Software

["Pete St. Onge" <pstong1@po-box.mcgill.ca>]

Lots of food for thought in Bob's last email, and a lot of
excellent points are made. First, what EXACTLY is our goal? Seems to me
we want to find out what the mainstream user would need in order to
consider the use of linux as their primary operating system...

"In order for an operating system to be ready for the mass market it
must have several attributes:

- have lots of applications 
- be relatively easy to install 
- have lots of applications 
- be relatively easy to maintain 
- have lots of applications 
- be relatively easy to use 
- have lots of applications 
- not crash (much) 
- have lots of applications 
- be economical 
- have lots of applications 

But you can eliminate all of these considerations in today's mass market
if only one thing is true:

- You have lots of applications.

After all, there would not be 170,000,000 DOS systems in the world if
any of the others had to be true." (taken from the Commercial HOWTO,
maintained by Martin Michlmayr, Jan 1998)

     We already know linux has a lot of applications, which brings up
the question of what application types are needed by mainstream users.
We have the broad categories currently on the Alternative page, and
these can easily be transfered to the main survey page.
     Then: what features must these applications have for the user to
want to use them; this is to some extent answered by the fact that a
user wouldn't want a spreadsheet to do word processing or a word
processor to set up a database (mind you, I've seen it done. Ugh!).

-Input/Output (of various types, including import/export of formats);
 2-3 questions like 'being able to use my existing files with these
 applications,' 'being able to use the files I create with this
 software with existing applications,'etc.
-Functions ... what makes one app better than another? 'Better' in
 this case would be subjective, of course, but an implicit bias
 towards mainstream users would be appropriate. This has the potential
 to be the largest part of the survey.
-Interface features (X-based or GUI versus text based) 2-3 questions?
 How important is WYSIWYG, shortcutting common tasks, etc.

[Once a user fills out the survey, an email could be sent to them
listing apps and associated sites as examples of the software available
for a given category - that could be a way to expose the user to all of
the software out there]

     One last question comes up: On one hand, the more we know about the
user's preferences the better, but this could get terribly long ...
where do we stop? This has been my hesitation with the software section
of the survey, as one could ask no end of questions to really get at
what the advanced users want. Then again, are we really going after just
the advanced users? Probably not (I mean, we want them to try linux as
well, but we have to worry about them less as once they are comfortable
with linux they will likely delve into the apps maps to find what they
really need.
     Seems to me what also might be a good idea is some way of easing
the transition to linux, perhaps as a document that the user would see
when they first install linux, giving a good explanation of the linux
approach and philosophy, where to find information, and where to find
applications, etc. 

     Cheers,

     Pete

-- 
Pete St. Onge - McGill U.  Limnology - Fun with Ropes & Buckets
pete@seul.org                  http://wwp.mirabilis.com/4322052
---------------------------------------------------------------
SEUL Expert Group - Linux for All!          http://www.seul.org
Programming For Science Page        http://www.trentu.ca/~erpds