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Essay: Why Free Software has poor usability, and how to improve it

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mouser:
I'm just making my way through this, but i like what i'm reading.. Not exactly mind-blowing stuff, but a very nice description of some problems and ways they can be ameliorated.

When I wrote the first version of this article six years ago, I called it “Why Free Software usability tends to suck”. The best open source applications and operating systems are more usable now than they were then. But this is largely from slow incremental improvements, and low-level competition between projects and distributors. Major problems with the design process itself remain largely unfixed.

Many of these problems are with volunteer software in general, not Free Software in particular. Hobbyist proprietary programs are often hard to use for many of the same reasons. But the easiest way of getting volunteers to contribute to a program is to make it open source. And while thousands of people are now employed in developing Free Software, most of its developers are volunteers. So it’s in Free Software that we see volunteer software’s usability problems most often.

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http://mpt.net.nz/archive/2008/08/01/free-software-usability





from http://delphi.fosdal.com/2008/08/why-free-software-has-poor-usability.html

simakuutio:
As a software test engineer, I have seen how easily usability testing is being skipped (for various reasons) when functionality and everything else might be covered quite well... especially when schedules are tight, user experience is least important aspect when trying to get maximum test coverage to minimize amout of real bugs... sad but true...

And when we are talking about free software, this problem get even worse...

Gothi[c]:
I hate usable software....

let me rephrase...

I hate software that assumes i'm an idiot, with big buttons and limited functionality.

I like things just the way they are :p

zridling:
This was one of the better articles I've read on the subject because its author delineates people like me who approach an app with design in mind compared to a programmer who's building for function (not form). He notes that designers are almost never coders, and vice-versa.

lanux128:
i guess i'm lucky that i can come to the DC forums to request and get the software designed just the way i want. :)

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