These are interesting commentaries. I think there is a lot of value in
looking at this operating system being open to 'different paradigms' and
very little value looking at it from the perspective of a hardcore windows
or mac user.
These computers are going to be used by children with little or no exposure
to personal computers. From everything I've read about the development of
Sugar it seems that it was built to support the tasks of these children.
Whether it's successful or not needs to be tested in the field rather than
the laboratory.
Sugar is also based on the faith that a community of users will develop. If
these communities develop then the operating system has much more potential
than it would for individual users. I am hoping that once it is set free in
the world some unpredicted things will happen.
Cheers,
Julie
On Dec 26, 2007 12:40 AM, Dan Saffer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I'd be interested in hearing from interaction designers who have
> played extensively with the new One Laptop Per Child UI ("Sugar").
>
> I saw the first public demo of Sugar back in August at AP's UX Week:
>
> <
> http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/08/14/uxweek2007-lisa-strausfeld-on-one-laptop-per-child/
> >
>
> but never really got to play with it. I was willing to keep an open
> mind about the UI, even though it uses very different paradigms than
> the ones we're all used to.
>
> But then Christopher Fahey's critique:
>
> <
> http://www.graphpaper.com/2007/12-23_challenge-if-you-cant-say-something-nice-about-olpc
> >
>
> "From what I've seen, the UI bears all the hallmarks of a user
> interface disaster, a case study in designer-driven design. I don't
> understand why the whole UX world isn't awash in skepticism over an OS
> that looks all the world like a Microsoft BOB for the Wallpaper* set."
>
> and Adam Greenfield's
>
> <http://speedbird.wordpress.com/2007/12/22/twenty-four-hours-with-my-olpc/
> >
>
> "Despite its inclusion of some innovative and useful features, I find
> the OLPC device's Sugar operating system poorly integrated with
> applications (here nicely dubbed "activities"), to the degree that it
> may well be impossible to evaluate whether the underlying idea ever
> had any merit. My first impression - and I reiterate, it's only that -
> is that many of the applications bundled with the device epitomize
> everything that's wrong with FLOSS user interfaces, even when the OS
> itself has been created by professional information designers."
>
> And more...
>
> <
> http://issues-in-publishing.blogspot.com/2007/12/first-reactions-to-olpc.html
> >
>
> "Sugar is the operating system on the XO, and it, too, is very cool,
> but it is slow, and not intuitive for the hardcore windows and mac
> users. It is just not as advanced an operating system, and it is clear
> that it was built by developers for developers."
>
>
> I'd be curious to see how the UI (and the machine in general) are
> working in the field. I know for fact that no generative user research
> was done for these, but I wonder if any testing has been done since
> then.
>
> And how about some heuristic evaluations from this community?
>
> Dan
>
>
>
>
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________________________________________________________________
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