unity-design team mailing list archive

[Martin Owens <doctormo@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed, 2012-02-08 at 12:39 +0000, Mark Shuttleworth wrote:
> But is it worth it? Saying no to options is an important discipline
> if 
> you want to contribute here. Saying yes always is an easy route to 
> failure. For a start, if we said that the total number of options had
> to 
> stay the same or decrease over time, which two options would you
> remove 
> in order to gain *this* one? 

Your rationale email was great and I completely agree with the
conclusion to remove the dodge option and strip out the code to keep it
lean.

But; the total number of options shouldn't fall to zero on principle.
That's an arbitrary rule which is a stand in for some more sensible
considerations. It'd be better to think of those considerations first
and not be burdened by a rule that could very quickly end up becoming
officious leading eventually to arbitrary callousness in many hundreds
of years. Ubuntu's Vogon rule.

I prefer software which is as simple as possible and grows with it's
user's use in increasingly complex computer behaviors. It's not easy
making software which is able to effectively hide dangerous and
pointless options from users that don't need them and provide advanced
users with escalating complexity in options that grow with the user's
demands.

Just because it's a hard design problem, shouldn't mean Ubuntu's design
team should avoid trying to solve them.

Best Regards, Martin