Computers should make our lives easier. Now and then, they turn out to do exactly the opposite. This is a list of seven things I believe computers could do completely without bothering us. For some of them solutions already exist. But these solutions did not become standard. I think they should.
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Saving
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Versioning
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Applying
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Connecting
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Compressing
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Encrypting
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Converting
Nearly every big app has a save button. Why? Why isn’t the application responsible to make sure that the current version of my document in memory is always in sync with the version on disk? We only believe saving is an important task because we’re used to malfunctions that simply shouldn’t happen.
I’m just typing this into WriteRoom, which doesn’t have a save button. And I really don’t miss it.
After reading #1 you might come up with an argument like: “What if I want to restore an old version of my document?” This is a good point. And using a save button to accomplish this is a hack that shouldn’t be necessary. Every good application can undo/redo your actions. And a really good application like Eclipse even gives you a good interface to restore older versions of your documents.
One reason why I love Mac OS is that it gets setting preferences right. In Windows after changing a configuration option I always wondered why the hell I have to click on an OK button. If I change the option, you can be pretty sure that I would like to see it changed immediately. I might change my mind after seeing the difference. But I’m certainly not going to change my mind while the mouse pointer moves from changing the option to an OK button. I’m about to write another paragraph about the importance of an “Apply” button, but I guess you got my point already.
The system preferences in Mac OS X all change options immediately. There are no OK buttons. And again it’s a button I don’t miss.
Ok, this one needs the right infrastructure. I’m looking forward to a world where network access is available everywhere and you don’t have to bother with configurations or settings. Your computer is just online whenever you want it to be. In fact, we already live in such a world with WiFi hotspots or mobile network access nearly everywhere.
There are already some applications that try to find the best connection alternative (Ethernet, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPRS, etc.) available. The problem today is that we have to define “best” in terms of either speed or cost.
When moving data from A to B, we can save a lot of bandwidth and therefore time using compression algorithms. Still, we deal with ZIPs, RARs, DMGs, etc. ourselves. We compress it before sending it, we decompress it after downloading it. When I send some file somewhere, you can be sure you’re doing nothing wrong if you automatically compress it using some loss-less compression algorithm the recipient can decompress.
Safari automatically decompresses downloaded ZIP files. Very handy.
This is very similar to compression in #5. Encryption will only become a widely used practice, if it becomes transparent.
The common operating systems all offer some functionality to transparently encrypt your data. But this is still not default. Again, performance can’t be an issue here. Talking about moving data again, messaging apps like Skype transparently encrypt your messages in the background by default.
Do you also hate it when you download music (legally, of course) and the downloaded file is encoded in a format your mobile player doesn’t understand? I perfectly understand that it’s neither possible to build a player that accepts all formats nor is it possible to make everyone use a single standard encoding format. But why not making the applications that download the file and that transfer it to the device agreeing on a format they both understand, and transparently convert it?
This crappy DRM stuff of course makes this even more complicated if not impossible. But we – the users – already knew in the beginning, that DRM and usability are pointing in two entirely different directions.
These seven examples show how transparency could make using our computers much simpler. Do you have additional ideas what should become transparent? Please leave a comment and let us know!