relative to Windows is not at all a fair comparison. Firstly "everybody" uses Windows, so 1/10 of huge number is still a huge number. Second, except for gaming and some particular areas like EDA, MacOS has a general software library with a broad-base of technical…

> MacOS has a general software library with a broad-base of technical and non-technical users throughout the world. Haiku OS cannot claim to have anything like that. That was the second half of my comment. Please re-read the first half. My point in that part, though, was that macOS has ~1/10 the users of Windows, but Windows' UI/UX was/is widely regarded as absolutely atrocious, and macOS' as being pretty good to gre…

[deleted]

Re: How to Design Software Good

#48

Post by nayuki »

I saw a quick flash of unstyled content (in Firefox) where all the text was jammed into one paragraph with no breaks. And then the page rendered normally.

So I glanced at the source code, and it surprised me to see that it was not a typical HTML document, but instead an XML document with a stylesheet. It is very rare to see a non-HTML page on the web, whether it is the XHTML serialization of HTML, or fully custom XML.

Re: How to Design Software Good

#49

Post by JadeNB »

fao_ wrote: post #38
JadeNB wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We blame the user, but it's our fault for laying hidden traps. You can implement social media without tricking users, but we choose not to. Aside from the fact that it's a minefield of dark patterns, how did social media get into this discussion?

> Aside from the fact that it's a minefield of dark patterns, how did social media get into this discussion? "Aside from [the thing that makes it relevant to this discussion], how is [x] relevant to this discussion?".

The layout of casinos is also a minefield of dark patterns, but I'd have been surprised to see it crop up in the middle of that comment without explanation or follow-up.

Re: How to Design Software Good

#50

Post by waddlesplash »

JadeNB wrote: post #36
waddlesplash wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This document was mostly written almost a decade ago, and by someone who I think went to a prestigious institution. So the "rules of style" back then aren't what they are today. You're right, we should update it, though.

> This document was mostly written almost a decade ago, and by someone who I think went to a prestigious institution. So the "rules of style" back then aren't what they are today. What does the second half of the first sentence have to do with the second sentence?

That prestigious institutions up until the past few years used male pronouns to refer to generic individuals as being "proper English", which this document ostensibly is, and this explains the document's use of them?
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