MathGroup Archive 1997

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Re: Useful Dumb User Questions

  • To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
  • Subject: [mg9047] Re: [mg8988] Useful Dumb User Questions
  • From: Mark Evans <evans at gte.net>
  • Date: Thu, 9 Oct 1997 01:42:26 -0400
  • Organization: None
  • Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com

Hi Dave,

Thanks for responding.  I was talking about the newsgroup, not Wolfram
Research.  I've already received one response that was exactly the kind
of stuff I remonstrated against; thus the newsgroup.  As for WRI, I
commend the company for its amazing recent efforts toward more intuitive
interfaces.

I just think that once a person learns something, like driving a car for
instance, it can become altogether too easy to forget the initial
difficulties.  When one then sees a novice going through the same
difficulties, one can grow impatient. 

The point I tried to make was that ease-of-use should always be a
primary consideration when the feature set is so enormous.  Otherwise it
is too easy to get lost in the woods, as so many of my coworkers have
done in trying to use Mathematica.  In light of this fact, I suggested
that novice user questions might hold important clues about how to make
the product easier to use.  I don't have specifics to offer, just a
general suggestion that this may be the case.

Best regards,

Mark




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