bare bones design

[Cedar Falls Public Library Acct #1]

On Tue, 11 Jun 1996, Tom Tipsword wrote:

> > Margaret F. Riley said:
> 
> Telnet isn't a bell or whistle -- it's one of the <basic> building 
> blocks of the Internet.  IMHO, the AOLs of the world are doing us all 
> a major disservice by misrepresenting their email, chat room, and 
> (more recently) web access as being "the Internet".   I don't even
> consider any vendor who doesn't have something as basic as telnet an 
> ISP, regardless of how they advertise themselves.

Total agreement from my end.

 
> The issue of designing for the lowest common denominator brings up 
> something that is both a fault and a virtue in us library folk -- 
> trying to make everything easy and usable for everyone.  After 
> wrestling with this for years I have come to the conclusion that no 
> matter how much time and energy you put into making things "easy", 
> somebody's going to push the wrong button or misconfigure things on 
> their end and then blame it on "the system".  (As in the saying "make 
> something foolproof and they'll make a better fool".)  I would like 
> to put forth the radical concept that users have some responsibility 
> to actually learn what is necessary to use new systems.

What usually happens is that we Librarians get to educate 
the system blamers to the fact that _they_ have misconfigured.
Another thing to teach people about using the library?...

 
> I'm not proposing abandoning user friendly design, or ignoring the 
> lowest common denominator, merely noting that progress depends on 
> stretching limits and that everyone is not going to be able to take 
> full advantage of every advance immediately, nor should we feel 
> guilty because this is the case.  We do both development 
> and production in our shop and our philosophy has always been to 
> maintain the practical (deliver reliable services that work) while 
> expanding the possible (finding new ways to do things and new things 
> to do).  We keep the entire spectrum of users in mind but design for 
> both the high and the low end.  A lot of library systems, even the 
> most advanced ones, strike me as being prime examples of new 
> oldthink in that they are faster or better ways of doing the same 
> old things we've always done.  Oh well, one of these days I'll get 
> around to issuing that manifesto on the future of library systems.... 
> :>

That old thing about technological change -- getting people to 
accept it means making it look like the stuff they're used to.
Think about the term "horseless carriage" and about the look
of the first fiberglass boats with their ridges reminiscent 
of the wooden hulls of just slightly older boats... 
:)

--Barb
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Barbara Dunn				524 Main St.
Technical Services Librarian		Cedar Falls, Iowa 50613
Cedar Falls Public Library		(319)273-8643

"All the men on my staff can type."  -- Bella Abzug
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> TNT
>  
> Tom Tipsword  
> Systems Manager, Hunt Memorial Library      vox:  904-226-6601 
> Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University        fax:  904-226-6368
> Daytona Beach, FL 32114
> 
> http://amelia.db.erau.edu/~tom/     tom at wilbur.db.erau.edu
> 
> "We need more fruitcakes in this world and less bakers." -- Jimmy 
> Buffet.
>