Tag: Rich Internet Applications

Users don’t want rich

Posted by Neil – September 30, 2009

For many years now, software developers around the world have been releasing quicker and more capable software on an almost constant basis. Each year, we tend so see new releases of existing products that make the products better in every apparent way, shape and form, and we, the computing public, lap it up.

For instance, Microsoft Word is currently at it’s 11th(-ish) version and still going strong as one of, if not the, most successful word processing packages of all time.  Each year or two Microsoft bring out a new and improved version that adds more features and more capabilities to the average person’s arsenal.

Now, for a moment, have a think about the last time you used Word.  Assuming you’re not one of the 10% of people who “power-use” Word, see if you can name five features of Word that you use on a regular basis.

Formatting?  Tables?  Printing?  er….. Word Count?

Let’s for a moment consider Word, with each and every standard toolbar open:

word

There’s a lot there, and there’s a whole load of stuff in there that you’ve never even seen before. Now, think back to the last time you upgraded your installation of Word.  What was the reasoning behind it?  What was the reason that you (may of) reached into your pocket and forked out for the funky new Office installer?

Well, let’s take Word 2008 – the headline features there were the Ribbon UI, and support for Office XML formats… and that’s about it.  Which of those features made you upgrade? Word probably has more functionality than you need… in fact, waaay more functionality than you’ll ever need.  So, why don’t you just use WordPad which comes free and is pre-installed on Windows?  Or TextEdit on the Mac?

Now cast your mind across to the web applications that we, as developers, are creating every day for our clients, be it on a bespoke purely custom basis, or as a product that we roll out to a customer base.  I dare say, that somewhere in your company is a man who works in what some would call ‘Marketing’.  This person wants to sell the product out to as many people as possible, and he also wants all of the current user base to upgrade on a regular basis.  Therefore, you most likely have an army of developers creating new features here and there, and making the existing features more capable in every way you can in order to persuade the customer that WhizzBang Enterprises Widget-o-matic 2009 is the best-est thing since last years version (which is now obviously outdated, insecure, and prone to crashing).

Why do we, as software shops, do this?  Why do we insist on making our software more complex, and more difficult to use for our customers?

bob

Put yourselves in the shoes of your user (let’s call him Bob).  First of all, be aware that Bob is nothing like you.  Bob doesn’t use computers for the fun of it, he uses computers to get something else done, so that he can go home on time and get back to work on his new garden terrace.  Bob doesn’t really get computers, he doesn’t really get the web that much.  Sure he uses Facebook, and emails his chums, and even has his own website (which incidentally is just his twitter stream), but Bob’s interested in other things – Bob just wants to get his shit done and go home.

So, whats the major difference between you and Bob?  Well for starters, for Bob, his computer, and the software on it is a tool – nothing more, nothing less.  He uses his tools to write his documents, send them out to his clients, and ensure that he gets paid at the end of the day.  To Bob his computer is identical to the bag he uses to carry his lunch to work, a tool to achieve a task.

So, thinking about tasks – what do most people want?  Well, it’s simple really.  Simplicity.  People just want to go in, get exactly what they want done with the minimum of fuss, and move on.  Even us developers do it.  We don’t sit down in the morning and think “I’m going to sit down for the next eight hours and write some Ruby…”, we think “I’m going to sit down for the next eight hours, and get this project finished and out the door”.  Our tools are an ends to a means.

So, coming back to our software, why do we make it so complex? Why are we so obsessed with feature richness and whiz bang interactions – the vast majority of people couldn’t care less, they just want to get their work done with the minimum of fuss.

Let’s take a look at richness in applications (the aforementioned whiz-bang element). Recently, there has been a huge movement by Adobe and Microsoft to get developers into using rich platform technologies such as Flash and Silverlight.  Whilst this is all very well, have a quick think about how many applications you use on a day-to-day basis you would consider to be rich (and buzzword bingo favourite “an immersive experience”).  Personally, there’s only one (Balsamiq Mockups if you want to know).  For most, it’s a twitter client.

So, what does this say?  Well for me it’s a sign that while we developers love to see the demo apps that are coming out and what some people are knocking out, but at the end of the day it’s ultimately simplicity and straightforward-ness that we prefer – we just want to get our work done.

In essence, I guess we might be guilty of three things – one, overestimating the users motivation and involvement in using the wonderful creation that you’ve just put out there. Secondly, of overcomplicating what we’re making the users use purely for the marketing aspect, rather than making a genuniely good product, and thirdly, for not really eating our own dog food and actually using this rich applications that we keep telling everyone they need.

Overally, we, as developers, need to keep it focused and keep it simple.  Distractions are aplenty, and we developers are incredilby suspectible to them all which makes us more prone to not keeping it simple…

Daily Links #4

Posted by Neil – June 30, 2009

Working from home today, which is always a bit weird…


Talking to the old duffers

Posted by Neil – May 27, 2009

The other day, on my 31st birthday of all days, I can only have what can be described as a “stupid  bint” drive into the back of my Mini Cooper.  Fast forward a few days, and I find myself stood in the foyer of my local Enterprise Rent a Car whilst the Mini’s in getting some repairs done (whilst I endure the Kia Cee’d)

Whilst standing in the queue of other loaners I found myself stood next to a “Community” board, which from what I could see consisted of letters sent in by “happy” customers.  Most of these letters were praising the service they had received and how great the company was.

victor_meldrewNow, a couple of things crossed my mind at this point – firstly, who the hell writes these letters (aside from old people with time to burn), and secondly, why do they write them?

More…

Traveling Salesman should love Adobe AIR

Posted by Neil – May 27, 2009

portal-graphics-20_1156949ajpgRecently, I’ve been seeing much greater interest in web applications from the sorts of people that love living the dark dingy corners of your local Days Inn/Travelodge, the traveling salesman. Typically these people tend to be fairly behind the times in terms of tech as its not a core part of their day. Sure, they might well be up to speed on the latest on mid-sized executive cars, or what their mobile phone can do, but technology? Not unless it’s something their selling.

Now from what I understand, these guys typically carry around several items:  A laptop, a phone, some sample product, and loads of manuals and documentation about what they are selling.  They almost have a boot load of stuff that just gets hauled up and down the country.

This causes a number of problem, namely that documentation needs to be produced whenever something changes, the sales guys needs to read all this stuff to stay up to date, and the management have no real idea of how good their staff’s product knowledge is.  They only really understand the sales orders coming back.

Enter Adobe AIR stage left. More…

It’s Enterprise-y Sir…

Posted by Neil – May 23, 2009

One of the many discussions we’ve being having recently at Monochrome towers is that of the Enterprise space. Normally the commentary we have is that of:

“WTF does Enterprise mean?”

Generally, we come back to the same thing.  Big business likes to call itself “Enterprise” because it somehow makes what they’re talking about more important.  By saying you’re building an Enterprise application somehow makes it better, even though the requirements may be identical to that of a smaller non-enterprise company.

Now, let’s slide this back a bit and take a look at software.  There’s a whole raft of stuff out there in the software market that calls itself “Enterprise” with no real definition of what this actually means.  Usually, you’ll see the same thing, i.e. a couple of extra features, slightly better performance, and a MUCH higher price tag.  Just like the wedding market:

So, what do you actually get for your money?  Usually it’s not much, as you can’t really buy real enterprise level services off the shelf.

But this then raises the question – what are enterprise level services?

In my mind, these are the things that don’t necessarily some in the shrink-wrapped box.  Let’s, for a moment, take the example of Snap-on tools.  Whilst they aren’t normally referred to as an enterprise service, I believe they are a good example of one.  Snap-on, on a basic level, manufacture tools for the motor trade.  You go to them and buy one of their socket sets, or whatever else may offer.  Now, this is exactly what you can do at any auto-factor anywhere on the planet. However, Snap-on are more expensive.

So what makes Snap-on a good analogy for the enterprise?

Well, for a minute, put yourself in the shoes of the guy using the tools.  One day, your tool will fail. One day it will break, and you’ll need to either use a workaround, or down tools and try and get hold of a new one.  This could mean lost money, a trip down to the auto-factor’s again for something potentially out of stock, or something worse like an unhappy client.

This is where the enterprise support of Snap-on steps in and justifies it’s extra cost.  Your tool fails, and you’re stuck.  So you give your local Snap-on dealer a call (which are all mobile based), and he comes round and gives you a replacement tool free of charge.  You then carry on with your work and go home happy.

Therefore, in my eyes, Enterprise means that you are buying a service, not a price-tag.  You’re buying something that means you won’t lose out at any point, or that someone else will worry about keeping something functioning.  You’re basically paying an insurance policy against having to worry about anything.

This leads me to believe that we’re suffering from the effects of those f**kwits known as marketing departments who sit there spouting their mar-bollocks trying to peddle their crap.  Unfortunately to a marketer, sticking Enterprise on the name means they can charge five times as much as provide much the same thing.

So, next time you’re buying Enterprise, consider the price hike you’re being nailed with and have a serious think about what you’re actually getting for your money.

Flash is un-webby?

Posted by Neil – July 1, 2008

On my way home today I was listening, as always, to one of the many podcasts that I subscribe to.  In this particular instance, I was listening to podcast #11 of the stackoverflow.com podcast hosted by Jeff Attwood and Joel Spolsky.  The podcast follows the development of stackoverflow.com, but turns largely into a general chat about web technologies and their use.

What I was listening to specifically was a chat between the two answering a question from a listener asking about what they thought of Silverlight.  Generally what they were saying was correct (as I see it) except for one point.  Joel pointed out that he thought flash and silverlight weren’t great for apps online due to factors such as the inability to bookmark pages, copy and paste text etc etc.  He was advocating that web applications were best based in an AJAX interface, it any interaction was required.

Joel then went on to say that he did not believe that Flash or Silverlight would be adopted for online applications as they were distinctly “un-webby”, giving you more of a rectangle in a browser window that tried to be a desktop instead.  Both Joel and Jeff agreed that this would prevent mainstream adoption of Flash and Silverlight for online apps.

However, as you may have predicted,  I disagree with this.  The reason for this is down to one fundamental part of their argument.  For me, the web is a connected set of applications: browsers, email clients, ftp clients etc etc; all providing different services in different ways.  One new element to the party is that of internet-connected applications, which is exactly where I see flash and silverlight winning over anything else.  The problem isn’t the un-webbiness of the rectangle in the browser, the problem is that the browser is built to suit paradigms that are now several years old, and a bit behind the times.  For instance, when was the last time you wanted to create a bookmark in an application other than your browser?

I see tools such as Adobe’s AIR changing the web by quite a margin, dropping the browser back to a pure surfing device.  OK, you might have a very website orientated app (such as Google) which will always be best suited to AJAX and the browser, but others such as eBay make make more sense as a proper standalone internet-connected application (as the San Dimas development is trying to show).

For now though, we are definitely caught in a tricky place where technologies like AIR and WPF are very new and everyone is figuring out exactly what you can do with these new tools.  As experience from the development community increases, as well as interest from prospective clients, I believe the internet will start to change into something very different to the one you are familiar with today.