Re: Belated look at the OSXhints April Fool's front page

Roger Merriman <NEWS@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Roger Merriman <NEWS@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Roger Merriman <NEWS@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Roger Merriman <NEWS@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
[snip]

It's just wrong - don't ask me, I've not figured it out yet.

from what you've posted over the years i can't imagine you liking it,
that doesn't mean it doesn't have it's uses just not for you.

You're missing the point: just because some people can make some use out
of it, doesn't mean Apple's got it right.

nor does it make it wrong by the same token, for some = magority,
anototaly the dock doesn't stress people, it's just a task bar. some
people fiddle with it to the eight degree, some just leave it as it is.
walk around a office full of macs and you'll see all falvours of
dockness.

Quite - that's why one cannot judge these things by looking at personal
preference, and must instead look at how well the gadget performs in
action.

<shrug> But can I get the idiots here to do that? No, I cannot - they
insist on performing judgements of this sort of thing based purely on
personal preference, and refuse to admit that it's possible for people
to get to like crap, or that it's possible for `something that is crap
in its intended role actually being damned useful for some in particular
restricted cases', etc.

That's *one* of the points I've been trying to get across here: `useful'
and `good' are two different things. So is `useful' and `fit for
purpose' - and I'm judging `fitness for purpose' of Expose.

And how might one perform such a judgement?

See how useful Expose is compared to other methods, /bearing in mind the
ways in which different people work/.

I've done that - and my conclusions seem to get rejected on the grounds
that single instances of people finding Expose useful proves the falsity
of my contention that Expose is worse than what we used to have /in
general/, /overall/, not considering just single instances.

expose does have problems such as a docked file doesn't show. and i
think that it really should group like windows together. but it is a
real step forward.

Just because you find it useful doesn't mean it's `a real step forward'.
There are other points of view in the world than yours, and methods of
window management that you have never even seen.

So why be so arrogant as to make that judgement? Why not try to find
out about the things you don't know and *THEN* make your judgement?

<shrug> What can I do when I'm discussing things with people who are
incapable of rational thought?

if you assume rational thought is only thought like Rolland then you'll
allways be disapointed.

If you think that my defintion of `rational thought' is `restricted to
thinking in the way I do it, and defining all my thinking as rational',
you must be completely insane.

Where did that idiotic idea come from? I can think of no reason for
suggesting it other than to insult me.

<shrug> It's such a stupid suggestion I really don't know what to say
in response.


[snip]

The thing about windows is that you're not supposed to be able
to identify them from icon or whatever.

why not? the name in days of downloading pdf's and doc's is quite
often meaningless.

Fair enough. I have enough trouble with them, and I'm fairly good
at being able to remember `which one of the particular pdfs I've got
open now with idiotic names was the one that's got X in it'. Do not
expect me to remember what's what half an hour later - that's not
how it works. It's a pain for me, I do know that; and I also can
tell the pain is going to be much worse for a dyslexic.

as i tend to not have that many apps running but maybe quite a few
windows then tend to be collected in one or two programs basicly doc's
and pdf's i rarely expose the whole system. just occationly if i'm
draging dropping files from something to somewhere else.

If I'm working `in one app', I'll usually use the app's window menu to
find the window I want - it's a lot more convenient for someone like me
who `does it all with words'.

that as maybe, but most people aren't so word locked,

What are you on about? Word locked?

I have no idea what that could possibly mean, but it sounds like you're
hurling an insult at me based on a seriously mistaken misperception of
how I go about viewing the world.

I think you think you know how I think. What makes you think you're so
special you can be so sure?

I think you've not got the foggiest so please stop writing as if you
did. I'm finding your line at the moment rather insulting, based as it
is on pretty much total ignorance and a good deal of blind arrogance on
your part.

What makes you think your so special that you can be *certain* of how I
think about things, eh? Are you one of those special `indigo childen',
or what? Or is it that you claim to be capable of reading my mind? Or
you've just got a special empathic ability such that you just *KNOW*
these things because you're such a special person compared to me?

i'm by no means
the only one who when on linux/windows etc misses expose. it is real
step forward, in window managent.

But it's useless for me in the general case, and the main reason for
that I think is the huge number of windows that I have open at any one
time, typically. Not the (unknown to me) cognitive defect of `word
locked' that you attribute to me, not at all.

If I only had a dozen windows open, then of course I would not have the
problems I have identifying Exposed windows.

And I say it's a step backwards compared to the old method that was
available - one that I believe you never even tried?

Yes, they are visible, but not `very visible' if you ask me -
they > don't leap off the screen and smack me in the eyes like
old-style > scroll arrows. > ah i almost never use them but drag
the scroll bar to what i was after.

Since OS X came along, I've been unable to use the scroll arrows:
Apple made scrolling that way accelerate to unusable speeds with the
introduction of PPCs. Under pre OS X, there's bolt-ons to kill this
misfeature so arrow scrolling worked at a controllable speed, but
I've never found anything like it for OS X.

ah i've normally found it too slow heh!

It's too fast for you to do what I need doing. Human beings cannot act
fast enough.

i'm not reading the text but looking at the shape of the text,

That's not relevant; and it's not possible to `find the place in text'
by looking at the shape of the text in general. That only works if
you're very familiar with the text you're working on - and it's only
going to be any use at all for short texts.

it works for documents that i have been reading before, lenght is not
really a factor here.

I find it rather hard to believe that you could spot the shape of text
in a useful fashion on my monitors, not when things are working the way
they normally do here.

i can
assure you i'm faster than the machine by a long shot! ;-)

I can assure you that you're fooling yourself - either that, or you're
an alien with superhuman response times.

just becuase you can't doesn't mean some one else can't

Just because I can't do it doesn't mean anything about humanity in
general, so naturally I ignored my own performance when making that
judgement. So why suggest that I used a moron's method of assessment?

I can think of no reason other than to suggest that I'm a moron
incapable of rational thought.

Why come out with crap like that? Surely you must know you're basically
using dishonest personal abuse here? And surely you must know that sort
of thing winds me up horribly? So why do it?

Is it that you enjoy that sort of thing? I hadn't put you down in the
same category as `the total shits' in this newsgroup, but you do seem to
be edging that way.

I'm telling you that no human being has response times fast enough to do
the job - the screen content scrolls past too quickly for any human to
spot the right place and let go before it's vanished.

The visual apparatus and nervous system possessed by humans does not
operate at that speed regardless of what you might think about the way I
work things out. Reaction time is more or less 0.2s - now time the
scrolling speed.

If you think you can stop at the right point, it's because you're
predicting the spot (or you are fooling yourself). That's perfectly
practical for some people - just not me or (I suspect) most people.
Remember, just because you can do it, doesn't mean most people can.

I'm sure many people can work that way. There's no other way you can do
it, unless you're had your nervous system beefed up with electronic
bypasses[1] or you're an alien or a cat or something.

Rowland.

[1] Like in the SciFi movies, 'cos it can't be done in real life yet.

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