Yes. I have multiple "granny users" using Linux (Ubuntu+derivatives of classic Gnome), exactly the way author describes: Here's e-mail, here's web, here's (video)chat, that's it.
No user-hostile distractions of the type "the computer has decided that it WILL reboot NOW", no useless "everything is all right, update has been installed" popups, no "oh look, a new flashdisk - guess what, the computer has decided that it needs yet another product reactivation," no "new printer? lol no, insert driver glork splurk mumbo jumbo" which I've come to know and loathe in Windows.
Updates are completely under the hood, devices simply work when plugged in (which shocks me to no end, after previous experiences with Linux and W8 driver issues), no crapware, no spyware.
It works for some two years now. Switching family to linux (laptop & desktop) two years ago have saved me tens of hours of tech support, and saved family from waiting for my free time. `It Just Works' for them. Really, everything except MS Windows games.
And given Valve's recent announcement of SteamOS, I expect that to change soon enough.
I fully agree. I gave my grandmother (born in 1941) a computer running Ubuntu 9.10 in 2009. Ever since then I've only had to fix things three times, I think, twice because of hardware failures and once because an update broke her Desktop. She's on 12.10 now, without me playing any part in the upgrading process, without her breaking her workflow.
I didn't quite say it was _perfect_, shit happens - and I've had my share of systems hosed by buggy updates everywhere: be it Windows, Linux, Mac or BSD. I still hold that in 2013, a modern Linux distro has _the fewest_ of such problems.
Or, to put it differently, of my simplified boxes for basic users, Linux generates the fewest trouble tickets.
>a modern Linux distro has _the fewest_ of such problems
Interestingly, I keep reading these claims online but every time I try it turns out to be exactly the other way around. Maybe I'm haunted by the Linux ghosts, but even though I love running Linux on servers, Linux on laptops has always been a complete disaster for me.
It runs hot, drains the battery, and updates ruin the entire installation with alarming frequency. It's not even remotely as stable as Windows or Mac (or Android, which is particularly interesting since it is Linux as well).
I've spent weeks investigating power management issues on Linux laptops down to individual drivers. I don't recommend the experience to anyone.
To reiterate: I'm not saying that Linux is the silver bullet, or problem-free; just that switching _a specific set of users_ to Linux has, so far, ensured the least problematic operation for them.
How does your anecdote fit into that, apart from "it both says Linux, so a single user desktop and a MySQL server is totally the same situation"?
My anecdote simply states that nothing is perfect and things do go wrong.
A more pertinent question is: is that less problematic as far as you are concerned or as far as the users are concerned? Also are you fully sure that you are qualified to judge this as a success based on the metrics you set out? Perhaps things take them ten times longer but they are ignorant to that fact?
Ten times longer in the same Firefox, Skype, Libreoffice, Thunderbird combo that they already had before? Not likely. (No, I'm not an UX expert, nor do I play one on TV; but I have seen the users "in action" enough to make an educated guess)
I realise what is meant, but not only is the term "granny" both sexist and ageist, it is also unnecessary. There is no useful distinction between a "granny" and a "user" in this person's hierarchy. MOST people view computers as tools to get things done and aren't interested in "exploring beyond that" -- or are we going to distinguish between "car drivers" and "granny car drivers" as well, when talking about simplifying the interface?
More likely than being sexist or ageist, the author probably had his granny in mind when he was trying to think of the label. I agree that it's not a very good one though; it's too specific.
I don't really agree on your wider point, though. Car manufacturers do absolutely distinguish between "car drivers" and "granny car drivers", and also between "boy racers", "mums on the school run", and so on.
If you're going to manufacture a new car, you need to know who you want to sell it to. The same should be true of computer platforms.
Agreed. I think this is exactly the market Google is going after with ChromeOS. And not just grannies - its people who just want to use the Internet and not much else.
Email? Use Gmail. Video chat? Google Hangouts. That's Google's answer.
The biggest problem isn't ease of use as such, it's consistency.
If you set granny up with Windows and she has a problem, you know she can probably find another grandson or nephew who at least knows how to google for the solution, failing that it's probably easy to hire a cheap tech support person to go to her house and fix it for her.
Once you set her up with a Linux distro , you're probably on the hook for that thing for it's entire lifetime. Granted it's probably easier to find Linux nerds now than it used to be but they're more likely to say "oh, this is Ubuntu.. I only use Arch".
I'd be worried about the co-occurrence of me arranging to go out and get drunk for the evening, granny wanting to watch an important episode of coronation street on BBC iplayer and adobe releasing another broken flash update. "It was very strange! They painted all the actors blue, I didn't like it!"
Not really - none of that part of my family are Linux users, yet the grandsons and nephews have no issue googling for her issues - as the issues she had were with the apps: "how do I do this on the internet thing" is not very OS-specific, when you know that internet thing is Firefox ;)
What's stopping Grannies from adopting Linux is the fact that legislators still seem to believe that it's not an abuse of monopolistic power by Microsoft to force laptop manufacturers into forcing the consumer to pay for an OS he doesn't need.
The EU's commission whose job it is to ensure healthy competition has been sleeping on this since a few decades now. They should get some of that coffee. It's really beyond me how MS is still allowed to operate like this. Why have companies like Redhat, Canonical, etc. not filed a complaint with the EU yet?
I agree on his one. For example in Portugal it's almost impossible to buy a computer with linux or no OS, you simply can't.
Last time I asked about it and told them that if they sent the computer to the manufactor or if they contacted them they would sell it to me without OS, the seller simply told me that he can't sell the computer like that and that the pc + os are a package and there's no way to separate them.
Recently I saw like 2 asus eeepc with ubuntu at shops, but that's it. Weak, small computers that almost nobody will buy and then they will tell the excuse "ohh, computers with linux don't sell". Simply stupid, I mean too damn smart for microsoft.
Monopoly rules and still exists. Most people won't buy stuff from amazon or any other online shop, specially a computer that's something expensive and that if they have problems they can't simply go to the shop for maintenance.
I think most people here live in a dream world when they say this kind of problem is solved.
Please stop thinking only about how you see the world ( hackers that dominate technology and internet, living in 1st world countries ) and think how normal, granny type users live and experience the world.
And I must laugh when people also say that ipad or mac computers are cheap enough for these users, seriously I don't know what to think...
And sorry, I know I may be ranting a little but this must be said.
Maybe you're experiencing some residual anger from 10 years ago because Microsoft is nowhere near a monopoly anymore.
You can buy a laptop loaded with Linux from Best Buy or Dell. Most creative professionals I know own Mac OS X laptops including myself. The Samsung Chromebook is the #1 sellng laptop on Amazon (or was a few months ago).
Pay for an os HE? doesn't need. I know the hn community isn't exactly sensitive to gender and age issues but come on. Why is the consumer he? Especially when we are speaking about this mythical "granny."
This is one of the countless known bugs in the English language. You're welcome to try to fix it (the core developers died centuries ago), but the large userbase is unlikely to accept fixes.
It may just be me, but it hardly seems constructive to be nitpicking on a gender-specific article in a sentence which would become convoluted if rewritten to use a gender-neutral form.
This makes sense if you look at it through your own tech-centric lenses. It seems plausible that Linux is good for a normal user when you try to put yourself in their shoes but the problem is that you can't really do that without bringing along your own knowledge and experience without realizing it. Linux is not okay for the basic user described in this post but it can be great for a lot of non techies.
"Grannies" don't like to deviate from the norm. The library has windows, friends have windows, by this point in time a person has come into contact with computers outside the home lots and they're almost always windows with an occasional Mac. You put Ubuntu on Granny's machine and she'll be asking why this doesn't look like what she saw elsewhere. Even if the function and UI are eerily similar there's this weird mental block that stops people from seeing the similarities and focus only on the differences.
The distribution described in this post is basically a Chromebook. Honestly, if your "Granny" needs email, skype, and the web then get an iPad + keyboard or a Chromebook. Not a full Linux install that you rip stuff out of. In fact, people with these granny use cases are already flocking to tablets over desktops in droves. A copy of Ubuntu "Gutsy Granny" as described here is bending a desktop to work not like a desktop save for the mouse.
I'm annoyed with the 2 mainstream OSes like anyone else and I especially hate having to troubleshoot problems that shouldn't come up for these Grannies but as annoying as it is I think switching these people to Linux is partly us trying to enlighten others (which comes off really condescendingly) and partly trying to make our lives easier rather than the user's by putting the user in the equivalent of a bubble where they can't break anything and if they do it's very convenient for us to fix.
No. I don't think Linux (Ubuntu et al) is or will become so in the next 5 years (FWIW I use Linux both at home and at work).
But a Chromebook is - and I'm speaking with years of experience observing my grandfather's use of a computer. Chromebooks are hard to screw up. You kill one? Replace it and get all the settings back. No viruses. No antiviruses (worse than viruses, usually). It just works. And the price is very low too.
>Linux is the best shot at a granny proof OS in 2013
No, it's not. Been following the "dream" since 1998. Then it was "a matter of 1-2 years" to "be ready for the desktop", nay, to conquer it.
Since then, the same three responses always come up:
1) "Well, I already use it for MY desktop, so there". Doesn't matter, you are an outlier. We're talking people at large here.
2) "Well, I installed it for my Dad and he goes along just fine". Sorry, a non-user with a friend to install Linux for him (and perhaps admin it) not representative of casual users.
3) Normal users are like "grannies" and "moms" (slightly sexist description which they use to mean: they do very little stuff with their PCs, like browse the web and check their email). Well, not really.
Some users are like that -- mainly older people. But most users are not, and as they spend more time with their PCs they become even less so. They would at some point want to: edit video from their compact camera, play a (specific, popular) game, create a presentation and share it, etc etc. As soon as they try a lot of those things, they find out that Linux doesn't cut it 100%.
So what? The article isn't about those people. It's about the plenty of people who just want a computer for browsing the web, checking their email, and playing solitaire. They haven't heard of "Left for Dead" or "Photoshop" and they don't care about them either.
Step 2 definitely counts for something, because "grannies and moms" aren't exactly buying bare bones PCs and installing Windows on them from scratch either.
Well, that's the old wives tale, but I've seen people like my dad (wholesale merchant, never used a computer or cared about them until 55+) that has, in the 3 years of buying one, reinstalled his Windows 2-3 times.
It's not that difficult. Insert DVD, next-next, done. With a Mac, perhaps, it's even easier.
But did he install it on a barebone pc? Getting all the missing drivers etc? This sounds like this was a factory installed PC with all drivers on the DVD ready to go. That's not barebone exactly. Also the question is why he was doing that; I haven't reinstalled anything (not Linux, not Mac) for many years and I actually like screwing around with hardware and drivers?
Yeah ok, I didn't know that. I have the same experience with Linux these days, but I'm not a good example. I know what hardware to buy and what distro's to use in what cases. The last Windows install I personally did was Windows 7 on a 2007 Acer and 2009 Toshiba and that was an incredibly horrible experience; almost nothing worked out of the box and finding drivers was hard ('no drivers found' was the message and on the vendor sites it said that it didn't have drivers for Win7 yet; the drivers for XP half worked and half did not). Needless to say this was not the DVD or partition I installed; I used a shiny new Win7 USB.
I think though that although some people will reinstall their system (why?), it should not be needed and that's where we are growing to with, on the low end, tablets (mostly linux: android)/chromeos (linux)/windows laptops and on the higher end macbooks. These machines get thrown out before a reinstall would be needed by the less computer savvy (and even by the computer savvy who earn too much :).
In the mac space people buy a new macbook / iPad when the new shiny upgrades are announced (october?) and on the other end of the spectrum people abuse the stuff OR it gets 'too slow' and replace it. In between is the high end Windows market, which, so far, seems to be split between business users (which are more and more going tablet), high end gaming and geeks. And those three all do (or their company does) in fact reinstall / upgrade (hard and soft) their systems. But that's very far from 'most users'.
Installing Ubuntu is incredibly easy, same next-next done process. IIRC, it's also a lot faster than installing Windows. Even setting up dual boot is simple.
Granted I have had problems even recently with wireless not working out-of-the-box on linux systems.
iOS might be an even better alternative. I've met quite a few arthritics who have to use a touchscreen, plus the interface (until recently, though it will be again) was much more natural.
No, the best [insert unfavorable stereotype here]-proof OS in 2013 is iOS. Compared to iOS, Linux compares unfavorably on almost every factor:
- For truly casual, non-savvy users the iPad is the ideal hardware platform. It's small, it's unintimidating, it's inexpensive.
- Touchscreens are great. They're the natural interface for a casual user. I have a grandmother who became somewhat notorious for breaking LCDs in my family. This was back in the early 2000s before touchscreens were remotely common, but that interface mode still managed to stick in her head so firmly that she never did develop an instinct for using the mouse.
- For users this casual, a Linux setup depends critically on having a friend or family member who's able and willing to set up and administer their computer for them. Very few people have that.
- By contrast, the biggest problem I've had to support with non-nerdy friends/family and their iPads is, "I can't get this Send to Evernote bookmarklet working in Safari." That's obviously coming from one of the less intimidated ones.
- The onscreen keyboard is generally fine because people this uncomfortable with computers generally don't touch-type anyway. For those who do, a case with a built-in keyboard is an easy solution.
Now I'll grant there are some political objections to iOS out there, and for people to whom those political objections are important, Linux is less problematic. To them I say, get over yourself. This isn't a computer for you. This is a computer for people who neither know nor give a damn about the GNU Manifesto.
Or if you think they really do want something that folds, a Chromebook probably works too. Haven't had a chance to try one of those, honestly.
"This isn't a computer for you. This is a computer for people who neither know nor give a damn about the GNU Manifesto."
The point of the GNU manifesto is that nobody, not even people who are hopelessly unable to manage their own computer, should be forced to give up control of their computers. It is one thing to lack a working knowledge of computers, but quite another to receive a computer that deliberately traps you. Beyond that, the GNU manifesto is about not dividing people into special social classes like "programmers" and "end users;" everyone should have the same rights over their computers, regardless of their ability to exercise those rights on their own.
Some of us are not going to recommend computers that are designed to be controlled by their manufacturers. I would rather deal with a million annoying demands for computer help from my family members than to see their technical ignorance taken advantage of by Apple or by anyone else.
Consider what you are saying in the context of free speech (not such a stretch, considering the censorship of political apps in the Apple app store). Would you say that free speech only matters for philosophers and political commentators? Would you say that it is OK to curtail certain speech for everyone else, because most people never say those things anyway? That is what you are saying about computers: that the freedom to hack belongs only to people who have the technical knowledge needed to do so.
Yes. And for all that, if you present it as an argument for why people need to be using a computer that's inscrutable to them, they'll dismiss you as a hopeless ideologue at best. At worst, they'll get offended by your nerd chauvinism.
"No you can't do as much with this system and are generally much more dependent on others if you use it, but the point is that you could be if you did have the technical knowledge. Which you don't, but that's beside the point!" might be a well-intentioned position, but it's horrendously privileged. For someone to whom the abstract Freedom offered by free software is, by any practical measure, inaccessible, the concrete freedom offered by well-designed user-friendly products is vastly more valuable.
I do not think you can say that the freedoms offered by Free software are entirely inaccessible to even the most technically illiterate users. We usually talk about things like the freedom to copy or study or modify software, but the most basic freedom is the freedom to use software (and by extension, your computer) however you wish. That is not something Apple's snappy interfaces deliver -- you are only free to use iOS for the things Apple approves, and subverting that control (i.e. jailbreaking) is no less intimidating than using a modern GNU/Linux distro.
My experience has been that deliberate restrictions on software use affect non-technical people as much as they affect me:
"What does 'activation failed' mean?"
"Why can't I copy this DVD?"
"I want to record this TV show and then watch it on my tablet, how do I copy it from my DVR?"
"My friend had that app, why can't I find it in the app store? How do I install it?"
Dismissing the freedoms offered by Free software as abstract and inaccessible ignores the reality of how people use their computers. Nobody is claiming that someone who never touched a computer in their life is going to be hacking the kernel, but it is not far-fetched to think that they might want to copy a movie or that they might be angry if their books mysteriously disappear one night. The snappy UI is little more than bait -- it is attractive to people who are frustrated by more complicated systems, but hidden behind it is a system that denies people the right to use their computers they way they want to use their computers. In other words, what I said in my comment: an attempt to take advantage of technical ignorance.
How can you say that the freedom to use the software however you wish exists for someone whose ability to use the software is contingent on them having an acquaintance to set it up and then lock them into a sandbox so that they don't break it?
Maybe in principle that freedom could exist for the non-nerdy Linux user. But in practice it simply doesn't.
Example: Retail Linux netbooks were an incredibly short-lived experiment. Reason? Customers kept returning them because they were having so many more of the kinds of issues you list than they did with even Windows computers.
"How can you say that the freedom to use the software however you wish exists for someone whose ability to use the software is contingent on them having an acquaintance to set it up and then lock them into a sandbox so that they don't break it?"
A sandbox that stops someone from breaking their computer is a lot different from a sandbox that stops someone from installing software that a distant corporation did not approve. It is not a sandbox that stops people from doing things that make sense for them and that they do understand, like copying a movie from a DVD to their tablet.
In other words, it is a stretch to even call it a "sandbox." It is not any different than what I do for my own user account on my own computer.
"Maybe in principle that freedom could exist for the non-nerdy Linux user. But in practice it simply doesn't."
Again, my experience differs. I have found that non-technical people are somewhat intimidated by complicated UIs, but that they become much more frustrated by simple UIs that tell them they are not allowed to do what they are trying to do, especially when they are trying to do something that seems simple and obvious. When my mother inserted a DVD into her computer and said, "Why can't I just copy this the way I copy files from a thumb drive?" was she not complaining about her lack of freedom? Do you really think it would be better for her to have a snappier UI, but to lack that freedom?
I have also found that non-technical people are more constrained by the fact that they do not realize what their computer can do than by the UI, regardless of what OS they are using. Of course my mother did not turn her desktop into a DVR on her own -- the idea that it was possible to do so never even occurred to her. Now that she has that set up, it has become something she relies on. The UI may be ugly (even by "geek standards"), but do you really think she would be better off paying a monthly fee to use some locked-down DVR that does not even let her copy her recordings to her tablet, or that only allows her to record certain shows?
(Yes, I like to use my mom as an example. Yes, I know she might be an exceptional case; however, other non-technical users I have interacted with seem to react similarly to these things, so I suspect this is not so uncommon.)
I think you are not giving people enough credit. Example: the outrage when Amazon deleted books from Kindles. People were complaining about the violation of a freedom they simply took for granted, a freedom they never realized they had given up when they purchased a Kindle, a freedom that had nothing to do with the UI.
Yes, yes, this is all fine and dandy until your linux distro updates and something causes the wifi drivers to crash or simply not work anymore. I think the OP wanted to have his granny just use an iPad or tablet of some kind where it's literally impossible to screw something up.
That sort of thing is the reason I switched from Fedora to ScientificLinux (i.e. RHEL). That switch happened years ago and I have yet to see anything critical break (in fact, I cannot think of anything beyond very obscure, configuration-specific breakage that is beyond what you would see for end user setups).
Why give your grandparents a toy someone else owns and controls when you could give them the real thing?
That's funny, because for the last several days I've been listening to people complain about various issues brought on by the iOS 7 update. One guy said his alarm clock app stopped working, causing him to miss an important meeting.
I've seen the kind of user ranking proposed in this article many times (from clueless users on to power users on to developers and elite hackers). The assumption being that those up the ranking have an all-around better command of computers than those down.
But it seems to me that a developer need not be a power user. It doesn't seem far fetched that one might be competent in (say) python while ignoring most of the innards of a unix-like system (modulo the part that she actually uses in her programming). Being able to code doesn't automagically turn you into an expert in, say, systemd service files.
In my experience some devs are power users, but many business devs are writers of code, they don't know dick about anything outside of their purview, and frankly, they don't care.
Look I may have been snide but I totally reject the entire premise that a "Granny proof" OS is a terminal locked down to three main apps. Heck the whole article goes through pains to say "Granny isn't stupid" but they only need a browser. I mean at this point why give them skype and email when they can use webmail and Skype via a browser? (requires Outlook.com so your mail is there to)
Granny proof to me is an OS where my granny can easily install their damn solitaire or scrabble games without too much hassle. They can get around to their downloaded images, create a gallery and maybe edit a Word Doc or excel spreadsheet. Its not some mythical strawman dummy user who really just needs an iPad. Right now an iPad is more powerful and usable device for a less tech savvy user then this stripped down - non-existant Linux distro.
Yeah for what I have seen with the users he describes, the $249 samsung chromebook is almost perfect. I would say it needs a touchscreen (I remember my grandfather trying to push on the screen 30 years ago when I showed him something with a button), but further it falls in the price range of almost everyone, it's always backed up, secure, simple. No worries about anything; just sending mails, browsing and writing the occasional text if needed.
The problem of not having internet around is also no issue; these kind of users use their computers maybe a few times / week which at which point, at least here in the village, they go to the local bar and use their wifi.
It may seem that way, but the average person is not so hopeless. Most people do not know what their computers can do for them other than a web browser. If, however, you take the time to show them, you might be surprised.
My mother once thought that web browsing was computing. Then she got a digital camera and, out of necessity, learned how to scale down images (at that time, sending full-resolution images to people was infeasible). Eventually she learned that she could do more -- she could remove red-eye, switch people's heads, create various jokes that earned a lot of laughs on the job. Now she cannot imagine a computer that lacks photo editing software.
One day recently she told me she wanted to get a TiVO and was asking for my advice. I said, "Why not just use the computer you have?" and I helped her set that up. MythTV was too complicated for her -- she is actually more comfortable using cron to schedule recordings. I wrote a small script for her to make recording a little easier, and occasionally have to help her with transcoding when she wants to watch a video on her Android tablet (but mostly she can do that herself). Already she has saved more money than the extra hardware cost, and while the process looks ugly and lacks a remote control, it works for her.
Now, maybe my mother is exceptional, but I think you'll find that most people can do more with their computers than you expect if you bother to teach them or nudge them in the right direction. In the worst case, you might just have to write a few scripts and a simple UI if you are dealing with someone who is too intimated by a terminal. On the other hand, when you give someone the expedient solution that "just works" but that is based on the idea that they are too stupid to do anything, you trap them and prevent them from doing anything more.
We're not too far from a time when every Granny grew up in a highly technical age where basic digital competency is as assured as knowing how to tie shoelaces. Hopefully then we can stop the over emphasis on providing systems for the least technically capable.
Systems can be intuitive and novice-friendly without limiting the capabilities of technical users.
Also don't count on basic digital competency anytime soon worldwide. Where I live, young and old alike stare blankly into computer screens with no clue what's happening. Two days ago I unsuccessfully tried to explain to a 25 year old woman what a website is.
There are so many emerging markets for computers that intuitive UIs will be crucial for a long time to come. I'm glad for that, since the ease of opening my web browser or music player has never once prevented me from using command line tools, editing system/configuration files, etc.
I'm not so sure about that. Compare with literacy. Not only is there a largish part of the population that hasn't enough reading proficiency'to be called literate, but even a large part of the literate do have trouble reading and comprehending texts, forms, and what not that are written by higher educated people. This is a big problem with governmental forms and the like. For the people for which these forms are often the most important have the most trouble reading and comprehending these forms.
No user-hostile distractions of the type "the computer has decided that it WILL reboot NOW", no useless "everything is all right, update has been installed" popups, no "oh look, a new flashdisk - guess what, the computer has decided that it needs yet another product reactivation," no "new printer? lol no, insert driver glork splurk mumbo jumbo" which I've come to know and loathe in Windows.
Updates are completely under the hood, devices simply work when plugged in (which shocks me to no end, after previous experiences with Linux and W8 driver issues), no crapware, no spyware.