Oh, my good, so this became a mac vs windows thing too. So, jsut because windows don’t have “buttons explaining actions” (although I would argue OK, Cancel is exactly doing that) then mac is three steps ahead ? It’s just two ways of doing it and please don’t touch my “OK”, “Cancel” buttons and garble them to become something with different meanings each time, the mac way is certainly not better or easier to understand.
Windows has always been more of a power os compared to macos and we certainly do not want it dumbed down to mac level.
“Windows has always been more of a power os compared to macos and we certainly do not want it dumbed down to mac level.” - clearly you’ve never heard of Unix. Get your facts straight.
So many people jump up and down about privacy and lack-of-control when software does something silently. Andy is right, systems need a choice between “Just leave me alone and do it” and “Ask me for permission first” to satisfy geeks and non-geeks. This option would probably be OK at the OS/User Profile level and all apps could just query the OS API to find out how it should behave.
Most people who read your blog will tend to be techno-geeks, and as such the comments will be skewed toward wanting control.
Also, I’d like PCs to have more warning lights for hardware (CPU temperature, fan go/no-go status, so I can decide what to do,
have more to report to the person subsequently fixing it, etc.
I recall back in the old days, pc’s had error codes which were done in beeps.
If I recall correctly it was something like:
^4 beeps = check underwear, then check manual - this is gonna be a looong night. Usually only the “good” kit had this level of error status.
4 beeps=RAM error,
3 beeps=IDE bus error
2,1 beeps = Normal.
Aye, I probably got the list out a bit but you get the idea. I seem to recall some enterprising company made a post-diag ISA card as well which used an array lights to give detailed errors (again, had to check the manual to divine the true reason).
I’m definitely one that would like more control, but I’ve seen plenty of my friends that have no clue. They hate stuff popping up on their screen and just want it to go away. No amount of pleading helps with this; they just aren’t gonna read the messages. They don’t want to do “maintenance” ; they just want to run their game/office app/whatever.
I definitely think the default should be to automatically download patches. I’m selfish with my time – I’m tired of helping my friends with the same spyware/malware/virus problems over and over. Make the geeks find the setting and turn it off if they want to.
I can tell you right now being an accomplished mechanic(8 ASE certifications and Master Tech certification) and an engineer the ONLY reason cars have check engine lights is due to federal regulation for emissions. The “check engine” light should be renamed check computer or check emissions system light because this is usually all it keeps tabs on. So if the computer world were to implement a light it would have to be federally mandated, checked (think iCheck!) and would drive the cost up. And for what? Because grandma doesn’t want her casserole recipe taken by microsoft and exploited? Or because the “geeks” (like me)can’t keep their game cheats safe?
Jeff if the examples that were given wouldn’t have asked for permission don’t you see a lot of people yelling and screaming that Microsoft or whoever is installing stuff without my knowledge and/or permission. I do agree with you that you shouldn’t have to ask them for permission on every single error that pops up, even though some of the examples were not errors, but run a standard protocol to resolve the issue keeping the users having the warm and fuzzy feeling.
As for the Check engine light I don’t know if it would do anything, but it would be funny to see a Big Yellow Computer icon in the upper right corner just sitting there. My guess is that if something like that would be implemented the users would be calling to complain about the fact that they cannot remove the Icon rather then trying to find out what the icon is representing. The solution that I can come up with is to have some OS setting/registry setting that says whether or not the user wants to be notified of Error messages/System messages or if they just want the computer to handle them quietly. Make the setting have a default of let the computer handle them quietly. That way it allows for the system to potentially work at its peak as well as giving the option for those who want to know everyt little thing that goes on.
Windows Automatic Updates can run automatically, but power users can override how they work or block specific update.
Notification icons in that area near the clock that we’re not supposed to call the system tray are a lot less annoying than dialogs, and most of them fade away if you don’t click on them.
Windows One Care is as close as a Check Engine Light as I can imagine. It runs automatically, allows me to override its behavior, and turns yellow or red when it thinks I should know something. The only shortcoming (which is Jae pointed out) is that it doesn’t let me override its behavior and stay green. In Jae’s check engine example, this would mean a way to acknowledge the O2 sensor light without disabling the check engine light entirely. That makes it less useful as a visual indicator to power users.
With the exception of UAC, a default Windows / Office machine pretty does what you asked for, doesn’t it?
The “check engine light” would be useful for hardware related issues such as defective disk, memory, or other hardware related issues. It could maybe be used by giving alerts when hard disk space becomes critical, memory usage approaches limits etc. Make it configurable to make everyone happy.
For software, I’d say your on your own and the “check engine light” would be of no use because of the many different manufacturers and there update schemes.
For recent versions of Windows I always set the auto updates to download the updates, and then I choose what to install.
Seems to work out OK.
Reporting of crashes and other automated logging etc should be configurable, whether defaulted auto or not.
Less dialogs is better. If you do get them, provide a link to the configuration to suppress them. If they don’t have that linke or button then bad design. If you are getting a lot of security dialogs that you don’t want to see, then you should be able to suppress them easily.
I guess if there wouldn’t idiots making malware the OS and the corresponding software would be more steamlined.
As others have said, it’s a trust/control issue - inexperienced users might not care, but experienced ones tend to get alarmed that there machine is going off talking to the rest of the internet, altering what’s on their machine without telling them. It’s their machine, not Microsoft’s (or Apple’s, or 's.
I don’t know if there is a universal, good solution for this. You can automatically do everything by default and hide the preferences behind “advanced” configuration panels. Then people will complain that Microsoft is secretly spying on you and breaking your machine. Or you can not automatically do it, and then people will complain that they have to find all the settings to enable them. Or you could prompt the first time about and then people will complain about getting prompted. Or you could heuristically sort of guess what people want to do (like those “personalized menus”) but then everybody will be confused when things start behaving differently when they haven’t altered anything. Personally I like to know the first time I have to make a decision, and get an opportunity to configure it right then, or go to the main configuration panel, but then not get prompted afterwards ("[checkbox] Always do X in the future"). But the same people that ignore dialogs will just click cancel on that dialog. Whuddyagunnado?