Re: [LAD] User eXperience in Linux Audio (rambling)

On 04/19/2015 01:35 PM, Gordonjcp wrote: I think both have a point here. Users, especially Windows users are often quite strange creatures. They come from an environment where Software is notoriously slow, bloated and faulty, so for example they come with a few subconscious expectations and assumptions: 1. I do not trust this thing in front of me, sometimes it works, most of the time it doesn't. I hate it, I don't want to use it and it is a PITA. 2. If I command my computer to do something, it must be complex and complicated, otherwise why would I have the computer do it anyway? If it was easy, I could do it myself! 3. Because computers do complex and difficult stuff, this stuff takes time and makes noise, (Freezing the gui for a few satisfying moments, loud rumbling of the hard drive, and and and, Sometimes displaying an ominous loading- or progress-bar). This kind of feedback is the resemblance of hard work, exactly the hard work I expect the computer to do for me (see 2.). While it does the hard work, I anxiously sit in front of it full of awe and expectations whether the hard work will show any usable result or just abort with a cryptic message some stupid programmer most certainly put in just for the purpose of annoying me. 4. If I click on a button and I can't notice any "hard work", something must certainly be wrong because no work was done. So this save button must obviously be broken, so better press it again and again... oh wait, it is greyed out and deactivated, better call the developer and tell him, that the save button does not work... Nr 4 did actually happen to a fellow developer in the past, so what did he do? After all his effort to uncouple the UI from the background processing and optimizing the speed and responsiveness of the application, he silently shed some tears and put in progress bar that runs for a fixed time of maybe 1.5 Seconds.Now the user can be sure, that the program has actually received his command and acted (or at least acted as if it acted) according to the users command. Because seriously, saving must at least take one second because it is hard work, otherwise it is obviously broken ;) Someone nasty could say, that users want slow and buggy software, but I am not that cynical, I guess some feedback is enough to give the user a good feeling. There are other alternatives than classic splash screens. 1. locking the UI in a visible way 2. displaying a loading bar 3. Be creative, maybe play some hard-drive crackling sound via speakers? Splash screens have the advantage of empowering the developer to put marketing relevant stuff there, Donation Buttons, logos, version numbers... so it's probably not entirely about UX I guess. Just my 2€ -- Markus