Bazaar Explorer prototype showing suggested Bazaar menu for IDEs

[Russel Winder]

Ben,

On Wed, 2009-06-03 at 17:02 +1000, Ben Finney wrote:
> Russel Winder <russel.winder at concertant.com> writes:
> 
> > I am of the firm opinion (backed by anecdotal evidence only though)
> > that a GUI interface is necessary for there to be any widespread take
> > up of a technology. Also, sadly, there has to be a Windows GUI for
> > there to be any take up at all.
> 
> You must mean something different by one or more of “technology”,
> “widespread”, or “take up” from what I would expect those terms to
> mean. Plenty of technologies without Windows GUI have long had
> widespread take-up: GNU+Linux, Apache, BIND, even Git.

Where there is no alternative, there is space for a new technology.
Linux competes with Windows and Unix/AIX/Solaris/etc. so is a different
issue.  It is beginning to be used widely because it is good,
dependable, and not Windows.

Apache grew because the standard alternative at the time had serious
problems.

Was there ever a time when BIND wasn't the standard?

Git actually is an interesting comparison.  Many people stated clearly
that Git was too Linux focused, and couldn't be built on native Windows.
As part of Git's development, ensuring easy build and work on Windows
was undertaken because it had to be to gain real traction.  For me and
many others git is only usable when gitk is employed -- GUI tools are
needed to make sense of the vast array of critical options to each of
the vast array of commands.  I use Git, and like it in many ways, I just
prefer Bazaar.

The overall point here is that we can exclude for the purposes of this
argument (is it the 5min argument or the full half hour :-) here
anything that isn't intended as a cross-platform application -- so I am
indeed working with a restricted domain of discourse.

> What is it you're actually meaning with the above opinion?

If an application is going to get used by a large number of people as a
core tool, it has to be usable -- I mean usable here in the
human--computer interaction (HCI) sense, i.e. when usability studies are
completed, the application gets a good result.

Usability is a task-dependent thing:  you cannot make any measure of
usability without dealing with all the tasks the user undertakes,
usually covered by scenarios and use cases.  Usability is also a
user-dependent thing:  you cannot measure usability without recognizing
the knowledge, skills, background, aims and goals of the user.  Moreover
usability is a context dependent thing:  the physical and computer
resources available give a context to the actions being undertaken.

Command lines are more usable than GUIs for some users, for some tasks,
in some contexts.  However the majority of situations mean that GUIs are
more usable.  It is difficult to justify in detail sweeping
generalizations, but basically GUIs are more likely to be usable because
of the strong feedback loops.

On the expectations side:  people in general have over the years been
indoctrinated that GUIs are the only way forward.  Fortunately, command
line is making a come back, but only in certain circumstances.
Basically people now expect GUIs -- even programmers, many of whom
cannot work unless they are plugged in to an IDE.

So to gain real traction, Bazaar needs a good GUI.  We have lots of bits
that work well and do the things that are needed.  What is missing is
the coordinating GUI.  Olive-GTK didn't quite cut it. Eclipse, NetBeans
and IntelliJ IDEA have special needs.  Bazaar Explorer may do the
business.

Where a system is truly cross-platform then take up is by need and
fashion independent of operating system.  But context is important.

For good or ill most people use Windows.  Indeed most programmers use
Windows.  I bet most programmers use Visual Studio, though Eclipse is
probably widely used.  So if we restrict ourselves to Bazaar being used
by programmers (which is a bad idea as I still believe non-programmer
use is critically important) use on Windows with Visual Studio or
Eclipse is the majority use/context.

So to get to the main market you need a GUI tool that fits comfortably
in that context.  So integration with Windows, Explorer, Eclipse is
essential.  It's all about numbers and percentages.

But it isn't an absolute, things have to measured against the
competition.  In this case Git and Mercurial.  If those systems play the
Windows/GUI game they will beat Bazaar no matter how good Bazaar is.

I have waffled on long enough, hopefully you see my case.

-- 
Russel.
=============================================================================
Dr Russel Winder      Partner
                                            xmpp: russel at russel.org.uk
Concertant LLP        t: +44 20 7585 2200, +44 20 7193 9203
41 Buckmaster Road,   f: +44 8700 516 084   voip: sip:russel.winder at ekiga.net
London SW11 1EN, UK   m: +44 7770 465 077   skype: russel_winder
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