Re: [tlug] Linux-compatible Mac laptop?

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

Jonathan Q writes:

 > But, as S. Turnbull notes in a later post, if you, the application
 > developer, think your users need more than one button, Apple says
 > you're wrong. OTOH they do enable multi-button functionality, so maybe
 > they are simultaneously telling you you're wrong and tacitly admitting
 > that they are :p

I think it's really important not to think in terms of right and wrong
here, but good and bad design.  The user is never *wrong*, although
sometimes he is ineducable. ;-)  A designer *can* be wrong, though, if
she makes life difficult for everybody.  It's *good* HI design to
discipline application designers to KISS, because they won't (do you
need me to remove all your editors and scripting languages that aren't
XEmacs[1] to make the point? ;-)  It's also *good* HI design to allow
power users to customize their environments.  Apple gives both, and
chooses the right precedence.

Cf. Zawinski on web design.  Man, can that guy vituperate! :-)

Footnotes: 
[1]  It is actually feasible to have /usr/bin/xemacs as both the only
line in /etc/shells and as the target of /usr/bin/x-window-manager.  I
won't say the experience will please you, though. ;-)