[WEB4LIB] RE: of mouse balls and such

[Jennifer Heise]

"Moderow, Kevin" wrote:
> 
> Long ago the command prompt was considered unforgiving.  Today the mouse is
> unintuitive.    One must ask: Just how much dumbing down is required?  I
> fear the day when being required to think is an assault on the individual's
> self worth.
> 

Just because the mouse is less unintuitive than the command prompt
doesn't make it any more intuitive than the steering wheel -- which
requires training and/or experimentation, not just 'THINKING', to learn.

"Moderow, Kevin" wrote:
> 
> Long ago the command prompt was considered unforgiving.  Today the mouse is
> unintuitive.    One must ask: Just how much dumbing down is required?  I
> fear the day when being required to think is an assault on the individual's
> self worth.
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Roy Tennant [mailto:rtennant at library.berkeley.edu]
> Sent: Monday, January 03, 2000 3:22 PM
> To: Multiple recipients of list
> Subject: [WEB4LIB] RE: of mouse balls and such
> 
> And to further drive home Tara's point, do you realize how unintuitive and
> downright odd it is to move an object on one plane that manipulates
> another object distant from it on a plane perpendicular to the first?
> *That's* the experience of using a mouse, and to expect anyone to
> get it immediately is asking a bit much, in my opinion.
> Roy
> 
> On Mon, 3 Jan 2000, Tara Calishain wrote:
> 
> > At 11:48 AM 1/3/2000 -0800, Drew, Bill wrote:
> > >A friend of mine (and she shall remain anonymous to protect the guilty)
> told
> > >me the following story once about one of her first experiences with a
> mouse
> > >on a computer.  This was when personal computers first showed up in the
> > >large department stores as items available for purchase.  She was with
> her
> > >teenage daughter and they walked over to a computer that was running a
> demo
> > >of Windows.  The instructions on the screen said "Place mouse here and
> > >click."  My friend picked up the mouse and placed it on the screen and
> > >pushed the buttons with no results.  While this was happening her
> daughter
> > >tried to disappear into the wood work.  She and her husband now laugh at
> the
> > >story.
> >
> > These are the kinds of things that really pluck my last nerve. The only
> thing
> > your friend is guilty of is following instructions to the letter. She has
> > no need to
> > feel ashamed or embarrassed because instructions are written badly or
> > computer interfaces are so confusing that we humans -- who are still not
> > accurately emulated by computers, BTW -- can't understand them.
> >
> > Imagine how much more pleasant your friend's experience would have been if
> > the mouse had been labeled MOUSE and the instructions on the screen had
> > said, "Slide the mouse back and forth." Once slid, the instructions could
> > change
> > to, "Keep sliding the mouse. See that arrow that's going back and forth on
> the
> > screen? That's called the mouse pointer. Slide the mouse around until the
> > you've moved the pointer into this blue box. Then push one of those two
> buttons
> > on top of the mouse."
> >
> > Sigh,
> >
> > Tara
> >
> >
> > Finding you great Internet research resources--
> > free weekly newsletter!
> > http://www.researchbuzz.com
> >
> >
> >


-- 
/   Jennifer Heise, Web Mgmnt, Lehigh Univ. Information Resources
\ \ Linderman Library, 30 Library Drive, Bethlehem PA 18015 
  / Phone (610) 758-3072          Email: jahb at lehigh.edu

"Comment is free, but facts are on expenses." -- Tom Stoppard