
The Great Ubuntu-Girlfriend Experiment - nreece
http://contentconsumer.wordpress.com/2008/04/27/is-ubuntu-useable-enough-for-my-girlfriend/
======
mosburger
I liked this article - I was expecting a "yay, see how usable Ubuntu is"
fanboy-style writeup. Instead it found some very honest issues with its
usability. I wonder if Canonical ever does any of the one-way-mirror style UI
tests that (presumably) Microsoft uses? It seems like it would uncover some of
these gotchas.

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phaedrus
We installed Ubuntu on all the machines in the computer lab. Apart from the
students who already used Linux, who just argued over which distribution, the
CS students who'd only been exposed to Windows unanimously expressed they
hated Linux. I asked them why, what was wrong, and it always came back to the
fact that it was unfamiliar. I'm not sure how you fix that, because in effect
their gripe was that it was not "exactly like Windows". It's yet another bad
effect of the Microsoft monopoly - people believe that Computer == Windows,
because they don't get exposed to anything else.

~~~
dgabriel
Frankly, when people move from Macs to Linux, or Mac to PC, or Linux to PC,
they generally dislike it at first. All the shortcuts and techniques you've
internalized are thrown out the window, so it feels awkward and slow. I read
about this effect at one point, but I don't remember where...

~~~
kirse
From personal experience I had no problem learning Mac-OS, which I stumbled
around in at first but didn't experience any major problems until much further
down the road (when I was capable of dealing with them).

On the other hand I downloaded Ubuntu last month, and after taking several
hours just to get onboard wifi working (xps m1330), I lost all desire to use
it further.

For me, gradual hurdles vs. massive roadblock after roadblock is the
difference between enjoying the learning process instead of dreading it.

~~~
goofygrin
>> after taking several hours just to get onboard wifi working (xps m1330)

I've got an xps m1330 and it's run Gutsy and now Hardy without any issues with
the Wifi.

I've got the Intel 3945ABG card in there.

I had the N card in for a while and couldn't ever get it to work well with
Gutsy.

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DanielBMarkham
I hope this comment doesn't sound trollish -- but it's a question that has
been buggin' me.

So where are the geeks who are excited enough to update a piece of open-source
software to help newbies out? I mean, if I were contributing to the greater
good and all, seems like it would be with something that I personally had a
need to do. While I'm sure that most contributors think of the noobs, where is
the cohesive push for simplification of user experience?

It's always seemed like to me that FOSS was great for geeks who wanted to keep
adding cool stuff and sharing it, but the motivator is -- excitement. It's
still an economy going on, it's just about emotion. I just don't understand
how people get excited about stuff that seems archaic or strange to them.

~~~
lg
Mint is an attempt to improve Ubuntu with a somewhat-friendlier UI and
software that people actually use, i.e. mplayer. I think Ubuntu's problem
isn't geekiness so much as ideology (and maybe there are legal issues with
including things like codecs that i'm not aware of). Anyway computer-literacy
isn't exactly on the downswing, so the trend is in FOSS's favor.

~~~
Jesin
Yes, I've heard good things about Mint. The only reason I've never used it is
that there is no 64-bit version.

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goofygrin
Last week my brother in law's laptop refused to boot windows.

He brought it over on Saturday and I booted off the HH live cd and copied all
his stuff onto my NAS.

There was a LOT of crap on his laptop (spyware and viruses it looked like).

I then installed HH, opera and the flashplayer on his laptop and said "here
you go, your password is xxx". I showed him synaptic and made sure that
hibernation and the wifi card worked and sent him home.

So far, I've not heard any complaints yet :)

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projectileboy
Sorry, open-sourcers, but I have to second the emotion on GIMP vs. Photoshop.
To say that GIMP's usability isn't in the same ballpark as Photoshop's is
putting it mildly...

~~~
wanorris
Is it that Gimp is so much worse, or is it simply that they're different?

I used Corel Photo-Paint for years and years, and when I tried Photoshop after
that, it seemed like it was designed by space aliens. I don't mean to say that
Photo-Paint is easier to use -- I doubt it is. But when you get used to a
particular interface for something like photo editing, maybe any given
interface is ok, but switching interfaces is hard?

~~~
projectileboy
Good question; I'm not sure. What I can be sure of is this story:

A couple months ago, I had to create some annotated screen shots to be used as
cheat sheets by a number of people I'm working with. I knew that I could do
something like this in Photoshop, having used Photoshop a bit 10 years ago.

I first tried GIMP, because it was free and available. After trying for a
while to figure out how to get layers happening, I finally gave up and
downloaded a copy of Photoshop. Everything was immediately intuitive. Even
though the Photoshop UI had changed (a lot) from when I had used it a decade
ago, I was able to very quickly create my annotated screen shots.

Now, you could say that I didn't bother to read any of the GIMP documentation,
and you'd be right. But with Photoshop I didn't have to.

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wanorris
I hope the Ubuntu team sees this and learns from it. They've built a great
system that I love using, and I'd really love to see it guide new users well
enough that my wife would be happy to permanently switch.

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JesseAldridge
I think the problem is not so much that Linux is designed by geeks ignorant to
the plight of the common person, but just that software is hard to create and
maintain, especially software as big and complex as an operating system.

The biggest system I've ever worked with was a game I worked on with a friend
for a year. By the end of the year the codebase was so massive and tangled
that the thought of adding a new feature or even modifying a current one made
me want to curl up in the corner and mumble incoherently.

I think the big problem to solve right now is simply making software
development easier.

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aflag
That experiment is a little biased. It wasn't an example of a person who
doesn't know how to use computers trying out ubuntu. It was an example of a
person who's very confortable with Windows trying to use a different Operating
System.

The test about using youtube is particularly bad. It's good that Ubuntu
doesn't come with flash, it would be even better if it didn't even tell you
about it. Maybe in the future it might come with gnash already installed (you
may want to install it, I'm sure it's on the repositories, even my debian etch
has it). For youtube specifically, as I understand the latest totem comes with
a plugin that allows you to watch youtube videos directly from totem, another
alternative for using youtube without flash.

And yes, I'm a free software extremist, who simply doesn't get it, who will
forever be wrong. And I'm too radical, things can't be taken so seriously,
I'll never find a girlfriend. I know all that. Still, the purpose of Ubuntu is
to spread the use of free software, not to be another system offering
propertary software. If the free software already available is not enough for
some people, I guess we'll just have to wait (not change our systems so it
includes propertary stuff).

~~~
brk
Maybe I'm missing something, but I've never viewed computer usage as a
militant adherence to a single software pricing model. I view it as using the
best combination of OS and apps that suit my needs, in combination with
offering the best cost to usability ratio.

Who cares if the software is free or paid? OSS or proprietary? Find what works
best for YOU, and go with it. Note that the best answer is likely to be very
different person to person.

Fanboys of any denomination are all equally annoying and blind.

~~~
aflag
Your view is different then mine. You see, I take care about the consequences
of my actions. Sure, it's much more convinient to use adobe acroread, using MS
Office is probably a lot easier than OpenOffice. But by using such software
I'm contributing with ideas that are not so good for society.

This essay explains a lot of my point of view towards software:
<http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/shouldbefree.html>

I think finding what work best for me is just too selfish, I rather find what
I think is best for everyone. Also, I realise that, althought proprietary
software may be the best thing for me in the short-term, in the long run, free
software will be much better for me. It will give me more freedom.

Now, I was hoping to have a serious discussion, but you call me a fanboy
(althought for some reason people are downmodding me like crazy). Are you want
to troll me?

~~~
brk
I was not meaning to call you a fanboy directly, although I guess by your own
admission you do fit the description.

I care about the consequences of my actions as well (or at least some actions,
I am not to be held responsible when beer is involved), but free software !=
the absolute answer for everything. Do you not believe that everyone deserves
to be paid for their work? Paying for software creates a cash flow for the
company, which can be used to fund development, maintenance and enhancements.
Some companies use that cash flow (IMO) in better ways than others, and that
factors in to how I make my choices.

~~~
aflag
Of course free software is not the answer for everything. It's just a good
effort towards freedom when it comes to software development and use. I
appreciate that freedom very much, that's why I like free software.

Free software doesn't mean you can't charge for them, it only means that the
user of the software trully owns it, as opposed to simple having the right to
use it.

Where I live it's very common to see companies that will write management
software for other companies and sell it to them. I don't see any reason why
they couldn't be selling free software, it would be very benefitial for the
client because he would be able to even maintain the software if they want to.
Or they can even contract a different company for maintaining the software.
You give your client a lot of freedom this way.

~~~
wanorris
In the enterprise software business (and typically, the desktop software
business as well), the most straightforward business model is to offer a
product and charge people for it. That way, you get paid whenever people use
your software (excepting for piracy).

If you release your software under a free software license, users are not only
free to look at the source and modify it, they are free to redistribute it to
others who have not paid for it.

If you can find a way to make free software work for you in a way that still
allows you to earn a good living developing your software (such as by
providing services), then more power to you. But for-profit software companies
are not producing non-free software simply through myopia and ignorance.

~~~
aflag
I haven't really taken the time to analyse that. Most of my work is academic
and I fear I may not have enough economics background. I do have an early idea
that it sounds more like a myth than a fact.

Let's say a company wants to outsource the development of some software they
need. They go ahead and contract your company. You develop it and sell it to
them for a certain price. Even if the license is free it's not very likely
that they will redistribute it for other companies, and even if they do, it
probably won't fit their needs just right. OTOH, they will be able to call
other companies (other than yours) to maintain your software. So they have
that extra freedom. And it doesn't really hurt business because, if you do a
better job maintaining your software than other people, chances are your
client won't switch.

There's also the case of the end desktop user. That's probably harder
territory for earning money with free software. But I've never seen some
company selling their software but giving the user a package with the GPL-
licensed code. Sure, after a while there would be lots of other non-official
sites to download the program from, but doesn't that already happen with all
the proprietary softwares nowadays? And it's not like anti-piracy laws are
doing any good against it. This way people may do their own derivative work,
for which they might even charge just like you. Now you'll have competition,
so things get more interesting and you have to make better stuff. Why can't
that work?

You can still charge for constant patches you deliver (though they are all
GPL'd). If it's an online game, you might charge for your server, and so on. A
big part of software nowadays seem to be services, anyway.

Say google opens the source for their search engine. Why would you turn to a
different site other than google.com? It would make great research
environment, nonetheless. Even google could gain from it.

So, what I'm saying is that I don't see a reason why people can't earn money
while keeping their software free. Even though things might get a little
different from what they are today. That's good, though, because today is far
from perfect. And I think free software is a move in the right direction.

~~~
wanorris
Red Hat charges for their Enterprise Linux, but releases it as open source. I
forget the names, but there are now 3rd-party Linux distros that basically
just redistribute RHEL freely to whoever wants them.

If someone openly pirates your proprietary software, you have legal recourse.
If someone openly redistributes your open source software, they are acting
within their rights to do so.

In fact, a third party repackager of RHEL even has the option of charging to
provide service, at a discount from Red Hat's price, and they can do this
perfectly legally.

Short version of the economics: if you can charge for services, you can make
money on open source, but only client by client -- you don't become more
efficient the more services you sell, unlike with products (especially low-
marginal-cost products like software). You have to add employees for each new
hour of services you provide. So if you have a potentially popular product,
all other things being equal, you have a higher potential for growth if you
sell the product rather than the service.

Of course, all other things aren't equal, which is why the desktop software
market has been in decline since its heyday in the 90s. Because the marginal
cost of each unit you ship is so low, when there's plenty of competition, you
tend to see a race to the bottom on price (unless you can convince people to
buy your product because it is the standard, as Microsoft has done).

Many enterprise markets are small enough niches that (1) there are a limited
number of competitors, and (2) if you give away your product, you may not
easily be able to make up the revenue in any other way. On the other hand, if
you have technically savvy clients, you may find it worth your while to offer
them your source under a non-redistributable license. They still have to buy
your product from you, but they can debug against the source, integration
test, etc. This isn't free software (obviously), but it may be a happy medium
for both you and your clients.

And yes, when the option of selling (or monetizing in some other way) access
to your server presents itself, that can be far more profitable than selling a
client-side product. That's why World of Warcraft is ridiculously profitable,
and it's why Google makes so much money. But it seems clear that this works
better for some markets than others.

I say all of this as someone who believes in free software wherever it is
practical, but also as someone who makes a living writing software and wants
to continue to do so.

And, as Eric Raymond argued over a decade ago, for something like an operating
system that is used by large numbers of people, there will be no shortage of
free labor to produce an open source product. But people will probably only
work on software for managing a multinational mineral extraction business if
you pay them. So open source is a great idea for many, many things, but
probably not for everything.

------
dean
I'm surprised a usability test is such big news. It's almost as though no one
ever thought to do one for Linux before.

------
jdavid
I still can not figure out how to get my nvidia drivers working in ubuntu,
after upgrading from 7.10-8.04 LTS. Windows is still more productive for me, I
do want to be fully on ubuntu by the end of june though. So I have a few more
months.

Right now my plan is to format my ubuntu partitions and to start over with
8.04.

~~~
wanorris
Upgrading to Hardy borked my nvidia, as well. I ended up replacing
/etc/X11/xorg.conf with xorg.conf.1, which used the generic vesa driver
instead of the nvidia driver. (If you don't know command line, this is 'sudo
/etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.new-backup' followed by 'sudo
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.1 /etc/X11/xorg.conf'.)

After I rebooted under the vesa driver, I was able to use the Hardware Drivers
tool under System/Administration to turn on the normal Hardy nvidia driver.

I also recommend grabbing nvidia-settings from the repository to tweak things
like multiple monitors more easily. (Once it's there, you just call 'sudo
nvidia-settings'.)

~~~
jdavid
i have a display driver loaded, but its just slow.

so, can i skip right to 'sudo nvidia-settings' ? or do i need to do one of the
above steps?

------
ambition
User testing is one area where free software has a fundamental disadvantage
vs. paid-for programs. Programmers can turn their time into code with no need
of money. Unfortunately, proper user testing costs real money. Paid-for
programs have revenue with which they can pay for user testing but only the
largest FOSS projects have that kind of cash. In my opinion, this is one
important reason why open source programs have a bad reputation for usability.

------
brlewis
"make the experience a lot more friendly for non-computer-literate people"

should be

"make the experience a lot more friendly for people who use Microsoft Windows
extensively"

~~~
jrockway
Well, learning is too hard for most people, so apparently Linux should be
exactly the same as Windows.

If you want to avoid the $300 Vista upgrade, along with the DRM and general
suckage of Windows, you might have to _learn_ to use the Free alternative. Why
is that such a terrible thing?

~~~
wanorris
Firefox started its ascension by systematically eliminating any reasons users
had for using IE, until it was similar to IE, but with more power, less
suckage, and a better interface.

It certainly doesn't mean Linux should jettison things that rock, like
throwing out package management in favor of Windows-style installer chaos. But
at the very least, we should expect to help users coming from different
paradigms understand what package management means and how it's different. Any
novices who are remotely sane will _love_ the little Add/Remove Programs
widget in Ubuntu.

~~~
krschultz
Exactly, his complaints are mostly "Why didn't they make this little thing
slightly clearer for the uninitiated" i.e. call it Brasero CD/DVD burner
instead of just Brasero. That is hardly throwing out the baby with the
bathwater and copying Windows.

