Hello Richard, In April you wrote: "What would it take to make it easy to construct and navigate such a zoom world in Lively Kernel?"
I hope you can spend some time to answer this question with a drawing: - http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYWzJ6ByFTvFZGhqNmI2cGhfMjc5Z2Q3cjlrZ2Y&hl=en - http://www.lively-kernel.org/repository/lively-wiki/index.xhtml Thanks, Philip Weaver On Sun, Apr 11, 2010 at 1:08 PM, Richard Karpinski <[email protected]>wrote: > Hello Dan and everybody, > > Smalltalk is wonderful. Making it work in virtually every browser by coding > the base system in Javascript is very clever and could be marvelously > useful. Enriching the current code to make Lively Kernel suitable for > awesome presentations well beyond what PowerPoint could dream of has much > appeal for me. I love neat things that are useful and can be acquired > inexpensively in money and time. When such things have unbounded utility, > Pavlov sets in and I slather and drool. Keep it up, man. I don't mind that > my shirt gets wet. > > But wait. How long does it take for someone to be comfortable navigating > around in a Lively Kernel world? > > I'm sure it's not one of those things that takes weeks to get into, but I > worry that it might take an hour or two. What I want is a system that > computer experts can become competent with in only a few minutes. It would > be truly great if novices could get there even faster. But who knows how to > build such a system? > > Today, I think no one knows how to do that. However, the late Jef Raskin, > father of the Macintosh and author of "The Humane Interface", did. Given a > charter to assist in getting around in a patient's chart which was > impossible to read when fully displayed and awkward to navigate when > magnified to be readable, Jef used zooming to good effect. He wanted to call > it a Flying User Interface, not only because he liked flying and it felt > like that, but especially so he could call it (phonetically) a Phooey. He > was like that. > > Anyway, he discussed the system in his book, but he left out some details. > When computer experts were trained to use the system. they became > comfortable and competent in less than TWO minutes. But when utter novices, > who maybe recognized the mouse as a thing to push around, not speak into as > Scotty did, they became fully functional with the system in less than ONE > minute. > > I really like that. I want that. With such a system I could teach a three > year old to use it, or a 93 year old, or even a college professor. I am NOT > kidding, the first and second examples may have time to spare, but the prof > does not. > > Why does it work so well? My theory is that for tens of millions of years, > our ancestors made it back to the nest, or we would not be here today. Thus > the talent for geographic navigation is built into our DNA. We do not forget > where the fridge is or where the couch is. Often we can get to such places > in the dark. If our computer world is so arranged, people won't get lost so > often. If we can follow links by rolling into a thumbnail and can return by > recrossing that border it will seem natural to us. > > What would it take to make it easy to construct and navigate such a zoom > world in Lively Kernel? > > Richard > > -- > Richard Karpinski, Nitpicker extraordinaire > > 148 Sequoia Circle, > Santa Rosa, CA 95401 > Home: 707-546-6760 > http://nitpicker.pbwiki.com/ > > > _______________________________________________ > lively-kernel mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.hpi.uni-potsdam.de/listinfo/lively-kernel > >
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