Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Should error messages apologize? (2013)

ux.stackexchange.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 262 posts

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#181

Post by dpassens »

retrac wrote: post #145
jerf wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In addition to the other couple of replies that mention Japan, I would suggest, just start paying attention to this in the sense of deliberative practice, and you may find that your brain has been doing more editing on your social interactions than you may have realized. Sometimes the hardest things to see are the things we deal with all the time because our brains just read them as baseline. There's only a handful o…

A similar effect: the imperative (giving orders). It is nearly as taboo in English, to just use the imperative, as it is in Japan. For example, if you have a dinner guest, you will ask "Would you like some more? Could you pass the salt?" It's always very indirect, put as a request that may be refused, or a suggestion. In other cultures, it may just be the bare imperative - "Eat more! Give me the salt." - and this is…

Is "Would you like some more?" really a good example here? It's not really implying that the person asked ought to eat more, is it?

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#182

Post by tanjtanjtanj »

mzs wrote: post #177
tanjtanjtanj wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Found" and "Updating" are verbs, you just changed the tense.

I guess, they are all missing 'to be' so incorrect - I don't know what to call that precisely - correct versions I avoid: "site cannot be found" "software is updating"/"updating is in progress"

They're just casual or conversational forms of the verbs. Dropping "is" from "is updating" for example.

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#183

Post by tanjtanjtanj »

LesZedCB wrote: post #180
mzs wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess, they are all missing 'to be' so incorrect - I don't know what to call that precisely - correct versions I avoid: "site cannot be found" "software is updating"/"updating is in progress"

> gerund: a form that is derived from a verb but that functions as a noun, in English ending in -ing, e.g., asking in do you mind my asking you?.

"Updating" in the phrase "Software updating" as a status message isn't a gerund though. It looks a lot like a gerund but it's really a casual form that drops the rest of the verb "[is] updating".

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#185

Post by yonatan8070 »

8organicbits wrote: post #43

I suspect there are cultural preferences here, there's no reason to believe there's one correct answer for all of humanity. I'm from the US but I've traveled to places where it's considered rude to say "no" directly and apologies aren't common. Like when trying to order an unavailable item from a menu: - I'd like the beef burger - The chicken burger is very good - That's OK, can I have the beef burger? - Our hot dogs…

I really don't want my software to be polite, I think that many Linux CLI tools do a good job with this:

    cat: /etc/whatever: No such file or directory
No nonesense, no politeness, just the pure, searchable error. I've noticed that some MS CLI tools do the exact opposite, and print out an entire paragraph to say something very simple, gpupdate comes to mind, spitting this out if the domain is unreachable:

    The processing of Group Policy failed because of lack of network connectivity to a domain controller. This may be a transient condition. A success message would be generated once the machine gets connected to the domain controller and Group Policy has successfully processed. If you do not see a success Message for several hours, then contact your administrator.
A much more sensible error in my opinion would be:

    Group Policy update failed: domain.tld: Destination host unreachable / Destination network unreachable / timeout / ...
Which would be both more consice and more informative about the actual issue

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#186

Post by tanjtanjtanj »

01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote: post #161
tanjtanjtanj wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Found" and "Updating" are verbs, you just changed the tense.

It's kinda foggy, "Found" can be an adjective, like "Found art".

That's technically true. The typical interpretation would be "[The] site [was] not found" as a verb. If you squint hard enough you can interpret is as "[The] site [is] not [in the state of being] found".

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#187

Post by Towaway69 »

dehrmann wrote: post #130
qwerty456127 wrote: post #129

ChatGPT seriously hurts me by apologizing all the time. Every time I ask it anything, let alone tell it about its mistake I want it to correct, I feel like I'm exploiting, abusing and hurting an insecure kid. So no, I want a machine to speak with cold, objective, concise factual style, not trying to mimic an overly polite person.

It's like having a conversation with HAL 9000.

Sorry Dave, I can't do that.

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#188

Post by Zondartul »

rogual wrote: post #66

I don't even like "We" in UI messages. "We couldn't find that site." "We're just updating your computer." Perhaps I'm just an old fogey, but passive voice feels like the only right choice: "The site could not be found." "Your computer is being updated." The insertion of "We" feels like an imposition; the company who wrote the code reaching in and enacting their will with your equipment, using your screen as their soa…

I think it can be acceptable to use "I" in UI messages. After all, the app is the one doing things, and it's what I'm interacting with, so it would be fine to have a message like "I'm going to do X" or "I tried to do X but Y", or "I can't find the Z on this computer"

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#189

Post by kmoser »

bitwize wrote: post #156
iguanayou wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least they stopped putting "My" in front of everything.

But that was just brutal honesty: it's not your computer anymore.

I've never liked the "my" prefix for labels because it wasn't immediately obvious whether "my" referred to me, or to the person/company/entity/software which created the thing.

This is particularly annoying when error messages are written from the point of view of an entity or fictitious person, e.g. "Sorry, I wasn't able to..." but things on screen are labeled "My..." Is "me" the user or the software?

Re: Should error messages apologize? (2013)

#190

Post by WesolyKubeczek »

TrianguloY wrote: post #56

What about "It seems you do not have permission" or "It appears ...". Other option is "Unfortunately you do not..." They are like in the middle between formal and informal, or maybe I feel that way because in not native English.

"It seems"? So there's a possibility the program may be wrong and just imagined the error?
Post reply on HN