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Good Tools Are Invisible
151–160 of 305 posts
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#152The effect of the interface becoming "invisible" is actually a function of time spent in the interface. I think what the author is reacting to is discretionary friction; designers or product folks adding features or complexity. The thing is, that friction may be necessary in order to achieve a certain task (think about resolving a merge conflict). And given enough time in the interface, even those "disruptive" steps…
> The effect of the interface becoming "invisible" is actually a function of time spent in the interface. emacs starts with "extensible", so wouldn't extending the tool be part of the interface? Purchased tools rarely align with this - they provide functionality over customization. especially in the apple world.
It really depends on the tool… CRMs and EHRs are often designed to be customizable. But end-users typically don't want to spend a lot of time configuring and customizing the interface itself. All the choices quickly become overwhelming.
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#153I get the sentiment and agree with it but vim has multiple cursors. I'm sure gingerbill is aware of this so to use that example is a little strange.
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#154Well this is a take. It’s weird how much the author fixates on Vim being “visible” and implies multiple cursors and features in Sublime aren’t. Just because your brain is trained to not think about it anymore doesn’t make it any less visible. Multiple cursors aren’t a native feature in many tools, it is still something to learn how to use, let alone effectively — just as Vim key bindings are. Plus, vim is more than j…
Its weird because vim has multiple cursor mode as well
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#155I get the sentiment and agree with it but vim has multiple cursors. I'm sure gingerbill is aware of this so to use that example is a little strange.
Vim does not have multiple cursors which can be placed ANYWHERE even multiple on the same line and at any offset. You are clearly not aware of what Vim actually offers.
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#156Having designed a good number of internal tools for teams of developers I couldn't agree more. Earlier I had the tendency to "leave the guts" open, thinking my users were developers and would want that. All it did was put obstacles in my teammates actually doing their work. My teammates must use the tools I made for them to achieve work the company needs them to do, they don't want, nor should they want to, fiddle wi…
> try to design the internal tools in such way as to make the users fall into a pit of success.
Yes. I couldn't agree more. The tools have to make it quick and easy for the users to succeed - as invisible as possible, and transparent to what a user wants to achieve.
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#157I get the sentiment and agree with it but vim has multiple cursors. I'm sure gingerbill is aware of this so to use that example is a little strange.
Vim does not have multiple cursors which can be placed ANYWHERE even multiple on the same line and at any offset. You are clearly not aware of what Vim actually offers.
Same line edits can be done with search and replace and regex. And your article doesnt specify offsets, in which case you can use a plugin, which you state you already have to do that for sublime's flaws. There's so many other examples you couldve used.
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#158I agree with Odin creator here. I am not sure when or why we have come to a conclusion in our professional industry that "real software engineer uses vim/emacs/insert your CLI editor here" type of mental model. Is it just the testosterone level speaking here?
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#159As a long time terminal user, it does not surprise me much when people just don't get it . The discussion often goes like this: — In a terminal, I can do so-and-so with a simple command — Well, in my FrobnicatorStudio, there's a shortcut Ctrl+Alt+So for that and this can go forever, going into pretty much useless comparisons like "in vim, I can delete 24 lines by pressing four keys" (no Sublime user ever needs that)…
I don't think your logic is off, but I also think that the FrobnosticatorStudio people have a point. The thing is, yes, the terminal gives you infinitely more capabilities but you probably have like, 20 actual things you do regularly? The learning curve makes it a hard sell when those 20 things are probably all you need. Like, sometimes I'll do something like this if I'm in a terminal and I want to find a build scrip…
My usual thought on this is that I don't want to get stuck at ctrlp ctrlf level. I always pick a tool that gives an intermediate expressiveness level even if it means a bit more efforts.. especially if it's not gui because I can reuse and compose it.
For instance jq falls too far on the capabilities curve. It's a nuclear weapon but it's almost a programming language and I never can keep the operators in mind (even though I loved the idea at first).
Re: Good Tools Are Invisible
#160GUI tools were better in the 90s when interfaces were more standardized, and I think the "invisibility" factor was a big part of it. I don't want to have to learn a company's whole design philosophy system because they thought building a packaged web app was "cooler" than using a standard widget toolkit. I find myself using the terminal more and more as time goes on, because I find the total friction to be less when things are predictable. I'd probably not have left the GUI world if we were all still using some modern equivalent of user32.dll.