Comments welcome: designer look for squeak - User friendliness..

Karl Ramberg karl.ramberg at chello.se
Sat Mar 30 17:54:04 UTC 2002


Serg Koren wrote:
> 
> Agreed.  A more "modern/techy/stylish" look would open Squeak to new
> users more.
> 
> Another perceived problem (and somewhat mine), is that Squeak is a
> "developer's" toy in the sense it's meant for people interested in
> working ON Squeak, and not for those that want to USE Squeak.
> Everything about this list SCREAMS it...yes everyone is helpful to
> newbies, but the main goal of this list appears to be in improving
> Squeak itself, rather than using it to do real work on a day-to-day
> basis.
> 
> A real problem (again related to this list) is that to a newbie, Squeak
> is a moving target.  There are changesets, and fileins, and enhancements
> and so on released every day on this list and to corporate types this
> sounds like "Squeak is undone and unstable, why should I bet on
> something that is never done...  I want to make money, not spend time
> updating my software."  Yes there are websites and the Swikis, but this
> list is the most active "support" component, and as such it's often
> confusing and frustrating to newbies who are looking for help on how to
> do simple things and they have to wade through tons of emails (several
> hundred a day at times) when all they want is a simple answer to a
> simple/dumb problem they may have.
> 
> Squeak needs to move away from being a toy for developers, for testing
> their latest theory, and move into usability and "friendliness".  Squeak
> is like Linux; it keeps trying (eToys are great) but the core product is
> still too cumbersome to use for most people.
>
This is true, but it's also true about every single computer
system I have used. Squeak is the first system I have used
that try to bridge the gap between using (as in point, click, type)
and using (as in developing). Once I got over that hurdle
the whole thing made more sense, but I can also understand that
most people will not have time or interest to learn it this
thorough. 
 
> 
> Maybe a "beginner's" Squeak would be good...stripped of everything
> (sound, speech, web browser, etc etc etc) except the core language, a
> more user-friendly, high-tech skinned morphs, and a "beginner's" Squeak
> book...something on the order of "Learn Squeak in 12 Hours".

The image you get form squeakland.org is stripped down a bit I 
think. There are a few basic tutorials on that site, too.

> 
> Then allow them to grow at their own speed (rather than dumping the
> entire system on them and saying "Oh, it's easy to learn, just jump in
> the deep end...you'll get it in a year or so...") by plugging in
> modules/components, whatever you want to call them...

But people come to Squeak for different purposes, some to use it as
a swiki server, some to work on multi media, some to learn Smalltalk, 
some to play FreeCell. It's hard to anticipate the target audience.

Karl



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