[Sderby] What fun Linux is!!

[Stormbringer]

On Tue, 10 Aug 2004 12:44:54 +0100, Barry Woodward wrote:
> My thanks to Derek Huskisson for taking the time to reply. I should
> have been more specific.  I strongly object to the use of Jargon
> where it is not only unnecessary but downright frightening.  A
> newbie installing any OS should not have to guess an obscure
> meaning,  (BIOS is one of the worst offenders for this but, a
> newbie may not even realise the BIOS exists.).
>
> The newbie faced with an option to "install without ACPI "  can
> guess it's meaning, or cancel the installation and investigate the
> meaning, or ignore the menu option and pray.  Is it not time for
> the software developers to think about (and write for) their
> audiences?
>
>

(Disclaimer: This is just a personal opinion which carries no weight whatsoever and so can be happily ignored by anyone who doesn't share it :) )

I think the core problem is not so much jargon. Abbreviations like ACPI are considered acronyms rather than jargon. (Though I prefer the original definition of an acronym as being a series of letters that makes an actual word. Which is completely irrelevant to anything at all.)

The question is, would your average newbie, or many oldbies for that matter, actually know what the heck anyone was talking about if the full name was used every time instead of the abbreviation? Would they be any the wiser and able to make an informed decision if the use of acronyms was prohibited?

The problem still seems to be that computers are very complex machines with an extremely rapid development cycle. Yet they are marketed on the basis that they are little different to televisions. Plug in and play. An illusion happily fostered by Mr Gates and the computer manufacturers who pre-install his product, so that the average muppet can indeed take it out of the box and start downloading porn within 30 minutes.

They even color code the connectors, which shows as clearly as anything else, just how highly they rate the expertise of their customers.

But as soon as you get beyond a reliance on what the manufacturer thinks you should have in the box, and what Gates thinks you should click on the screen, you enter a scary world.

This isn't aimed at the original author of the thread, as I have no idea his degree of knowledge of computers. And I would agree to an extent that the use of techno-speak is often a rather thin mask for techno-elitism. But there is still the underlying fact that computers are extremely complex and there is a limit to which the acquisition of necessary knowledge can be removed from the end user without also removing their ability to choose.