Browse Books

Reviewer: Len Bass

Do you think your computer is hard to use__?__ If so, you are not alone. Norman thinks so too, and in this book he explores the reasons why. Not satisfied with merely analyzing the problem, however, he proposes a possible solution and describes both instances of this solution and inhibitors to its being quickly adopted. Personal computers are hard to use for two reasons. One is the distinction between a general-purpose device that is good for everything but specific to nothing and a specialized device that has limited capabilities but can be designed to be superb at those capabilities. Today's personal computer is a general-purpose device that must support several different applications. Norman uses the analogy of a Swiss Army knife. If you are at home and need a screwdriver, you will use one specialized for turning screws. If you are camping and need a screwdriver, the one included with the Swiss Army knife is adequate. A Swiss Army knife is complicated, however. It has multiple blades, and the user is forever pulling out the wrong one for the particular purpose. Thus, because the personal computer performs so many functions, it is inherently complicated. A second reason why the personal computer is so hard to use derives from the business model of software vendors. Software vendors make money not from initial releases but from upgrades. Therefore, they must encourage customers to upgrade at regular intervals. The encouragement to upgrade has two facets: new features are added to the software product (in 1992, Microsoft Word had 311 commands, and by 1997 it had 1033), and files created by new versions of the product are incompatible with older versions. Thus, as soon as one customer for the new version attempts to share a document, the recipient must upgrade in order to read the document. What does the future hold__?__ The history of technology tells us that initially products are feature-rich and complicated. Eventually, the technology becomes good enough and the customer base shifts from “early adopters” to the “early majority” (to use terms from Geoffrey Moore's <__?__Pub Fmt italic>Crossing the chasm<__?__Pub Fmt /italic> [1]). These two trends result in hiding complications from the user and making the technology easier to use. For example, in the early part of this century the automobile was very complicated, whereas it is now much simpler from a user's perspective. Norman sees the future of computers in “information appliances.” These are devices that are specialized for particular purposes, such as digital cameras and address book/calendar computers. Such devices are beginning to appear commercially, and they are much in evidence at the gadget-oriented research conferences such as the Symposium on Wearable Computers and the recent Computer Supported Cooperative Work conference. If these devices are beginning to appear, what is the problem__?__ Norman identifies the problem as the sharing of information, which the current personal computer supports because all applications are on the same platform. Once we move to a world of information appliances, an infrastructure will have to be created to support the exchange of information. The creation of infrastructure is a different problem from the creation of the individual devices; it requires standards and coordination among multiple different groups. This book is a call to action for interested parties to coordinate and take steps to ensure the creation of adequate infrastructure in time to support the commercial emergence of information appliances. The one false note in the book is the chapter in which Norman discusses the design process. This is his area of expertise, and I suspect he could not resist including his latest ideas on design. The book, however, is not primarily a design book, and this chapter may not be of interest to the general reader. This is a book intended for those interested in the interplay between social, business, and technical factors. I would put it in a category with <__?__Pub Fmt italic>Crossing the chasm<__?__Pub Fmt /italic> by Moore and <__?__Pub Fmt italic>The evolution of useful things<__?__Pub Fmt /italic> by Henry Petroski [2]. Both of these claim readerships outside of technical audiences<__?__Pub Caret>. I expect this book also to achieve a readership that goes beyond the computer business. Both in its subject matter and in its style, it is worthy of being included with those books.