1 Nov
2005
1 Nov
'05
10:33 a.m.
>it's
easy for non-programing people to bring "visions" regarding
>interface design. (and i love do so :) as i know programers, it's quite
>hard to establish a new standard. but imho the interface standards
>(buttons, dropdown boxes, scrolling, menu-structure, etc.) are now a
>couple of years old, and there might be better solutions for specific
>tasks. audio seems to me like a good point to start.
i wasn't talking about such rudimentary stuff. of course there are
alternatives to these basic widgets and several audio applications (even
free ones) have begun to support them.
the point about a visual interface is that it acts as a "memory buffer"
for the user: you do not have to remember much about the structure of
the session because the structure is made visible on the screen. can't
remember precisely where you put a certain sound? how many copies of the
bridge riff did i put in? is the door slam before or after the creak?
its all there on the screen, just waiting for you to look at it.
as soon as you move away from a visual UI, you have to find some way to
avoid requiring the user to remember everything about the session. the visual interface offers another hard-to-replicate
feature as well:
trivially variable precision. if you try doing cut-n-paste based only on
audio feedback, you will find it quite hard/laborious to be as precise
as you might want to be. with the visual interface, its much easier to
use visual information to get the rough location of an edit and then
get to precisely where you want, without many steps. with audio feedback
based approaches, i think you will find yourself needing many more
iterations through the edit-play-edit-play cycle before you get the
location correct.
i think it's all a matter of training. you do the
"display-keyboard-mouse-combination" for long years and you became
professional in speed and precision. watch a pro-gamer gaming with
mouse.. what's about data-gloves? whats with feet-controlers and other
"non-standard" devices?
greets,
gabriel
(sorry for my clumsy english)
1 Nov
1 Nov
10:55 a.m.
New subject: [linux-audio-user] Miscellaneous hardware/software questions
as soon as you
move away from a visual UI, you have to find some way to
avoid requiring the user to remember everything about the session.
when i try to remember a poem my brain creates images and i walk trough
them, when i reproduce it. when i learn a piece of music it does other
stuff (i'm a pianist and singer) but in the end i have a very complex
thing in my mind, just think of a bach fugue. i have the fugue also in
"the fingers". different areas of the brain work together. i have the
same oppinion as you, we are very good in using a visual UI. we trained
it for a long time. but there could be other combinations that work
nearly as good as "mouse-to-eye". i think it's all a matter of training. you do the
"display-keyboard-mouse-combination" for long years and you became
professional in speed and precision. watch a pro-gamer gaming with
mouse.. what's about data-gloves? whats with feet-controlers and other
"non-standard" devices?
as a counter argument, why don't gamers use the keyboard? i suggest that
its because the keyboard's own particular properties are *never* as good
as the controllers they prefer, and so even though it would be cheaper
(and maybe offer more possibilities), they don't do it.
--p
23 Dec
23 Dec
1:02 p.m.
New subject: [linux-audio-user] Miscellaneous hardware/software questions
I am top posting my response to the below, because I find Paul's
statement wll articulated. I don't want to break the flow, but I do have
a commnt or two.
I, for one, would not deny that vision, or the gui/mouse UI provide
advantages not easily replicated through other senses and modalities.
However, it is also most true that all of us, each and every one, have
disability ahead of us in our lives if we live long enough. I am
thankful that J.S. Bach simply dictated Art of the Fugue would he could
no longer see to write it himself. Similarly, I know we are all thankful
that Beethoven kept writing it down when he could no longer hear it
himself.
The point of accessibility is more than just providing something to do
for persons with disabilities, however. It's about exploring and
refining human abilities--those abilities we all share (mostly). When
one fasts one gains an enhanced and refined taste--at least for
sometime. When one experiences Eric Satie's Vexations (as I did at my
college in the 1960's), one might find one's hearing amazingly enhanced
and refined for nuance.
In the case of user interfaces, exploring adapted presentation and input
modalities similarly enhances and refines our options with computers.
One needn't use a wheelchair to appreciate the curb ramp at the street
corner. Good disability design is really human potential
facilitation--and always will be. Making something work for someone who
is blind is never about vision, it's always about the remaining senses
that the person shares with other human beings.
Janina
Paul Davis writes:
i don't agree, but i would be happy to be proved wrong. i believe,
taking a cue from Donald Norman, that interfaces have certain kinds of
inherent (often unexpected) properties that we end up using efficiently.
in the case of visual UI's i don't believe that our skill is the
dominant factor, rather its their ability to represent vast amounts of
information very efficiently. you can get very good with a table saw and
a router, but you will never be manipulating as much information. and
with all due respect to js bach, as complex as his fugues are, the task
of playing them from memory is made much easier by the fact that its a
*flow*: you deterministically move from one part of the fugue to
another, from one bar to the next bar, from one note to another. you are
*not* composing when you do that; if you are, you are probably
improvising a piece in which the final result doesn't "matter" in the
sense that there is no correct answer. but trying to find the right
arrangement for a multitrack piece during editing and mixing is
potentially a much more complex task, requiring a whole different skill
set, and the management of lots of information.
of course, if your music is mostly recorded in single takes, then a lot
of these issues fade away. i am thinking of more complex compositions.
--
Janina Sajka Phone: +1.202.595.7777
Partner, Capital Accessibility LLC http://CapitalAccessibility.Com
Marketing the Owasys 22C talking screenless cell phone in the U.S. and Canada--Go to
http://ScreenlessPhone.Com to learn more.
Chair, Accessibility Workgroup Free Standards Group (FSG)
janina(a)freestandards.org http://a11y.org
as soon as you move away from a visual UI, you have to
find some way to
avoid requiring the user to remember everything about the session.
when i try to remember a poem my brain creates images and i walk trough
them, when i reproduce it. when i learn a piece of music it does other
stuff (i'm a pianist and singer) but in the end i have a very complex
thing in my mind, just think of a bach fugue. i have the fugue also in
"the fingers". different areas of the brain work together. i have the
same oppinion as you, we are very good in using a visual UI. we trained
it for a long time. but there could be other combinations that work
nearly as good as "mouse-to-eye". i think it's all a matter of training. you do
the
"display-keyboard-mouse-combination" for long years and you became
professional in speed and precision. watch a pro-gamer gaming with
mouse.. what's about data-gloves? whats with feet-controlers and other
"non-standard" devices?
as a counter argument, why don't gamers use the keyboard? i suggest that
its because the keyboard's own particular properties are *never* as good
as the controllers they prefer, and so even though it would be cheaper
(and maybe offer more possibilities), they don't do it.
--p
12:36 p.m.
New subject: [linux-audio-user] Miscellaneous hardware/software questions
Gabriel Brachtel writes:
--
Janina Sajka Phone: +1.202.595.7777
Partner, Capital Accessibility LLC http://CapitalAccessibility.Com
Marketing the Owasys 22C talking screenless cell phone in the U.S. and Canada--Go to
http://ScreenlessPhone.Com to learn more.
Chair, Accessibility Workgroup Free Standards Group (FSG)
janina(a)freestandards.org http://a11y.org
>>>it's easy for non-programing people to
bring "visions" regarding
>>>interface design. (and i love do so :) as i know programers, it's quite
>>>hard to establish a new standard. but imho the interface standards
>>>(buttons, dropdown boxes, scrolling, menu-structure, etc.) are now a
>>>couple of years old, and there might be better solutions for specific
>>>tasks. audio seems to me like a good point to start.
>
The accessibility approach now being codified in Free Standards Group
(FSG) accessibility standards treats these objects abstractly as objects
with properties that might be exposed in numerous ways--some of which
would be nonvisual ways. That's the basis of the AT-SPI & ATK
technologies developed for Gnome 2.X and now adopted by KDE (beginning
with QT 4.2).
We have already seen these accessibility enhancements to computing
provide benefit in non-accessibility contexts. Several automated testing
tools rely heavily on this architecture to pinpoint problems. Indeed,
today's Red Hat and Suse releases, if they are less error prone, owe
their mrobustness to the ability of AT-SPI to expose problems. It seems
to me one needn't be a blind musician to find benefit in this more
generic approach either. Seems to me this might prove a readily
available mechanism for 21-Century organ-type pistons, various foot or
hand driven actuators, or even event driven actuators. That's just one
example, imho.
>
> i wasn't talking about such rudimentary stuff. of course there are
> alternatives to these basic widgets and several audio applications (even
> free ones) have begun to support them.
>
> the point about a visual interface is that it acts as a "memory buffer"
> for the user: you do not have to remember much about the structure of
> the session because the structure is made visible on the screen. can't
> remember precisely where you put a certain sound? how many copies of the
> bridge riff did i put in? is the door slam before or after the creak?
> its all there on the screen, just waiting for you to look at it.
Well, yes, but that doesn't necessarily result in smarter use or smarter
navigation of the neighborhood. If you ever get lost in some unfamiliar
city, ask a blind person how to get somewhere. You're likely to get
superior directions. If sighted people are so good at navigation, why is
the GPS navigational aid business such a success?
Janina
as soon as you move away from a visual UI, you have to find some way to
avoid requiring the user to remember everything about the session.
when i try to remember a poem my brain creates images and i walk trough
them, when i reproduce it. when i learn a piece of music it does other
stuff (i'm a pianist and singer) but in the end i have a very complex
thing in my mind, just think of a bach fugue. i have the fugue also in
"the fingers". different areas of the brain work together. i have the
same oppinion as you, we are very good in using a visual UI. we trained
it for a long time. but there could be other combinations that work
nearly as good as "mouse-to-eye".
the visual interface offers another
hard-to-replicate feature as well:
trivially variable precision. if you try doing cut-n-paste based only on
audio feedback, you will find it quite hard/laborious to be as precise
as you might want to be. with the visual interface, its much easier to
use visual information to get the rough location of an edit and then
get to precisely where you want, without many steps. with audio feedback
based approaches, i think you will find yourself needing many more
iterations through the edit-play-edit-play cycle before you get the
location correct.
i think it's all a matter of training. you do the
"display-keyboard-mouse-combination" for long years and you became
professional in speed and precision. watch a pro-gamer gaming with
mouse.. what's about data-gloves? whats with feet-controlers and other
"non-standard" devices?
greets,
gabriel
(sorry for my clumsy english)
6328
days inactive
6745
days old
linux-audio-user@lists.linuxaudio.org
3 comments
3 participants
participants (3)
-
Gabriel Brachtel -
Janina Sajka -
Paul Davis