General > General Technical Chat
Your pet peeve, technical or otherwise.
james_s:
--- Quote from: SilverSolder on May 08, 2023, 12:46:52 pm ---I like older cars for exactly those reasons... cars with real knobs and buttons, with AM/FM radios, etc.! - I recently rented a 2023 car in the UK, everything was on touch screen and my passenger had to spend a long time figuring out how to control the heating/AC, and the radio. There is no way that I could have done that safely while driving.
The people that design the touchscreen systems for cars are the most inept user interface designers, they must have been selected specifically for their lack of skill and common sense - it cannot possibly happen at random! How is it possible to make something that only needs a couple of buttons so hard to use? It takes real talent to do that!
--- End quote ---
It's probably interns or young grads that don't drive. They've never spent enough time behind the wheel to understand the importance of being able to operate everything without taking your eyes off the road.
paulca:
--- Quote from: SilverSolder on May 09, 2023, 06:30:35 pm ---
--- Quote from: Zeyneb on May 09, 2023, 04:14:18 pm ---Today I experienced the general practice in my town is unable to provide me a referral letter to hospital per email. This was because their amazingly f*cked up ICT system is unable to email me when I leave the field for the mobile phone number empty. I do have a normal landline number which is actually Voip, but they can't accept that. But still, it is just a plain old email I want to receive.
I get f*cking angry it seems that everything requires a mobile phone nowadays.
--- End quote ---
Obviously the phone number is now a de facto, unregulated, ID number.
--- End quote ---
It's not unregulated. It's open season. In the UK you cannot get a simcard activated without a credit or debit card in the name of the person registered to the number. This is regulatory to try and prevent "Burner phones" being used by criminal gangs.
What it also means is that every mobile phone number has official documentation linking it to the legal (at least financially) identity of the person whom it is registered to.
It is also a brilliant seed search for social engineering or hacking an invididual and can often yield quite a lot of information about a person, from their facebook to their linked in.
The last 4 digits of your phone number are also used in many authentication protocols.
So it has significantly high value as a piece of PII you really should look after it and consider who gets it.
As an asides rant, peeve. Work. Work asking for your personal mobile number. Customers asking for your mobile number! The last time this happened I completely blank ignored the request. They followed up with an email which contained a table of invidividuals, the name, phone numbers, timezones, "place of work", personal email addresses.
"THIS! THIS! Is why you cannot have my phone number you fucking imbeciles! You work in a fucking bank I should report you all to the securtity officer, start an investigation into where else my PII has gone under GDPR AND file for damages for the leakage of personal information!"
I didn't hit send. I just raised it directly with my HR department as a "proxy" complaint.
paulca:
--- Quote from: james_s on May 09, 2023, 11:02:58 pm ---
--- Quote from: SilverSolder on May 08, 2023, 12:46:52 pm ---I like older cars for exactly those reasons... cars with real knobs and buttons, with AM/FM radios, etc.! - I recently rented a 2023 car in the UK, everything was on touch screen and my passenger had to spend a long time figuring out how to control the heating/AC, and the radio. There is no way that I could have done that safely while driving.
The people that design the touchscreen systems for cars are the most inept user interface designers, they must have been selected specifically for their lack of skill and common sense - it cannot possibly happen at random! How is it possible to make something that only needs a couple of buttons so hard to use? It takes real talent to do that!
--- End quote ---
It's probably interns or young grads that don't drive. They've never spent enough time behind the wheel to understand the importance of being able to operate everything without taking your eyes off the road.
--- End quote ---
I have nightmares still about being followed in traffic by "young grads". Constantly looking in the mirror to see the top of their head as it's down in their lap. As traffic moves forward, you proceed forward, a 20 yard gap builds behind. Suddenly the young'un looks up, looks aggrivated at the distraction from social media and accelerates towards you.... then it's the top of the head again while they approach..... closer... closer.... top of the head... closer... closer.... I'm reaching for the horn now... finally they look up and slam the brakes on, stop and IMMEDIATELY it's "top of the head again".
One day I got so stressed after this happened 10 times in a row, I was so close to getting out and going and having a chat with the person face to face about it. Probably resulting in their phone finding itself in the fast lane under a lorry.
Instead, I took the next turn and found another way home.
RJSV:
My niece, in her 40's would likely respond positively, to complaints about new technology, and about 'social media', and is often at the center, when somebody needs help with, for example, signing up to use UBER ride sharing. But my attitude is different (grumpy), and I expect more than "just figure it out".
So, UBER or Lyft are just examples, but the PET PEEVE is concerned with the instructability issue, that also involves various KEYBOARD short-cuts and effectively no access to clear instructions. She would likely shrug it off, saying " Yeah I guess". Now I suppose maybe it's the expectation that differs, between generations...
Pressing the cellphone rt. hand side 'square thingy' and maybe just a split-second too long...and the phone goes into 'Collections: Add to collection'. What the hell does that mean ? (Rhetorical: Don't answer that). It's a smartphone feature, I get that, and a younger generation will try it and find out what that particular 'nuance' has in store for user.
A newer thing, DRAG across the phone keyboard, and you've got a 'trail' staring at you, on the screen. Yeah I know somebody could, randomly, tell me what that does...and then 'scold' me for being so backwards as to question; "What does squiggle squiggle tap squiggle do, on a Tuesday, exactly ?".
So, I'm trapped, somewhat. I've mentioned before, (several times), having purchased 'Android for Dummies' ...that dang book is somewhere in the room now. But why can't Google (choak) put out explanation, when introducing 'Squiggle squiggle tap, tap will get you, when tap is 330 milliseconds, will get you to airport reservations'. That way (I) can decide.
My phone, at 3 years old, is now getting system message:
'Server not supported' ...
I thought there were updates, downloaded. But, again, where do I go for 'update ANDROID' action?
But cheaper phone once per year ?
PlainName:
Graphics and CAD programs that treat the mouse wheel as vertical scroll.
It's dumb. It's a 1D control but there is a 2D screen to move, so what if you want to pan horizontally? The solution appears to be pressing a key as well, but now you have some movement needing a magic key and some not, and what if you really wanted to go diagonally?
The solution should be obvious: make the mouse wheel zoom in and out. With that, you can zoom and pan to wherever you want, all without any magic keys or anything, just scroll the wheel. If you need the page-analog scroll, you can add the ctrl key for vertical, shift for horizontal. That (needing a key whichever way it goes) makes more sense than sometimes needing one, and the most used option (zoom) never needs one.
Some packages let you configure the mouse wheel to however you want. I happened to try the latest Inkscape last night since someone pointed out how grown up it had got, and that doesn't let you do anything at all. You'll fart around pressing a key when you shouldn't, not when you should, moving off the bottom of the page when you meant to zoom in, and you'll bloody like it. Inkscape doesn't need to feat me using it in the near future.
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