11–20 of 103 posts
> No matter how much well-intentioned user research these companies invest in, they'll never be able to produce software that fully meets the needs of individual users and culturally distant communities. Domain experts being able to solve their own problems sounds is a worthwhile objective for software tools but innovation in this space has been surprisingly sparce. I've been searching for other examples of end-user…
They often work with the software, based on their "strange" mental model, and can have very weird workflows.
In some cases, this is excellent, and it is worth it for me to learn the new model, and maybe add affordances for it.
The biggest issue that I come across, is users of my software, developing mental models of the software that I would never, in a million years, have developed, myself. They often work with the software, based on their "strange" mental model, and can have very weird workflows. In some cases, this is excellent, and it is worth it for me to learn the new model, and maybe add affordances for it.
> No matter how much well-intentioned user research these companies invest in, they'll never be able to produce software that fully meets the needs of individual users and culturally distant communities. Domain experts being able to solve their own problems sounds is a worthwhile objective for software tools but innovation in this space has been surprisingly sparce. I've been searching for other examples of end-user…
> No matter how much well-intentioned user research these companies invest in, they'll never be able to produce software that fully meets the needs of individual users and culturally distant communities. Domain experts being able to solve their own problems sounds is a worthwhile objective for software tools but innovation in this space has been surprisingly sparce. I've been searching for other examples of end-user…
People using notepad to subtitle screen-captured tutorials on Youtube.
The biggest issue that I come across, is users of my software, developing mental models of the software that I would never, in a million years, have developed, myself. They often work with the software, based on their "strange" mental model, and can have very weird workflows. In some cases, this is excellent, and it is worth it for me to learn the new model, and maybe add affordances for it.
Literally everyone I ever see using this software drags videos directly from the finder onto the timeline, then pick a transition once and then just copy/paste it within the timeline. So 50% of the screen is wasted real estate for a lot of the users.
[1]: https://www.gwern.net/docs/technology/2004-03-30-shirky-situ...
The biggest issue that I come across, is users of my software, developing mental models of the software that I would never, in a million years, have developed, myself. They often work with the software, based on their "strange" mental model, and can have very weird workflows. In some cases, this is excellent, and it is worth it for me to learn the new model, and maybe add affordances for it.
Could you talk about some concrete examples?
The biggest issue that I come across, is users of my software, developing mental models of the software that I would never, in a million years, have developed, myself. They often work with the software, based on their "strange" mental model, and can have very weird workflows. In some cases, this is excellent, and it is worth it for me to learn the new model, and maybe add affordances for it.
Could you talk about some concrete examples?
The biggest issue that I come across, is users of my software, developing mental models of the software that I would never, in a million years, have developed, myself. They often work with the software, based on their "strange" mental model, and can have very weird workflows. In some cases, this is excellent, and it is worth it for me to learn the new model, and maybe add affordances for it.
Unfortunately, because people function that way, there's a lot of pain ahead for those to learn to rely of obscure uses of software. Sooner or later those pathways are dropped, if for no other reason than cutting down on maintenance costs.