Survex

[Wookey]

On Wed 10 Jul, David Gibson wrote:
> In article "Survex" in <!survex>, on Wed, 10 Jul 2002
> Wookey <wookey@aleph1.co.uk> wrote

> >Can someone who uses Windows help Bill out please?

> Wookey - you didnt give Bill's email address, so Im posting this to the
> list.

yes I did - I cc:ed him precisely so you could do them same - obviously you
didn't spot that. I've forwarded your response to him (and ol's)

> The short answer - which seems a bit bizarre to me - is that Survex does
> not have a Run option.

> I know the people developing Survex are not really Windows people, but
> the apparent (bearing in mind I havent bothered to look :-) lack of a
> 'standard' Windows Open / Save / Run menu seems a bit of an omission.

Well from our point of view the common inability of the average Windows user
to comprehend something as simple as a text file and some instructions seems
a bit of an omission :-) It has certainly been a revelation how many people
still find this difficult even though there has been chapter in the manual
for several years now saying 'how to start a new survey'. Given that most of
these people aren't actually lazy idiots, I suppose it's an example of the
power of training in a particular interface design, and how that prevents
even entaining the possibility that there is an alternative (so they don't
even try reading the manual).

The whole 'monolithic application' concept without which most Windows users
seem unable to function seems rather odd when you come from a 'small, simple,
tools for the job' background. It's all about interface expectations.

As Ol observes the development technology is such that both world-views can
now be accomodated reasonably painlessly and it's actually likely to happen
quite soon.

Wookey
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