based on another overheard user comment. treat the computer screen like it’s a telly and the keyboard/mouse like a big remote control. the screen gives you a view into ‘computer space’ – the user doesn’t identify what they see as “my computer” or “my files” or “my programs” .. it’s just “stuff in another ‘world’”.
obviously i need to think this out a bit more – just needed to make a note really.
just a few of thoughts .. how about this:
there should be file->delete in applications.
(i saw a user get confused because it wasn’t there.)
those who know me will be amused and faintly relieved to hear that i’ve finally given up on being a Land Rover owner having killed another one.
this one had a slightly fiery end as i attempted to get the LPG system working properly. i carefully followed the instructions given and twiddled the appropriate knob in the engine. engine stalls. engine can’t be re-started. re-adjusted knob. still can’t start but can still hear and smell gas escaping. eek!
managed to stop the gas smell by switching the system back to petrol but couldn’t be sure it wasn’t just reduced. clearly i was a bit ill at the time because my next trick was to wave a lighter at it. KIDS, DON’T DO THIS!! small fireball and fire in the air filter. no phone (sorry – no picture) and no fire extinguisher!
luckily that small fire went out after a minute or so. presumably it really was just burning off some residual gas. but again i couldn’t be sure so i ended up calling out the fire brigade on new years day. and they weren’t sure either. in the end we all agreed it was probably okay but i should stop fiddling.
this is more stress than i want to deal with. this morning i arranged for it to be scrapped. never again!
in response to hughsie’s post about “refresh cache” in PackageKit (but not in the reponse comments as i don’t have or want a livejournal account) here’s some name suggestions:
Suspend: “Pause computer” (would be better when we can have those zero-power LCD displays)
Hibernate: “Switch off” (possibly this shouldn’t be available at all – it should just happen automatically if the battery’s getting low. if there’s energy-usage issues about leaving systems paused then the hardware people should improve their suspend facilities. or this happens automatically after an idle timeout.)
Power off: “Log out and switch off” (we shouldn’t need this anymore)
Reboot: “Log out and restart computer” “Apply system updates” (that’s the only time this should be needed – the option shouldn’t be available otherwise)
Refresh cache: “Update software list now”
i know they’re a bit wordy and the changes to ’suspend’ and ‘hibernate’ rather depend on those functions (and their associated resume functions) really, really working properly! still,maybe it makes sense. annoyingly, it looks like, once again, Microsoft might have actually got a lot of this right in Vista.
