I loaned my lab assistant a Unity laptop.

[woodsmoke]

I'll keep this short.

My lab assistant, a very perspicacious young lady, was in need of a laptop to "do assignments" and "submit them online".

So, I installed the latest Unity Ubuntu on a Toshiba Satellite, a few years old, and it runs just fine, found wireless, found printers etc.

But I then WATCHED her trying to "use" the OS.....

doing two simple things.. "minimizing Firefox" and "finding" a "previously opened and worked on" Libre Office document.

In other words,

a) she spent a long time fo finally figure out that FF's "controls" were suddenly not in the app but in the upper panel. She didn't ask why because she didn't want to "insult" me, but I could tell that she was thinking, that is a change that is not necessary.

b) when she finally minimized Firefox, she could not "find" the document anyplace, it was in the panel to the left, but not labled in any obvious way. It took her quite a while to radomly pick from unlabled icons and get it to maximize. Again, I could see in her actions, why did they make this so hard to do?

(This is in the fully distribution upgraded version, the icons are well....useless...)

Now this is a very "perspicacious" young lady. She is smart, simple as that, I can show her a lab process once and she has it. She is no dummy, she is an "A" student and can interact with an IPAD, her friends, so it is not that she is "GUI clueless".

She is also not a "computer geek" ....she looks at a computer as a tool.

I didn't ask her, but after she fiddled with Unity for a while....

I noticed that she was using "ctrl- " keys to maximize and minimize things.....she really is VERY bright......

Why was she using "ctrl-" keys?

She was OBVIOUSLY using them because the Unity interface is not "intuitively obvious" .....she needed to get work done; not use a ( to her ) obscure way of interacting with a GUI.

I did not ask, but could see it in the way that she was using the OS, that she thought that Unity was just.... cumbersome and NOT in any way an "improvement" over the "old way" of interacting with a computer.

(please remember that she ON HER OWN, figured out the "ctrl-" keys..... I did not tell her).

Now, if a quick young lady such as her.... views Unity like in that way....what is the average "non-intuitive" user going to think about Unity?

Just a question, and probably of little worth.

woodsmoke

[HalationEffect]

Hmm... it's been my experience that when someone says that a particular interface "isn't intuitive", what they usually mean is "different to what I'm used to".

I know that for myself, when I recently used Windows for the first time in several years (I hadn't touched Windows since XP), I had a hell of a time familiarising myself with the Windows way of doing things, in those instances where it differed from the KDE way of doing things.

[GreyGeek]

Put a complete, rank computer novice with absolutely no experience or knowledge of computers, mice, usb sticks, printers, etc.. and set them down in front of ANY desktop. They won't have a clue, or intuition, of what to do. They won't know what a panel is, or what buttons or sliders or text boxes are, or anything else If they can't read the language on the screen it will be even worse for them. If they start clicking around they will probably get lost in the bowels of the desktop and can't find their way back out.

Almost everyone in America from before Kindergarten on up has been exposed to some kind of computer platform. They are "intuitive" about those they are familiar with or which work similar to those they are familiar with. A person who has experience with the classic XP or Win7 desktop will have little trouble working the Kubuntu KDE classic desktop because everything will be "familiar". Their problem will be determining what applications in Kubuntu are similar to those in XP or Win7 (Libreoffice for Office, GIMP for Photoshop, etc...). Some will acclimate more rapidly than others, but that has more to do with native intelligence than anything else. IMO.

[woodsmoke]

Hi guys....and thanks for the comments.

I agree completely about "intuitive" and "what I am familiar with", but again,

That was exactly my point.

If there is one person who I would think would be able to, relatively quickly, learn a new GUI it would be her.

If she is floundering around so much that she resorts to CLI tricks then what is the average NEW USER to Unity....

that does not have her skill set....

going to do with Unity?

It is possible that they will just walk away.

Actually Kubu is more "normal" except that one can then "later" start using a new paradigm.

Unity requires using the new paradigm from the first click of a mouse.

just a thought about how new people, who are not trained, that are maybe looking at a laptop in a box store might react to Unity.

Maybe.....they would just walk away?

Don't know, just a thought.

woodsmoke

[HalationEffect]

If she is floundering around so much that she resorts to CLI tricks then what is the average NEW USER to Unity....

Well, the point was that a completely new user (as in, completely new to computers), might actually have less trouble, because they don't have to unlearn anything.

[woodsmoke]

ok i can see that!

woodsmoke

[capt-zero]

I hate to add to this thread, but couldn't resist. Having been "used to" the windows XP enviornment for about a year, I switched to Kubuntu. My computer experiences to date are; a proprietary OS from the fourth level of hell I had to use at a hospital I worked at for a couple of years. Before XP I had toyed with windows '98 for a few months, otherwise the only other computer systems I had worked with were in the '80s (TI, TRS 80, early Apple and Mac). I can't speak for Unity, as I've never been exposed to it, but using Kubuntu and KDE was not daunting to me at all. Don't get me wrong, there were quite a few stumbles and still are, but all in all I found Kubuntu well laid out and easy to work with. Forunately, I wasn't having to use it for any work purposes (deadlines, timed projects, ect.), but I feel that anyone with a basic understanding of what a OS does shouldn't have any difficulty getting around in it. Not sure why it was difficult for a 'bright' student to figure out the minimize button in the toolbar. It's in the same place as it is in windows, and not exactly a paradigm shift.

I will mention, that I tried a Gnome desktop in Ubuntu for about an hour, before deciding that that was not the distro for me. However, that's mostly a matter of taste. If I was forced to use it, I wouldn't have any major problems.

[SteveRiley]

I hate to add to this thread

Simply writing these words surely is an indicator of the opposite

(j/k)

[vw72]

With all of this talk of the difficulty people have with Unity, it is important to remember that even smartphones, whether iOS or Android based come with a little getting started guide. I'm not sure how realistic it is to sit somebody in front of a new interface without any guidance and expect them to just pick it up. It doesn't matter whether it is Windows, OS X, iOS, Android, Gnome, Unity or KDE, etc., each is different enough that if you aren't familiar with it, you will have problems.

Somebody coming from a Windows environment will probably be able to pick up KDE better than Unity, not because KDE copies Windows, but because it uses a similar desktop metaphor. Likewise, somebody coming from an OS X environment would probably feel more at home with Unity, with it's global menus. Just look at how much angst occurred when Gnome came out with Gnome 3. The desktop interface changed, but almost everything else gnome was the same, and yet people were very frustrated (the same could be said about KDE 4).

In summary, it is unreasonable to expect somebody to just "pick up" a new interface without some assistance. Yes, it can be done, but difficulty at doing it for the typical user is not indicative of a poorly designed interface.

[claydoh]

The same things can be said for any OS the has different conventions than one's norm. It could easily have been OSX.

[woodsmoke]

Konqueror not "noticed" when used by MS user.

Due to a variety of circumstances I had need to use the laptop and updated and also installed the KDE desktop.

I then set the default desktop for the lab assistant to the KDE workspace and mentioned that to the lab assistant; that I would like to see the reaction to the different workspace.

I watched with interest, while washing many ehrlenmeyer flasks, whle the person was using the laptop.

The general comment was, ummm not much difference between it and MS but a lot easier to use than Unity....

AND still the use of ctrl-commands....hmmmm so it may be that the person just naturally has a bent for CLI....

But....this should be of interest.... Konqueror popped as the browser and was not even noticed!

Until.... the person was interacting with a chatroom for a class and the javascript would not load.

There were a LOT of "reples" to questions etc. that sorta stuff.

So the old switcheroo to FF but.....

The TAKEWAY....is that Konqueror was "just used as normal".....by a person who has no experienc with Linux.

until there was a javascript problem that Konqueror could not handle.

woodsmoke

[luckyone]

I'm old enough that I remember how lost I was with Microsoft's first product. I started with Win 95 and quickly moved to Win 98 SE. 95 was a steep learning experience for this non-computer versed person.

[sealbhach]

I wonder if you had given her Ubuntu with Unity on a touchscreen device, how the experience would differ.

.

[cavedweller]

I'm old enough that I remember how lost I was with Microsoft's first product. I started with Win 95 and quickly moved to Win 98 SE. 95 was a steep learning experience for this non-computer versed person.

I had to smile at that. I started with dos 5 and power menu on and 8088. I built a 286 and put an 80mb hardrive in it. Loaded it with dos 6.33 and windows 3.1. I was uptown then. Then I built a 386 and a month later a 486 dx2 66. At thaat point I was in high cotton. Got my first pentium a P-ll 266 with windows 95. I was at Comp USA in Spokane, WA. and saw a boxed set of reghat 4 or 5. It came with a big book and it needed it.

Like has been said I think it is what you are use to or exposed to. I like KDE for a dressed up desktop with alot of features, and I like xfce for plain, simple, balls to the wall fast.