People only really contribute when they get something out of it. When someone is first beginning to contribute, they especially need to see some kind of payback, some kind of positive reinforcement, right away. For example, if someone were running a web browser, then stopped, added a simple new command to the source, recompiled, and had that same web browser plus their addition, they would be motivated to do this again, and possibly to tackle even larger projects.

His major work in recent years has been on information visualization, originating the treemap concept for hierarchical data.[30]

The see-and-point principle states that users interact with the computer by pointing at the objects they can see on the screen. It's as if we have thrown away a million years of evolution, lost our facility with expressive language, and been reduced to pointing at objects in the immediate environment. Mouse buttons and modifier keys give us a vocabulary equivalent to a few different grunts. We have lost all the power of language, and can no longer talk about objects that are not immediately visible (all files more than one week old), objects that don't exist yet (future messages from my boss), or unknown objects (any guides to restaurants in Boston).

The critical research question is, "How can we capture many of the advantages of natural language input without having to solve the "AI-Complete" problem of natural language understanding?" Command-line interfaces have some of the advantages of language, such as the large number of commands always available to the user and the rich syntactic structures that can be used to form complex commands. But command-line interfaces have two major problems. First, although the user can type anything, the computer can understand only a limited number of commands and there is no easy way for the user to discover which commands will be understood. Second, the command-line interface is very rigid and cannot tolerate synonyms, misspellings, or imperfect grammar. We believe that both these deficiencies can be dealt with through a process of negotiation.

The basic principles of the Anti-Mac interface are: The central role of language A richer internal representation of objects A more expressive interface Expert users Shared control

If the user is required to be in control of all the details of an action, then the user needs detailed feedback. But if a sequence of activities can be delegated to an agent or encapsulated in a script, then there is no longer a need for detailed and continuous feedback. The user doesn't have to be bothered unless the system encounters a problem that it cannot handle.

The problem with WYSIWYG is that it is usually equivalent to WYSIATI (What You See Is All There Is). A document has a rich semantic structure that is often poorly captured by its appearance on a screen or printed page. For example, a word may be printed in italic font for emphasis, as part of a book title, or as part of a quotation, but the specific meaning is lost if it is represented only by the fact that the characters are italicized. A WYSIWYG document shows only the final printed representation; it does not capture the user's intentions.

The Anti-Mac principles outlined here are optimized for the category of users and data that we believe will be dominant in the future: people with extensive computer experience who want to manipulate huge numbers of complex information objects while being connected to a network shared by immense numbers of other users and computers. These new user interface principles also reinforce each other, just as the Mac principles did. The richer internal representation of objects naturally leads to a more expressive external representation and to increased possibilities for using language to refer to objects in sophisticated ways. Expert users will be more capable of expressing themselves to the computer using a language-based interface and will feel more comfortable with shared control of the interface because they will be capable of understanding what is happening, and the expressive interface will lead to better explanations.

The One Hypertext done right, I think, is a proto-Metaverse. If we build a Web that feels like a place designed for life, the services and sites on the Web can stretch into the horizons of this hypertext Metaverse. We could meet people on the Web, find entertainment, connect with partners, and build a living online. But aren’t we already building pieces of this Metaverse today? To propel this trend into the Metaverse of 90’s science fiction, I think we need someone thinking more intentionally about building a Web experience from the perspective of an architect, rather than a user interface designer. The Web is increasingly a home more than it is a tool, and our design needs should change to reflect it. I think this work of building a Metaverse requires something different from the iterative engineering the Web industry has engaged in for the last decade. We need more first-principles design, more imagination in what kinds of places the hypertext Metaverse could contain in the future, the way an architect might dream of their next stadium or skyscraper.

Twitter’s main user interface, the algorithmic timeline, is bad for using Twitter as a learning tool. It feels like sticking a straw into a firehouse and hoping you’ll suck out enough interesting insights to be worth the effort.

What if curating things for your audience was radically easier? A company like Pocket or Instapaper, who already have a substantial user base clipping and collecting reading material they like, may be in a good place to launch an experiment in this space. But those most avid readers and curators may also already have started newsletters, and may not want something lower maintenance. Another minimal viable product may be a kind of a filter for Twitter that aggregates just the links and good reads that people you follow have shared. People are already curating and sharing – a good first step may be to simply slide into where people are already curating, and make the processes of curation and discover easier and higher-reach.

If we were to build a medium for better thinking on top of the web browser, it’s reckless to expect the average user to manually connect, organize, and annotate the information they come across. Just as the early World Wide Web started out manually-curated and eventually became curated by algorithms and communities, I think we’ll see a shift in how individual personal landscapes of information are curated, from manual organization to mostly machine-driven organization. Humans will leave connections and highlights as a trail of their thinking, rather than as their primary way of exploring their knowledge and memory.

However, to build an enabling medium that’s more than a single-purpose tool, it isn’t simply enough to look at existing workflows and build tools around them. To design a good creative medium, we can’t solve for a particular use case. The best mediums are instead collections of generic, multi-purpose components that mesh together well to let the user construct their own solutions.

later

While the term “mobilization system” is new, the underlying ICT techniques have beenexplored for at least a decade or two, under labels such as “persuasive technology”, “collaborativetechnology”, “user experience”, and “gamification”. This paper will first review a number of suchexisting approaches and then try to distill their common core in the form of a list of mobilizationprinciples. Finally, we will sketch both potential benefits and dangers of a more systematic andwidespread application of mobilization systems.

Free as in ...? Points out that freedoms afforded by foss software to the average computer user are effectively the same as proprietary software, because it's too difficult to even find the source and build it, let alone make any changes. Advocates the foss developers should not think only about the things that users are not legally prevented from doing, but about what things they are realistically empowered and supported in doing.

In terms of this analogy, a lot of objections to end-user programming sound to me like arguing that Home Depot is a waste of time because their customers will never be able to build their own skyscrapers. And then on the other side are the people arguing that people will be able to build their own skyscrapers and it will change the world. I just think it would be nice if people had the tools to put up their own shelves if they wanted to.

"The implicit feel of where you are in a physical book turns out to be more important than we realized," says Abigail Sellen of Microsoft Research Cambridge in England and co-author of The Myth of the Paperless Office. "Only when you get an e-book do you start to miss it. I don't think e-book manufacturers have thought enough about how you might visualize where you are in a book."

In turn, such navigational difficulties may subtly inhibit reading comprehension.

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Emacs has aspects of the right thing

However, what if we replace “ human face ” in this decisive quotewith “interface,” that is, the interface between man and apparatus?

as if the only option we had to eat was factory-farmed fast food, and we didn’t have any way to make home-cooked meals

Show me a switch statement as if it had been handled with a set of subclasses. There is underlying deep structure here. I should be able to view the code as if it had been done with switch or as if it had been done with polymorphism. Sometimes you are interested in all the facts about Dalmatians. Sometimes you are interested in comparing all the different ways different breeds of dogs bury their bones. Why should you have to pre-decide on a representation that lets you see only one point of view?

the very existence of a master plan means, by definition, that the members of the community can have little impact on the future shape of their community,

V$A*$*=0"$1&$10+'('+,Y$0)#1+'&2$1&4$=*'&2$1$&-+#7--@$0-&*+'+=+#4$1$C-4#$-.$)#18+'C#$'&+#).10#V

If you can acquire the youngest users, retain them as they get older, and continue to attract the new cohorts of young users, you will win over time. 

let timer; // Timer identifier const waitTime = 500; // Wait time in milliseconds // Search function const search = (text) => { // TODO: Make HTTP Request HERE }; // Listen for `keyup` event const input = document.querySelector('#input-text'); input.addEventListener('keyup', (e) => { const text = e.currentTarget.value; // Clear timer clearTimeout(timer); // Wait for X ms and then process the request timer = setTimeout(() => { search(text); }, waitTime); });

In order to execute an event listener (or any function for that matter) after the user stops typing, we need to know about the two built-in JavaScript methods setTimeout(callback, milliseconds) and clearTimeout(timeout): setTimeout is a JavaScript method that executes a provided function after a specified amount of time (in milliseconds). clearTimeout is a related method that can be used to cancel a timeout that has been queued.

Most content is typically displayed in these formats:

We have to endlessly scroll and parse a ton of images and headlines before we can find something interesting to read.

Notes from Underground

There are different types of requirements. In this article we divide the requirements into a number of categories that help us with the software selection.

To some extent this is understandable. We don’t know how to design things in such a way that they are easily customizable by everyone.

except its codebase is completely incomprehensible to anyone except the original maintainer. Or maybe no one can seem to get it to build, not for lack of trying but just due to sheer esotericism. It meets the definition of free software, but how useful is it to the user if it doesn't already do what they want it to, and they have no way to make it do so?

A big cause of complex software is compatibility and the requirement to support old features forever.

Ihavelearnttoabandonsuchattemptsofadaptationfairlyquickly,andtostartthedesignofanewprogramaccordingtomyownideasandstandards

Another fourteenth- century manuscript of Hautfuney’s index to Vincent of Beauvais’s Speculum historiale. The absence of rubrication and the narrower columns make the entries harder to identify although the two indexes contain the same information.

work-around

CSP is taking away too much of the user's power and control over their browser use

Apparently there is a CSP ability to stop inline scripts from executing. I have not come across any sites that use that feature and/or the browser I am using does not support it.

software will work only if we provide the tools to fix it when it goes wrong

Is there a setting (or would it be possible to add one) so I can change the width of the sidebar with the annotations? On my bigger monitor it's ok, but on my normal screen I can barely see the actual PDF and the side bar covers almost half the screen. Also, I had a very hard time getting the plugin to actually find the file. It couldn't find it anywhere aside from the same folder the annotation note is in. (I tried a different folder in the vault, as well as an absolute path on my PC.) Aside from that, love the plugin! Thanks :)

The reason for the new name is that the "dist-upgrade" name was itself extremely confusing for many users: while it was named that because it was something you needed when upgrading between distribution releases, it sounded too much as though it was only for use in that circumstance, whereas in fact it's much more broadly applicable.

A major advance in user interfaces that supports creative exploration would the capacity to go back in time, to review and manipulate the history of actions taken during an entire session. Users will be able to see all the steps in designing an engine and change an early design decision. They will be able to extract sections of the history to replay them or to convert into permanent macros that can be applied in similar situations. Extracting and replaying sections of history is a form of direct man ipulation programming. It enables users to explore every alternative in a decision-making situation, and then chose the one with the most favorable outcomes.

Learning how to learn is often listed as a goal of education, but acquiring the goal-directed discipline, critical thinking skills, and cognitive self-awareness that support collection of knowledge is difficult. Advanced user interfaces may be able to help users better formulate their information needs, identify what information gaps impede them, and fabricate plans to satisfy their needs. Often as information is acquired, the users's knowledge shifts enough to require a reformulation of their plans. Information visualization interfaces and hypertext environments are a first step in supporting incidental learning, exploratory browsing, and then rapid reformulation of plans. As a refined theory of knowledge acquisition emerges, improved tools will f ollow.

Since any powerful tool, such as a genex, can be used for destructive purposes, the cautions are discussed in Section 5.

Users who expe rience empowering designs that are comprehensible, predictable, and controllable, may be inspired to pursue quality in their work products.

pratik This may be too late to be a Micro Camp topic but does anyone knows if any UX research exists on the ideal post length for a timeline view? Twitter has 280 chars (a remnant from SMS). I think FB truncates after 400 chars. But academic abstracts are 150-300 words (not chars).

To realize this potential, we must provide a medium that can be mastered by a single individual. Any barrier that exists between the user and some part of the system will eventually be a barrier to creative expression. Any part of the system that cannot be changed or that is not sufficiently general is a likely source of impediment.

And it’s easier to share a personal story when you’re composing it 280 characters at a time and publishing it as you go, without thinking about or knowing where the end may be. It’s at least easier than staring down a blank text editor with no limit and having to decide later how much of a 2,500 word rant is worth sharing, anyway.

Whether to inject behavior into a Web page is my choice. How I do so is nobody's business. If a need that can be met with a bookmarklet instead requires a set of browser-specific extensions, that's a tax on developers.

StopTheMadness is a web browser extension that stops web sites from making your browser harder to use

"The good news is that you can wrest control of your browser back from these malicious, control-freak sites."

browser extension

What is End User Computing (EUC)? Thanks to the progressive introduction of DevOps, attention to the role of the end user in software development and testing has increased significantly. It is now important to think like an end user when we develop and test software. After all, that's what we're all doing it for.

Make simple changes to (some carefully chosen fork of) any project in an afternoon, no matter how large it is. Gain an hour’s worth of understanding for an hour’s worth of effort, rather than a quantum leap in understanding after a week or month of effort.

<a href="https://web.hypothes.is/help/" class="hyp-u-horizontal-spacing--2 hyp-u-layout-row--center HelpPanel-tabs__link" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><span>Help topics</span>

The internet is for end users: any change made to the web platform has the potential to affect vast numbers of people, and may have a profound impact on any person’s life. [RFC8890]

Users are shown four animated GIFs, each correspondingto modifying an attribute for a given image.

As John Palmer points out in his brilliant posts on Spatial Interfaces and Spatial Software, “Humans are spatial creatures [who] experience most of life in relation to space”.

For a long time, I believed that my only hope of becoming a professional writer was to find the perfect tool.

Even more important is that all this isn’t about the software. It is about the system you set up. Some software nudges you, sometimes even pushes you, towards system design decisions. Take Wikis as an example. Most of them have two different modes: The reading mode. The editing mode. The reading mode is the default. But most of the time you should create, edit and re-edit the content. This default, this separation of reading and editing, is a small but significant barrier on producing content. You will behave differently. This is one reason I don’t like wikis for knowledge work. They are clumsy and work better for different purposes.

Bret Victor: email (9/3/04) Interface matters to me more than anything else, and it always has. I just never realized that. I've spent a lot of time over the years desperately trying to think of a "thing" to change the world. I now know why the search was fruitless -- things don't change the world. People change the world by using things. The focus must be on the "using", not the "thing". Now that I'm looking through the right end of the binoculars, I can see a lot more clearly, and there are projects and possibilities that genuinely interest me deeply.

This is actively being worked on - for those interested you can follow the progress in https://github.com/snapcore/snapd/pull/10836

After 5 years there's still no fix. This is so annoying. I'm now getting rid of all snap packages and installing deb variants instead. Finally I'll purge snap and if these weird decisions keep on going I'll also move to another distro. Common Canonical. Seriously?

Disable features that inhibit control and transparency, and add or modify features that promote them (these changes will almost always require manual activation or enabling).

In addition, Google designed Chromium to be easy and intuitive for users, which means they compromise on transparency and control of internal operations.

user n. When referring to the reader, use "you" instead of "user." For example, "The user must..." is incorrect. Use "You must..." instead. If referring to more than one user, calling the collection "users" is acceptable, such as "Other users may want to access your database."

There is a close relation between the conceptual knowledge on which a narrative relies and the notation that it employs. Domain-specific vocabulary directly names relevant concepts. Shorthand notation replaces frequently used words and lengthy sentences that involve these concepts. For example, Newton's laws of motion are commonly written as F=m⋅a

I don’t even minify page assets

I am being told my Login Keyring Password "no longer matches" my login. I am confused - I provided a password as I was setting this up, and so I don't know what this is about and how I can fix it. Thanks for the help.

my favourite KDE bug

It's still pretty far away from catching up -- in fact, I think that now, in 2020, it's farther than it was in 2010.

The FOSS community has been trying to emulate the best parts of Windows' GUI for about twenty years now.

This is one of the points made in TheMythOfThePaperlessOffice -- that workplaces often shift from more efficient paper-based technologies to less efficient electronic technologies (electronic technologies can be either more or less efficient, of course) because computers symbolize The Future, Progress, and a New Way Of Doing Things. An office on the move, that's what an office that uses cutting-edge technology is. Not an office that is stuck in the past. And the employees are left to cope with the less productive, but shinier, New Way. -- ApoorvaMuralidhara

education@hypothes.is or support@hypothes.is

While Microsoft is entirely in the right by reminding people of the terms they agreed to, many users are taking issue with the fact that they hadn’t been warned about the limit in the eight years it’s been in place, and many people are now being told they are over the limit after years of being over.

consumer friendly

Status Indicator

These example are for Rails applications, but there is no dependency on Rails for using this gem. Most of the examples are applicable to any Ruby application.

I don't believe the sprockets and sprockets-rails maintainers (actually it's up to the Rails maintainers, see rails/rails#28430) currently consider it broken. (I am not a committer/maintainer on any of those projects). So there is no point in "waiting for someone else to fix" it; that is not going to happen (unless you can change their minds). You just need to figure out the right way to use sprockets 4 with rails as it is.

This project will be great for instruction and portable reproducible science

(Yes, I realize from a technical, end-user perspective this really doesn't matter.)

With Stack Overflow for Teams being a flexible platform, we’ve seen customers use it for a wide variety of use cases: A platform to help onboard new employees A self-serve help center to reduce support tickets Collaboration and documentation to drive innersource initiatives Breaking down silos and driving org wide transformation like cloud migration efforts A direct customer support platform Enable people who are working towards a common goal, whether a startup or a side project, to develop a collective knowledge base

Many designers strive to create products that are so easy to navigate, their users can flow through them at first glance. To design something with this level of intuitiveness, it’s imperative designers understand affordances—what they are and how to use them.

To improve the usability of text fields and to determine which text field variables to alter, our researchers and designers conducted two studies between November 2016 and February 2017, with actual users.

You might not always notice, but Material Design is constantly evolving and iterating based on research.

We are continuing an overhaul of our default startup editor in order to provide relevant extension-contributed tips and walkthroughs, intended to make both core VS Code features and extension contributions more approachable to new users.