Principles for User-Interface Design

[Alex Tweedly]

Judy Perry wrote:

>Al:
>
>It sux bigtime!!!
>
>I remember once I was teaching the "how to turn your computer on" class on
>the PC platform and some CS major decided it would be cute to reprogram
>the left-right mouse buttons to their opposite.
>
>I can't begin to tell you how much fun that was.  Happened periodically
>that term.
>  
>
I know what you mean.
I used to work on a CAD graphics editing program. Some bright spark 
thought it would be funny to write a program that would roam around the 
network until it found a machine running the program, take over the 
whole screen, find where the buttons were, and then program it such that 
(sometimes) when you tried to click on a button, the button would 
"squirt" out from under the mouse, and scoot across the screen away from 
you .... slowing down a bit until the cursor got near when it would 
speed up again and go in a different direction.

That was a big fad for a month or two, but then it became "old hat"; so 
next was the "melting screen" problem. The windows (esp near the top of 
the screen) would start to slowly "melt" - the borders would droop 
slightly, drips would form on the bottom corners, then the interiors 
would randomly and unevenly slide down, looking just like the windows 
had been painted on and the paint was running.

Then there was the "paratrooper" - he'd drop down from the top of the 
screen, "land" on the bottom, then march off to the right - pushing in 
front of him any windows he found low enough on the screen.

That was the week we disconnected the customer demonstration rooms from 
the development part of the network ....


-- 
Alex Tweedly       http://www.tweedly.net



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