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A word to the over-eager

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    A word to the over-eager

    Many people carry a Swiss Army knife around in their pants pockets (or purse). A Swiss Army knife is a handy tool to have: it has several knife blades, a screwdriver, tweezers, toothpick, nail file, corkscrew, and perhaps a number of other things on it. For the everyday, small miscellaneous jobs where you need a simple, general purpose tool, it's just the thing.

    On the other hand, an experienced carpenter doesn't build a house using a Swiss Army knife. Instead, he has a toolbox chock full of specialized tools--a saw, a hammer, a screwdriver, a plane, and so on. And he knows exactly when and where to use each tool; you won't catch him hammering nails with the handle of his screwdriver.

    The Unix developers at Bell Labs were all professional programmers and trained computer scientists. They had found that while a one-size-fits-all program might appeal to a user because there's only one program to use, in practice such programs are
    a. difficult to write,

    b. difficult to maintain and debug, and

    c. difficult to extend to meet new situations.

    Instead, they felt that programs should be specialized tools. In short, each program "should do one thing well." No more and no less. Such programs are simpler to design, write, and get right--they only do one thing.

    Furthermore, they found that with the right machinery for hooking programs together, that the whole was greater than the sum of the parts. By combining several special purpose programs, you could accomplish a specific task that none of the programs was designed for, and accomplish it much more quickly and easily than if you had to write a special purpose program.
    From the GNU Coreutils manual
    Copyright (C) 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005
    Free Software Foundation, Inc.

    - - I, for one, would hate to see a good program founder in a sea of feature-itis. IrfanView is already a Swiss Army knife. It is already getting hard to find and remember all the bells and whistles. So let's think before asking for more! more! more! More is not necessarily better. All improvements are not additions, and all additions are not improvements. - -
    Its: Belongs to "It"
    It's: Shortened form of "It is"
    ---------------------
    Lose: Fail to keep
    Loose: Not tight

    ---------------------
    Plurals do not require apostrophes

    #2
    I second this very profoundly !

    I hate e.g. waveditors, with also a email-thing or a maker of jewelcases.
    I carefully select the apps on my set, to get a toolbox filled with dedicated programs. But I want quality, not programs that pretend to do everything needed.

    Often these bells and whistles are just quickly made to 'pimp' things up, so badly programmed too.
    I immediately wiped Acrobat reader's 50 MB off my set, when I found Foxit (2.5 MB), which does the same.

    If I discover that a prog is not capable of something, I first go searching for a small app, that can fullfill this task.
    Of course I check every new update of my software, but with some of them I stopped it, because the development went the wrong way into a bulky prog.

    I prefer to concentrate on what IV already has, and improve the quality.
    0.6180339887
    Rest In Peace, Sam!

    Comment


      #3
      I wholeheartedly agree. Remove some "features" and simplify the interface.
      _______________________
      Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
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        #4
        Ping.... Idea!

        Originally posted by Bhikkhu Pesala View Post
        I wholeheartedly agree. Remove some "features" and simplify the interface.
        I agree... on one hand theres too many features for some users....

        ...but on the other hand, It's got more than enough features to save me from opening photoshop unless it's absolutely necessary. Which is a god send should I be using a crappy machine.

        Perhaps the answer lies in Irfanview-lite?!?!?!

        Or building on the idea from the opening post, how about specialised versions of Irfanview? IE: Irfan-batch, Irfan-video, etc.

        Just throwing it out there...!
        Sites4Biz | Grimaldi - UK Heavy Metal | The Hell Hole

        Comment


          #5
          Irfanview-lite?

          Originally posted by Spambanjo View Post
          Irfanview-lite?
          NO! IrfanView is not that heavy. It is still much smaller than many other similar (but not as good) tools. It (the basic .exe) still can be run from a floppy (remember those?)

          If you don't want those other features, don't use those other features.
          I wish to die peacefully in my sleep, like my grandfather.
          Not like those passengers, in his car, when he drove over that cliff.

          Comment


            #6
            enough features to save me from opening photoshop unless it's absolutely necessary
            Exactly. IV is fast. I run a 'crappy' set on 600 MHz, so loading times has to be taken in consideration regarding the job.
            But apart from speed, it's also a matter of avoiding unnecessary wearing out of one's HD due to the bulky loading of things.
            Besides this, if one wants more bells and whistles, Irfan View is capable of handling external .8bf plugins as well.

            It (the basic .exe) still can be run from a floppy (remember those?)
            OT : I remember a floppy being 640 KB, I guess you're referring to a diskette of 1.4 MB

            IV lite is in some way a contradiction of course, especially compared to other apps, as ChuckE stated.

            But Antoine made me think.. What could be skipped for a 'bare' version ?
            Now the 4 groups of added plugins come into the picture.
            Because it may be so, that the exe-file still is quite small, but e.g. 'iv_formats.zip' is 4MB, and the other 3 are another 1.5 MB.
            I always refresh them all, with a new update of IV, but I know that these plugins contain lots of things which I will probably never use. Too exotic.
            So maybe a 'stripped' version of these plugins, with only the most obvious features, could create a package which one could call 'Lite'.
            0.6180339887
            Rest In Peace, Sam!

            Comment


              #7
              You can do your own stripping. I carry a very "Lite" version on my USB stick, along with an assortment of other basic tools. For home use, I keep all the plugins, even the ones I never use, just in case someone asks me to work with some odd item, and I have 8bf filters coming out of my ears and floating in my soup. The flexibility is in our own control.
              Its: Belongs to "It"
              It's: Shortened form of "It is"
              ---------------------
              Lose: Fail to keep
              Loose: Not tight

              ---------------------
              Plurals do not require apostrophes

              Comment


                #8
                Agreed. I was just wondering around.
                0.6180339887
                Rest In Peace, Sam!

                Comment


                  #9
                  Originally posted by Sam_Zen View Post
                  OT : I remember a floppy being 640 KB, I guess you're referring to a diskette of 1.4 MB
                  Actually I probably have been around much longer than you, for I remember when 8" floppies were just 80K or 100K, and then came the Apple (not the Mac) having the wow!-size of about 110k on any non-specific 5.25" , and later changing just chips to then have 143k. Even later, there was the 400k floppy used in Apples.

                  But in the ("IBM") PC world, floppy capacities being 180k, 360k, 720k, 1.44M, even 2.88M, even the old 8 sector disks were either 160k or 320k, but I never heard of 640k

                  So, of course I was talking about today's common (but dying) 3.5" 1.4MB floppy. I used to use a floppy (3.5" 1.4MB) with the i_view.exe file and run around to various PC to snapshot test setups in a lab. Placing the snap shots on the same floppy, since there was room to spare.
                  -----
                  But the whole point I was making was that IV, by itself, is already small enough, since it is very usable without all the plug-ins. If I were to request anything, I'd like to see where just the executable was available, and not inside a setup installation wrapper. Since the wrapper has all the additions of Google toolbar, etc selections. I don't blame Irfan making a few cents here and there, though. And if that's my penance for getting the great IrfanView tool, so be it.
                  I wish to die peacefully in my sleep, like my grandfather.
                  Not like those passengers, in his car, when he drove over that cliff.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    You're right. It was 720 KB instead of 640 KB.
                    0.6180339887
                    Rest In Peace, Sam!

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Slimfanview

                      Originally posted by ChuckE View Post
                      If you don't want those other features, don't use those other features.
                      My reply was based on the original post. He mentioned about new/occasional users who can't find what they need buried under heaps of features. I know it's not a "heavy" program in the traditional file size sense of the word, but it's not exactly low on functionality, and it's these tools that trip people up.

                      I think a lite version with just the basics like Resize, Rotate, Enhance color, etc for beginners would be a great idea. I think as well as slimming down the number of features, that maybe the settings could be based on a drop down menu... (ie High, Medium and Low quality JPG... or 100%, 60% and 40% compression as most would say!). This would make the process much simpler for beginners.

                      Most people, if faced with 10 features they don't instantly recognise, each with it's own pre-defined set-up options, they will usually give them all a quick try, to see what they do.

                      If you are faced with 100s of different features and options, and loads of settings per feature, just giving something a try can take much longer than necessary and can seem pretty daunting to a noob.
                      Sites4Biz | Grimaldi - UK Heavy Metal | The Hell Hole

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Originally posted by Spambanjo View Post
                        Most people, if faced with 10 features they don't instantly recognise, each with it's own pre-defined set-up options, they will usually give them all a quick try, to see what they do.

                        If you are faced with 100s of different features and options, and loads of settings per feature, just giving something a try can take much longer than necessary and can seem pretty daunting to a noob.
                        Coming from a computer teaching background, I believe that most people will NOT try the 10, or 5, or even two of the features they don't instantly recognize. Seems that most people want the absolute simplest tool or actions they think they know how to do. I have never worked that way, I like the bells and whistles, but I don't see all that many in IV. I'd hate to see the basic tools and features, already present, pared down.

                        I used to work in a big well known computer company, that designed their own computers, displays, keyboards and operating systems. On the keyboard was an <Again> key. That key was to do the exact same keyboard actions you just did (from the last mouse click), which was a VERY USEFUL function when we were editing a lot of documents. I'd see people manually do the same edits, and edits, and edits again, never using the <Again> key. I'd ask them, "why don't you just use the <Again> key?" and they'd say "the what?"
                        They never even saw the key that has been right on the keyboard, in front of them for the past 2 years! It was not a small key, either. People just don't want to experiment.

                        I just don't find IV all that complicated to use, for the simple things it can do. But it can get complicated for doing complicated things. But most people don't need to do that. So, I see the current IV as a two-level tool; simple to use for the simple things to do, and it goes upward from there.

                        As someone once said, "if you make something that is fool-proof, only fools will use it"
                        I wish to die peacefully in my sleep, like my grandfather.
                        Not like those passengers, in his car, when he drove over that cliff.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          I think that a little re-organization of some of the menus and of course the options ("Properties") dialog would help simple-minded newbs a lot. I wouldn't want any features removed either - I just think that some people get a little hyper in their suggestions for new features. Sometimes they overlook what can be done with what is already there. That is not hard to do when there is a lot. Adding more could add to the problems.

                          I have been teaching some lately, and I try very hard to see things from a perspective that I left behind years ago. Much of what I do is point to menus and say "click there and see what..."
                          Last edited by matera; 30.06.2007, 03:11 AM.
                          Its: Belongs to "It"
                          It's: Shortened form of "It is"
                          ---------------------
                          Lose: Fail to keep
                          Loose: Not tight

                          ---------------------
                          Plurals do not require apostrophes

                          Comment


                            #14
                            I agree with ChuckE about IV as a two-level tool; simple to use for the simple things to do, and it goes upward from there.
                            And I agree with matera about : "they overlook what can be done with what is already there".
                            And of course the Properties dialog needs a remake for a more logical survey. But that's already in a discussion.

                            But I also find it a healthy policy not to 'pamper' users too much. It's ok to offer easy common things, but if they demand
                            more quality or control over things, they have to realize that it's a 2-way game. They have to put extra effort in it too.
                            But because of that effort, it can give people insight, so they really learn how to control some function.
                            0.6180339887
                            Rest In Peace, Sam!

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Originally posted by Sam_Zen View Post
                              I hate e.g. waveditors, with also a email-thing or a maker of jewelcases.
                              I carefully select the apps on my set, to get a toolbox filled with dedicated programs. But I want quality, not programs that pretend to do everything needed.
                              I completely agree. But this makes me think why on earth is IrfanView messing with video and audio files, and even rendering textfiles to graphics?

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