Re: New COMMON Conference

I don't get the impression at all that Paul is saying green-screen is
intrinsically better than GUI in general. I think he's saying that in
his particular circumstance, not only does green-screen serve their
needs very well, but the *culture* there is not really subject to the
shiny-and-new-is-better syndrome. In the kind of environment he's
talking about, a GUI (even a mouseless one) might be *perceived* as
fiddly and unreliable, regardless of whether it actually is. I'm sure
we all know (or maybe are!) people who would rather use a thick, heavy
hand tool than a space-age tool that *can be physically proven to be
stronger* yet is just too light and delicate-looking.

I think some of the other example environments (airport ticket
counter, car rental place), while very comfortable with green-screen
now, could more easily be won over by *well-designed* GUIs. (Believe
me, I know that not all GUIs are good! Even our glitz-obsessed
marketing department has found some GUIs to be worse than our green
screens.)

As for the field-exit key: I understand that people who cut their
teeth on green-screen find this indispensable. Hard-core users of the
Unix editor vi navigate with the h, j, k, and l keys (and don't want
to have anything to do with the arrow keys let alone a mouse!). But
it just has no relevance in a UI that is designed and built from the
ground up to be run in a browser or other graphical environment.
(Again, not saying this will necessarily be the best interface for
everyone, but *if* you're going to build a new interface, the chances
you will need or even want a field-exit key are vanishingly small.)

John